Bob Dylan - Blood on the Tracks - Acoustic Version (1974)

Bob Dylan's 1975 album "Blood on the Tracks" is an undisputed classic. Acclaimedmusic.net, which aggregates music reviews, currently lists it at the 22nd best album of all time.

The songs on the released version are mostly done with a band. For instance, six out of the ten songs have drums on them, and eight of them has bass. But when Dylan first began recording the album in 1974, he planned to put out a version that was just his voice, acoustic guitar, and harmonica. My idea here is to make the best acoustic version I could, using those earlier takes, with the exact same song order as the released album version.

This was a very easy task to do, thanks to the six disc 2018 box set "The Bootleg Series, Volume 14: More Blood, More Tracks." Not only does that include every take I could want to use, there was a single disc version, as well as a slightly different "sampler" version that generally featured the best versions. So nearly every version I selected here came from the single disc version and/or the sampler version.

The one exception to that is the version of "Up to Me." That and "Call Letter Blues" are kind of bonus tracks added to the end, since they're the only two original songs recorded for the album but not released on it. ("Call Letter Blues" basically has the same melody as "Meet Me in the Morning," but has totally different lyrics.) The version of "Up to Me" had the sound of buttons on Dylan's jacket repeatedly banging against his guitar, which I find annoying. I used a take that has almost none of that. Frankly, I'm puzzled why they chose the button clacking version as one of the best, but whatever.

Dylan did record one more song during these sessions: the cover version "Spanish Is the Loving Tongue." I've revised the mid-1970s stray tracks album "Abandoned Love" a bit, and I've put that song there.

Although "Blood on the Tracks" was released in early 1975, it could have easily been released in late 1974, so that's why I have 1974 in the headline. These recording sessions were all done in September 1974.  

Note that these versions aren't simply acoustic versions of the ones on the final released album. Many of them have drastically different lyrics, and often the feel of the songs are different. For instance, the album version of "Idiot Wind" has a lot of anger on it, whereas this version is more contemplative. Both are excellent, but in different ways.

This album is 56 minutes long without the two extra songs at the end. In comparison, the released 1975 version is 52 minutes long. If you add those two extra songs, it's an hour and five minutes long.

01 Tangled Up in Blue (Bob Dylan)
02 Simple Twist of Fate (Bob Dylan)
03 You're a Big Girl Now (Bob Dylan)
04 Idiot Wind (Bob Dylan)
05 You're Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go (Bob Dylan)
06 Meet Me in the Morning (Bob Dylan)
07 Lily, Rosemary and the Jack of Hearts (Bob Dylan)
08 If You See Her, Say Hello (Bob Dylan)
09 Shelter from the Storm (Bob Dylan)
10 Buckets of Rain (Bob Dylan)
11 Up to Me (Bob Dylan)
12 Call Letter Blues (Bob Dylan)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15109382/BobD_1974d_BloodontheTrcksAcoustic_atse.zip.html

The cover art uses a photo taken during the "Blood on the Tracks" recording sessions. I used the exact same font and style as the official album for the text.