Bridgeport, CT (30-Sep-07)

Everything takes a while to warm up in what is generally a representative display of the last leg of the 2007 tour. When the filmer finally finds his shots, and Bob his voice, we get to see and hear excellent versions of “Nettie Moore,” “When the Deal Goes Down” and “Rollin and Tumblin,” as well as decent revisits to “Highway 61” and “Til I Fell In Love With You.” Things start with a humorless “Leopard Skin Pill Box Hat” accompanied by stills until the instrumental preceding the final verse. Bob hams it up with his guitar by lifting his knee higher than necessary when tapping time to an “It Ain’t Me Babe” that has completely lost the fire it had on the European leg of the tour. Filmer gets a nice shot of Bob from the waist up that is occasionally blocked. “I’ll Be Your Baby Tonight” suffers from the same softly growled recitation, which continues into “You’re a Big Girl Now,” on which Bob finds a melody only for the sixth line of each verse. The song begins nicely as Bob plays harmonica and keyboard simultaneously, and the sparse arrangement is maintained throughout, giving Bob plenty of room to croon, an advantage of which he refuses to take advantage, limiting his vocal tone to the strep throat cry of a drunken pirate relieved by the occasional whine of sinusitis.

The first authentic sign of life comes with “Rollin’ and Tumblin” and continues with “Workingman’s blues,” although the lyrics on the latter are lost in Bob’s sock-down-the-throat vocals. Filmer gets a great shot of Dennie Freeman on the former, in which he looks like William Burroughs, a shot he will return to several times throughout the show. Other nice compositions include Bob on the keyboards with Donnie Herron behind him on the steel, and a nice high angle shot of George Recile on the drums. Sometimes the maneuvering between these shots is clumsy, but there are none of it is unwatchable, and the stills that cover the gaps are in keeping with the look of the whole show.

Bob takes great pleasure in his phrasing on the final two verses of “Til I Fell In Love With You” and hits a melodic stride with “When the Deal Goes Down.” The roar of the crowd is expectedly present on “Spirit on the Water,” a song that I judge by how well he sings the “ghost” line. They also show their assent to some key lines in “Nettie Moore.” The editor of this upgraded version, who also did a fine job with the fills, adds a cheesy but humorous bit to “Highway 62” with a bolt of lighting hitting Bob in the head during the opening lines. Although he has been singing it at nearly every show for several years, “Summer Days” is still full of life, while “Thunder on the Mountain,” in many ways a better song, still hasn’t ignited in concert. “I Shall Be Released” has us waiting for Elvis Costello to show up, but he doesn’t, and the show ends with more unnecessary proof that “Like a Rolling Stone” will never be the song it used to be.

Six months on the road has taken its toll on Bob, but he still manages to renew himself with inexhaustible musical inventiveness that will keep him going long after he has only only note left to sing. This last month on the road found him compensating for his melodic limitations with a percussive approach that has sparked up even the old warhorses like “Highway 61,” by splitting each line in two, and dividing them with a pause of varying length that allows him to compress or extend each half-phrase to his spontaneous desire.