Bob Dylan recently announced that the latest installment of his Bootleg Series, Fragments Time Out of Mind Sessions (1996-1997): The Bootleg Series Vol. 17, is going to release on January 27th. The Box Set will include five CD/10LP collection with a remixed edition of Time Out of Mind (by Michael H. Brauer), two discs of outtakes and alternate takes, a bonus disc that includes more outtake and alternate recordings, and a disc of live performances from 1998-2001. It is currently available for preorder.
Steven Hyden writes in the set’s liner notes, “The album itself has been remixed to sound more like how the songs came across when the musicians originally played them in the room, without the effects and processing that [original producer Daniel] Lanois applied later, It’s not meant to replace the Time Out of Mind that won all of those Grammys a quarter-century ago; it’s a reimagining, an alternate view of a great work of art. If the original album remains mythic and enigmatic, this Time Out of Mind puts you in close proximity to the players.”
Time Out of Mind is usually talked about as a comeback album for Dylan who prior to its release on September 30th, 1997 hadn’t released any original material since 1990’s Under the Red Sky. Back in 1999 Dylan was quoted in saying that, “The high priority is technology now, It’s not the artist or the art. It’s the technology that is coming through. That’s what makes Time Out of Mind … it doesn’t take itself seriously, but then again, the sound is very significant to that record. If that record was made more haphazardly, it wouldn’t have sounded that way. It wouldn’t have had the impact that it did. The guys that helped me make it went out of their way to make a record that sounds like a record played on a record player. There wasn’t any wasted effort on Time Out of Mind, and I don’t think there will be on any more of my records.”
The album was able to win three Grammy Awards, including Album of the Year, and also was able to reach number ten on the Billboard 200.
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