LATEST ADDITIONS

Long lost and once thought destroyed, Sundazed Records’ tape- sleuth-in-chief Bob Irwin recently located the original mono master tape of The Mama’s and the Papas 1966 debut album If You Can Believe Your Eyes and Ears (Dunhill D50006).

Bootlegs, outtakes and unreleased material mostly interests completists, scholars and obsessive fans. Usually, the quality and significance declines with each new archival release, but not with Bob Dylan.

It's easy to understand why some youngsters don't get Dylan. Everybody sings like him now but no one did back then and at first only a few could take the unadorned voice (referencing the Dylan on these old recordings, not the current croaker).

Still, some might find the new records too aggressive. I’m not in that group, but it sounds as if Mr. Grossinger mastered the original LPs, manipulating the tonal balance as he saw fit, whereas it sounds as if the GZ folks just took the files they were sent and cut. I’m just surmising that. It could be the ‘soft’ lacquer versus the ‘hard’ copper.