枯葉

Autumn Leaves

LAタイムズにThe secret Sinatra past of Bob Dylan's new albumというちょっとマニアックな記事がある。記事を書いたGustavo Turnerは、記事を掲載したのちに、あの、ディランの本棚、スコット・ワーマスに記事の感想をツイッターでたずねた。

スコットは、ディランが「アンカヴァー」と言ったのは、多くのロックンローラーにとってそれは未だにネガティヴな響きがあるからだと前置きして
（別の一例としてジョーン・ジェットのインタヴューも示している↓）

I don't really think of them as cover songs. Cover songs are usually considered hit songs that you redo. That would be my definition of a cover song. When you redo a song that wasn't a hit, or a song that people really don't know, it's just doing a song that was recorded by someone before you. I'm not hung up on me writing everything. I want the best songs on the record regardless of who wrote them. I've got plenty of songs on this record. (Joan Jett)

ディランの「枯葉」（主にイントロ）についてこんな風に言ってる。

「アメリカのTVドラマ、マッドメンのテーマ、そのイントロにサンプリングされて使われているイノック・ライトの枯葉の組み替え型だと言える」

Enoch Light - Autumn Leaves

「そしてロジャー・ウィリアムズの枯葉も外せない。イノック・ライトの枯葉に影響を与えた」

Roger Williams - Autumn Leaves

「ロジャー・ウィリアムズの繰り返しをイノック・ライトの枯葉の中に聞くことが出来る、そのイノック・ライトのイントロをサンプリングしたのが、マッドメンのテーマA Beautiful Mine」

A Beautiful Mine

Autumn Leaves

スコットがツイッターで答えた枯葉の部分をGustavo Turnerは記事に加筆している。実際にスコットが言う通りなのかは定かでは無いが、ただそうしたイージーリスニングを意識していた可能性は高いように思う。ここで引用だのサンプリングだのの話をする気は全くないが（笑）この段階ですでにごちゃごちゃ感は否めない。ディランが言ってた「カヴァーされすぎた」とは、こういう事なのかもしれない。今回のアルバムは歌詞を簡単に触れない分、アレンジなどに色々とあるかもしれないが、一方で、ディラノロウイルス、ちゃうわディラノロジストが新たな解説を加えるだろうと、皮肉たっぷりに言う人もいる。
Bob Dylan: Shadows in the Night by Jesse Jarnow (relix)
この人は典型的なアンチディランか（笑）。まぁ個人的にはこういうのは面白いくて好みだ。嫌な物は嫌だと言ってくれた方がいい

それにしても、実際アメリカで感じるものと日本とでは、もう、どうしようもないのだろうなと絶望に近いものをいつも感じる。ビューティフル・マインのイントロからイノック・ライトの枯葉…アメリカ人なら「ああ、それそれ」的に普通な感じなんだろうか…。

そんなShadows In The Night…心の何処かでこんなアルバムを待っていたような気がする。それはスタンダードとかシナトラとかそういう意味ででは無く…今回はたまたまこうした形で実現したに過ぎないのだが、しかし一方で逆にそれが良かったのかもしれないとも思う。が、今はまだよくわからない。ただこのアルバムは、グラミークラスの圧倒的自信作だとだけは言える。わたくしのグラミー的中率は100％だ。未だかつて外した事は無い。シングルかアルバムかジャンルもわからないが…因みに100％の中身は、1勝0敗だ（笑）。1年後を楽しみに…あぁマッドメンにはディランの曲も使われている。

▼Releases From Bob Dylan and Diana Krall（NYT）
※トリヴィア

Mia Farrow and Frank Sinatra at Truman Capote's 1966 Black and White Ball

Covering romantic pop songs once sung by Sinatra, he finds a new way into rock history (RS)

Shadows in the Night by Michele Bruttomesso

EU方面のショップで配布しているシルクスクリーン

販促ポスター

dylan.comの限定シルクスクリーン

各レヴューの反応が良いせいか、SMEはアルバムリリースに併せて早々にリリースを出してきた。

Bob Dylan's Shadows In The Night Receives Critical
AS ALBUM IS RELEASED TODAY IN CD, VINYL & DIGITAL FORMATS

NEW YORK, Feb. 3, 2015 -- Bob Dylan's first new album in three years, Shadows In The Night, arrives in stores and online today in CD, Vinyl and Digital formats. Showcasing the artist's singular interpretive artistry on ten classic American songs, Shadows In The Night is the 36th studio album from Dylan and the first since the release of his worldwide hit Tempest in 2012. Produced by Jack Frost, Dylan's unique approach to recording the songs included refining complicated arrangements for 30-piece orchestras down to those uniquely tailored for his five-piece band. The album can now be found at Amazon (http://smarturl.it/shadowsinthenight), iTunes (http://smarturl.it/shadows_itunes) and at all music retail outlets.

Critical response to Shadows In The Night has been rapturous, with rave reviews coming in from around the globe:

David Fricke wrote in Rolling Stone, "The great shock here is Dylan's singing. Dylan's focus and his diction evoke his late-Sixties poise and clarity with an eccentric rhythmic patience in the way he holds words and notes across the faint suggestions of tempo. It is not crooning. It is suspense."

The Los Angeles Times' Randall Roberts summed up his thoughts in his review, writing, "Ten songs, 34 minutes, a soaring lifetime's worth of emotion conveyed with the fearlessness of a cliff diver spinning flips and risking belly flops in the open air — that's Dylan and his band on the graceful, often breathtaking Shadows.…Profound, thematically devastating and so well curated as to feel essential."

USA Today's Elysa Gardner opined, "To have a songwriter of Dylan's stature champion interpretive singing is cause for celebration. The genuine care and knowing he brings to a different American pop tradition, to the music and lyrics – it's something wonderful."

In his 5-star review of the album, The Guardian's Alex Petridis wrote, "It may be the most straightforwardly enjoyable album Dylan's made since Time Out of Mind. He's an unlikely candidate to join the serried ranks of rock stars tackling standards: appropriately enough, given that Frank Sinatra sang all these songs before him, he does it his way, and to dazzling effect."

In another 5-star review, Mojo's Michael Simmons wrote, "While countless other contemporaries have recorded Great American Songbook collections, Shadows In The Night -- Dylan's flat-out brilliant contribution to the concept – is not, by any definition, a recreation of the past. His singing on Shadows is his best vocalizing in years – in-studio or out. He glides with the melodies and relaxes into them, enjoying the ride that these gems provide….Much will be made of the autumnal theme: from the age of the material to songs that address mortality. But this extraordinary record is more refreshing burst than last gasp and its timelessness speaks more to life than death."

Concurrent with the release of Shadows In The Night is a 9,000-word interview with Dylan in AARP The Magazine. Conducted by the publication's Editor-In Chief Robert Love, the interview is one of the most extensive of Dylan's career and covers a broad array of topics, including Frank Sinatra's enduring influence, Irving Berlin, recording of the new album, whether young people find songs from the '40s and '50s to be 'corny,' corporate influence in the U.S., his period of self-seclusion in the mid-1960s and growing up without television, to name only several. The interview can be found in its entirety on AARP's website (http://aarp.org/dylan).

Bob Dylan's five previous studio albums have been universally hailed as among the best of his storied career, achieving new levels of commercial success and critical acclaim for the artist. The Platinum-selling Time Out Of Mind from 1997 earned multiple Grammy Awards, including Album Of The Year, while "Love and Theft" continued Dylan's Platinum streak and earned several Grammy nominations and a statue for Best Contemporary Folk album.

Modern Times, released in 2006, became one of the artist's most popular albums, selling more than 2.5 million copies worldwide and earning Dylan two more Grammys. Together Through Life became the artist's first album to debut at #1 in both the U.S. and the UK, as well as in five other countries, on its way to surpassing sales of one million copies. Tempest received unanimous worldwide critical acclaim upon release and reached the Top 5 in 14 countries, while the artist's globe-spanning concert tours of the past few years have heavily emphasized that album's singular repertoire.

These five releases fell within a 15-year creative span that also included the recording of an Oscar- and Golden Globe-winning composition, "Things Have Changed," from the film Wonder Boys, in 2001; a worldwide best-selling memoir, Chronicles Vol. 1, which spent 19 weeks on the New York Times Best Seller List, in 2004, and a Martin Scorsese-directed documentary, No Direction Home, in 2005. Bob Dylan also released his first collection of holiday standards, Christmas In The Heart, in 2009, with all of the artist's royalties from that album being donated to hunger charities around the world.

In recent years, Bob Dylan was the recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the United States' highest civilian honor. He was awarded a special Pulitzer Prize in 2008 for "his profound impact on popular music and American culture, marked by lyrical compositions of extraordinary poetic power." He was also the recipient of the Officier de la Legion d'honneur in 2013, Sweden's Polar Music Award in 2000, Doctorates from the University of St. Andrews and Princeton University, as well as numerous other honors.

Bob Dylan has sold more than 125 million records around the world.

Shadows In The Night
The Critics Have Listened

* * * * (out of 5)
"Quietly provocative and compelling….suggests the chapel-like quiet of a last-chance saloon. The great shock here is Dylan's singing. Dylan's focus and his diction evoke his late-Sixties poise and clarity with an eccentric rhythmic patience in the way he holds words and notes across the faint suggestions of tempo. It is not crooning. It is suspense."
Rolling Stone – David Fricke

* * * * (out of 4)For those who care about interpretive singing, Shadows In the Night is cause for celebration — and as vital an album as you're likely to hear this year….[The album] will be a revelation to anyone whose judgment has been shaped by young pop stars and TV talent-show contestants who try to substitute vocal gymnastics and bombast for feeling.
USA Today – Elysa Gardner

* * * * * (out of 5)"While countless other contemporaries have recorded Great American Songbook collections, Shadows In The Night -- Dylan's flat-out brilliant contribution to the concept – is not, by any definition, a recreation of the past. His singing on Shadows is his best vocalizing in years – in-studio or out. He glides with the melodies and relaxes into them, enjoying the ride that these gems provide….Much will be made of the autumnal theme: from the age of the material to songs that address mortality. But this extraordinary record is more refreshing burst than last gasp and its timelessness speaks more to life than death."
Mojo – Michael Simmons

"Ten songs, 34 minutes, a soaring lifetime's worth of emotion conveyed with the fearlessness of a cliff diver spinning flips and risking belly flops in the open air — that's Dylan and his band on the graceful, often breathtaking Shadows.…Profound, thematically devastating and so well curated as to feel essential…..Shadows in the Night is an album that's best appreciated when heard with intention, while sitting still, with volume and focus. It's Dylan upending expectations once again, another left turn in a career filled with them, sharing his wisdom and defining himself through the lines of others."
Los Angeles Times – Randall Roberts

* * * * * (out of 5)
"It may be the most straightforwardly enjoyable album Dylan's made since Time Out of Mind. He's an unlikely candidate to join the serried ranks of rock stars tackling standards: appropriately enough, given that Frank Sinatra sang all these songs before him, he does it his way, and to dazzling effect."
Alex Petridis – The Guardian

* * * * (out of 5)"Shadows In The Night is quite gorgeous, the sound of an old man picking over memories, lost loves, regrets, triumphs and fading hopes amid an ambient tumble of haunting electric instrumentation. It is spooky, bittersweet, mesmerizingly moving and showcases the best singing from Dylan in 25 years….[An] extraordinary record."
The Telegraph – Neil McCormick

"The sound of Shadows In The Night is clear as water. Not only can you hear every word, every note, that Dylan sings, but you can hear him draw breath before beginning to sing, and sighing out the end of a line. The instrumentals – even the infrequent horns, and soft, subtle drums – don't ever drown him out. You're as close as the microphone, making this record feel as intensely personal as, perhaps, it is to its maker. Dylan sings these songs intimately, sometimes conversationally, with emotion and humor….Shadows In The Night is an early valentine to us all. It's music to dance to in someone's arms, slowly, with half-forgotten steps in the formal patterns of long ago. It's a record to remember to, to dream to, and -- most of all -- to feel to."
No Depression – Anne Margaret Daniel

"A tour-de-force of restrained genius….This is indisputably the singer's most memorable vocal performance in years: irreducibly "Dylan", yet freighted with an unexpected beauty that powerfully reinforces these tales of love, loss and sorrow - and refracted through some of the most tantalizing melodies ever committed to manuscript."
GQ.com UK – Bill Prince

"[A] stunning new album….Dylan turns the tired standards into introspective, wise musical poems, just as Sinatra did."
Boston Herald – Jed Gottlieb

"A gem…., once you get past the initial shock of hearing Dylan crooning classics, the biggest surprise is how successfully he pulls it off. How deftly he avoids what could easily have been a ridiculous train wreck. And how he manages to pay respect to timeless songs and an immortal artist — while still doing things his way."
Toronto Sun – Darryl Sterdan

"The performances are almost painfully heartfelt and direct…. Dylan exposes a raw emotional vulnerability that jumps out at the listener…. The music is actually enhanced by Dylan's willingness to move outside his comfort zone. Isn't that what we want from our boldest creative spirits?"
Daily Beast – Ted Gioia