The best way to describe Bob Dylan‘s latest release, Triplicate, is with one word: unlistenable.
This maybe surprising coming from me, a devote fan on the rock bard, but Triplicate is everything a good Dylan album isn’t. It’s musically trite and pedestrian. It has neither energy nor pathos and, if you stripped away Dylan’s broken voice, which sadly is not up to these songs as they’ve been arranged, it is of a piece with Rod Stewart’s absolutely soulless American songbook project.
It didn’t have to be this way. Triplicate is Dylan’s third “Sinatra” album, and easily the weakest. The first, Shadows in the Night, was a surprise — the news that Dylan would be releasing a collection of songs associated with the Chairman of the Board sounded like a joke or something artists release when they are looking to close out a contract. But it turned out to be a flawed but strong record, as Dylan opted for spare arrangements that allowed his fragile rasp to sound weary and lived-in, granting the record an unexpected delicateness.
The second, Fallen Angels, was probably unnecessary, but it maintained the basic charms of Shadows in the Night. Triplicate is both unnecessary and without charm. It is three records of Dylan growling his way through the American songbook over well-played but pedestrian, even cute arrangements — with little emotion and no sense of irony. The only reasons for an artist like Dylan, who has such a keen understanding and connection to American musical history and has written some of the most important songs in rock and folk history to dip his toe into the pop canon is to remake it emotionally or to show off one’s voice. See Cyndi Lauper, who manages to do both. Dylan’s vocals, as I said, feel perfunctory, and it has been a long time (if ever) since anyone thought the bard could sing.
Readers might notice that I’ve not mentioned any of the album’s individual songs. The reason? The album is of a piece, a long slog of a listen, with nothing in particular standing out. This is just a bad record. Take my word for it and stay away.Send me an e-mail.
Hank Kalet 