Expecting Rain

As noted in Isis #193, "it seems that Dylan's people are sure that none of the music from John Wesley Harding sessions has ever found its way into the hands of collectors", and for that reason they do not intend to release them in 2017 to protect the copyright, as they did for previous years sessions.
May be 'Dylan's people' should reconsider the question: there is at least one collector who has them, (with many other non circulating gems). This is not a legend: several other people have listened to these outtakes, including myself.
So even if the person who has these sessions will never let them circulate, as he does not make any copy, nobody can be sure of what will happen in the future.
That's why, in terms of commercial protection of the copyright, it would be a wise decision for Sony to release the 1967 sessions.

Well, tell us what you've heard.

they won't risk losing the copyright – even if the stuff the have is total crap

Agreed. It's a Business.

We can always hope.

What if Dylan's people just talk to the guy who allegedly has these tapes and buy the recordings back from him? Make him an offer he can't refuse, or something like that?

Shame Albert Grossman died. He was probably a perfect Luca Brasi.

This will not happen. The person who has the tapes (I remember there were several takes of All Along the Watchtower) has a collection of non-circulating tapes, that he will NEVER let go out of his hard drive. He did not pay to get them, just established through the years a relationship of trust with somebody who is quite close to Bob Dylan. Even if this is very frustrating, one can understand, as the condition to get these outtakes was to never let them circulate.
This is and will (unfortunately) be respected.

If hard drive means that the original tapes are digitized, where are the tapes now? Are they destroid or in some kind of safe? Who has the key or knows the code? Are there any security backups of the said hard drive? What will happen to the hard drive if the "he" passes away in the future? Is it encoded in a way no inheritor can open the files?
Is there a self destroing gadget installed?

What I want to say is: how can one really be sure that them outtakes won't leak in the future? Or is the "he" one of Bob's family, a son?

This is exactly what I meant in my first post: that's why Sony, perfectly aware of the situation, should officially release them.
Time will tell...

Its best not to speculate. Im hoping sony do not get ahold of them and have to release a copyright collection.

My understanding is that most of the physical master copies of things from the Dylan team's archive reside at the Iron Mountain underground facility in Boyers, Pennsylvania. The official "digital" copies of everything are at the Dylan archive project in Oklahoma. http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/ ... n-20160303

Want to see the still lost Basement Tapes tracks, that wasn´t included on the Official Release, in the 1967 Copyright Set!

I strongly suggest leaking the track list at minimum and someone might pick up the story and then Dylan's people might become more aware of what's truly out there. Then, they might consider a copyright release...

Time is ticking so post away!

that is no commercial use. At least not the kind of commercial use that the European copyright laws refersto (since the stuff is not being sold or made available in Europe)



this option will only help to keep the recordings sealed in Bobs archive but won't help him to keep the copyright

I was not arguing such. I was replying to the comment that asked where the master tapes reside.

Just so we're clear, these are just outtakes of the existing JWH aren't they? - There's nothing that new on offer here is there?

Probably not, but it is true that he was making up arrangements and rewriting lyrics on the fly, so some of the alternate takes might be significantly different.

Cool. Thanks for clarifying. Let's hope we get the copyright release then.

To clarify further: I'm basically just speculating, based on the rumors I've heard and what I know about how Dylan worked during the mid-60s. I have no special knowledge! But people in the know have said that some of the early takes -- notably "Watchtower" -- are fascinating and great in their own rights.

Does Columbia even know about this mythical guy that has all these outtakes just sitting on his laptop?

I heard the outtakes were one of the things demanded by DB Cooper and their whereabouts are thus unknown

Absolutely: somebody at Sony/Columbia knows that these outtakes are in the hands of this collector, but he is quite trustable and they know he is not open to any discussion for sharing them at any price.
On the other hand he gladly lets people listen to them, as he did last year with me: I spent 2 hours of dream, listening and watching to uncirculating material. But everything is 'for your eyes/ears only'. This was quite a frustrating experience, but once again I can understand the position: he made the promise to not let the tapes circulate, he keeps it.

Weakness exposed.
Most likely this is all Dylan, Inc. needs to hear, in order to get moving on protecting these copyrights.
"If you want somebody you can trust, Trust Yourself!"

The other collections were released or at least announced by now (late august) in the previous years? Its not looking good, I was really looking forward to hearing these.