A GUIDE TO THE HIGHWAY 61 INTERACTIVE CD-ROM
A GUIDE TO THE HIGHWAY 61 INTERACTIVE CD-ROM
or
"I wouldn't know how to use it if I had to"
by
Sven Erick Alm
sea@math.uu.se
Contents:
*********
1. Introduction
2. About the CD-ROM
2.1 Files on H61I
2.2 Statistics
3. About the Database
3.1 Records
3.2 Fields
3.3 Notation and Maps
3.4 Reference numbers for albums and videos.
4. Database reports
4.1 In what file do I find it?
4.2 What's in the files?
4.3 Where do I find it?
4.4 All songs with artists
4.5 Dylan recordings
a) All recordings
b) Interviews
c) Unreleased recordings
d) Complete recordings
e) Videos
4.6 Unsolved mysteries
1. Introduction
************
When first examining the CD-ROM "Highway 61 Interactive", I noticed that I
repeatedly asked myself "Where did I find that?", or "How did I get
there?". Continuing the exploration, I noticed that the CD-ROM contained
stuff that did not seem to be accessible from the CD-ROM program.
In order to keep track of my discoveries, I decided to create a database
of all audio and video content on the CD-ROM.
As there seems to be a general interest in the content of this database,
I have used it to make this guide. The purpose of the guide is to be an aid
to those that have examined the CD-ROM and want to
- know if they have missed something,
- get help to remember where they did find something,
- get more information on the Dylan recordings, like
+ has this been released, and if so, on what album?
+ when was it recorded?
+ Krogsgaard numbers, etc.
The guide is NOT meant to be used while exploring the CD-ROM, as that
would spoil a lot of the fun of it!!!
There may well be some errors in my database. There are still some of the
files on the CD-ROM that I have not been able to access directly from the
CD-ROM program. They may however be accessible in some intricate way that I
have not found out yet. As an example, I thought that Blind Willie McTell's
Broke Down Engine was inaccessible until it was pointed out to me by Thies
Meyer how to find it (clicking on the east side of the sign post "Main
Squeeze", not on the poster "Blind Willie McTell's Broke Down Engine",
which gives Dylan's version!), which was less than obvious! There may be
similar tricks involved with the other files that I have not been able to
access. If you notice any errors, please let me know!
I would like to thank:
- Olof Bjorner, for helping me identify the recordings and for proof-
reading the guide.
- Thies Meyer, for helping me find Broke Down Engine.
- Graphix Zone for producing the CD-ROM, which, although certainly not a
flawless product, has given me hours and hours of fun.
- Bob Dylan himself, without whom many of us would probably not have had,
or even have used, a multimedia computer!
2. About the CD-ROM
****************
The CD-ROM "Highway 61 Interactive" (H61I for short) was produced by
Graphix Zone Inc. and Sony Music Entertainment, 1995. It contains one song,
"House of the Rising Sun", that is playable on an ordinary CD player and
1879 files totalling 612,781,934 bytes for use on a multimedia computer.
The same CD-ROM works both on a PC (with MS-Windows) and on a Macintosh
computer.
There are at least two official releases of the CD-ROM plus a promo
release. The latter is rumoured to contain some early material (1958),
which was excluded on the official releases. The main difference between
the different official releases seems to be that some bugs in the earlier
release(s) have been fixed, e.g. that the program hanged when you tried to
save your progress. To my knowledge, there has not been any changes in the
contents of the CD-ROM.
What is described in this guide is Release 1.2.1, which I have used on a
PC. Most of what follows should apply to other releases and to Macintosh
computers as well.
2.1 Files on H61I
=============
H61I contains a total of 1879 files occupying 612,781,934 bytes on the
CD-ROM. The files are organized into the following file structure, which
is accessible e.g. from the File Manager.
\-- 30 installation files
|
|- BIN 33 program files
|
|- MEDIA
|
|- 263 .MOV files
|- 459 .PIC files
|
|- DATABASE (files used in the Lyrics Database, LDB)
|
|- ALBUMPIC 45 .PIC files of album covers
|
|- ALBUMS 92 text files with contents and liner notes
|
|- DSGRAPH 60 internal .PIC files for LDB
|
|- LYRICS 888(!) text files containing mainly
covers (442 .cov) and lyrics (441 .lyr)
to most Dylan songs!
There are, in principal, four different file categories on the CD-ROM:
1. Executable (program) files.
Among these are QuickTime Movie Player (player.exe) and QuickTime
Picture Viewer (viewer.exe), which are used to play .MOV files and view
.PIC files.
2. Movie files (.MOV).
Contain all audio and video on the CD-ROM. The files are associated with
QuickTime Movie Player and can thus be played from the File
Manager (by doubleclicking the file name, or selecting the file and
pressing Enter).
3. Pictures (.PIC).
The files are associated with QuickTime Picture Viewer and can thus
be viewed from the File Manager.
4. Text files (e.g. .COV, .LYR).
Contain album information (track lists and liner notes) and song
information (covers and lyrics).
The object of this guide is to describe the content of the 263 MOV files
on the CD-ROM. These files contain all audio and video selections on H61I.
It could of course also be interesting to make a similar description of the
PIC files, but I will leave that project to someone else.
An index of the songs that have lyrics (.LYR) and cover information
(.COV) and their corresponding file names have been posted to
rec.music.dylan by Mitch Gart (mg@ASP.CAMB.INMET.COM).
The text files can be printed from an ordinary word processor (e.g. MS-
Word) if they are imported as "text with format" and "Saved to" another
file name to make the CD-ROM files writable. The beginning of the file
contains some "garbage" that you may want to erase, and the word processor
may have missed a line break or two, but otherwise I have not encountered
any problems.
2.2 Statistics
==========
The MOV files on the CD have audio and/or video content. To save disk space
all audio is in mono. The sampling used is 16 bits at 11.025 or 22.050 KHz.
Most files use the lower sampling frequency. As a comparison, an audio CD
uses 41 KHz sampling frequency.
Both video and pictures use the resolution 72 dpi.
Detailed information on each MOV file can be obtained from the Movie
Player (QuickTime Movie Player 2.0.1.41), which among other things gives
the playing times in hundreds of seconds!
The total playing time for the 263 MOV files on H61I is 9738.66 seconds,
or 2 hours 42 minutes and 18.66 seconds. This is quite amazing as all this
fits on a single CD, and considering that almost one third of the playing
time includes video! To be more precise, there is 3197.68 seconds (53
minutes, 17.68 seconds) of video on the CD-ROM!
A bit more detailed statistics is given below.
Playing times (in seconds):
---------------------------
Type video no video | Total
______________________________________________
All 3197.68 6540.98 | 9738.66
Audio 3052.67 6540.98 | 9593.65
Songs 1700.05 4926.70 | 6626.75
Dylan 1609.89 4974.73 | 6584.62
Dylan singing 1560.38 4591.56 | 6151.94
3. About the Database
******************
3.1 Records
=======
My database contains one record for every MOV file on the CD-ROM. Some of
the MOV files, e.g. antiluv.mov, contain separate items that have been
given their own records in the database, so that the number of records is
278 although there are only 263 MOV files.
3.2 Fields
======
Each record contains a number of fields.
File information fields: FileName, FileSize, FileTime, PlayTime.
Normally, FileTime=PlayTime, but a file with multiple content has
PlayTime=0 and the different parts have FileTime=0 and PlayTimes that
add up to the correct FileTime.
General: Description.
40 character description of the content.
Localisation fields: W1, Where1, W2, Where2.
These come in pairs, so that e.g. W1 gives a general and Where1 a more
detailed description of where to find an object.
The abbreviations used are described in 3.3.
Category information fields: Audio, Video, Dylan, Access, Category.
The first four only take the values + or -.
Category can be:
a about (somehow related)
c composite (multiple content)
e effect
i interview (with Dylan)
p picture or painting
s song
t talk (Dylan related)
Song information: LyricsDB, Complete, Title, Artist.
The first two are +/- fields.
Dylan recording information: Released, RecDate, Krogsgaard, Interview,
VideoContent.
Released=the number, see 3.4, of the album on which the recording
was first released, or u if previously unreleased.
Krogsgaard numbers refer to Krogsgaard, M.: Positively Bob Dylan, 1991,
which covers recordings up to #1229: February 22, 1992. Later recordings
are given approximate Krogsgaard numbers, e.g. 1400+ (to be interpreted
as: at least 1400, but probably less than 1500). A number like 0017+
indicates an older recording that is not listed by Krogsgaard, with a
number "between" 0017 and 0018.
3.3 Notation and Maps
=================
The following abbreviations are used in the fields W1 and W2:
V Greenwich Village
BK Madison Square Garden (BobFest)
C6 Coffee House '61
C7 Coffee House '75
CS Columbia Studio
MC Main Collage
SC Supper Club
To simplify the description in fields Where1 and Where2, we give
schematic maps over the Coffee-houses, the Village, and Madison Square
Garden.
a) Coffee-house Map
----------------
Both 1961 (C6) and 1975 (C7).
Downstairs: Upstairs:
------------------------------------------- -----------------
| Jukebox | | |
| | | |
| | ----------- | |
| Table 1 | Booth 3 | | Office |
| | | | |
| Table 2 | ----------- | |
| | Booth 2 | | |
|Stage | | | |
| | ----------- |--------- ----
| Table 3 | Booth 1 | | |
| | | | |
| Table 4 | ----------- | |
| Hall |
| Stairs |
| |
| Bar ------ Exit -----
--------------------------------------------
b) Map of The Village (V)
----------------------
Subway | | Closed
Entrance | | Subway
| | Entrance
Books | |
| V| Alley
| W|
| |
"Nashville" | |
(Country) | | The Onion
|T |
|A |
|X |
Records |I |
| | Gospel Church
| |
| |
| |
Main Squeeze | |
(Blues) | | Rubinstein's
| | Deli
|VW T|
Clown |B A|
|u X|
|s I| Art
| | Exhibition
| |
Wine & Beer | |
| |
| | News Stand
| |
| |
| Entry |
Point
c) Map of Madison Square Garden, BobFest (BK)
------------------------------------------
Stage:
Audience
Microphone Monitor
Stage exit ----------------------------------------
Backstage (Dressing rooms):
---------------------------------------
| 1L 1R | 2L 2R |
| The Eddie | Roger Eric |
| Band Vedder | McGuinn Clapton |
-------- ---------------- ----------
Stage TV1 |
Entrance TV2 |
-------- ---------------- ----------
| 3R 3L | 4R 4L |
| Ritchie Rosanne | Lou Clancy |
| Havens Cash | Reed Bros. |
---------------------------------------
3.4 Reference numbers for albums and videos.
========================================
On the CD-ROM, the following numbering is used for Dylan's albums. The same
numbering is also used in the database to describe on which album a song
was first released. For convenience, a few extra numbers are added (C1, V1,
V2).
1 Bob Dylan
2 The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan
3 The Times They Are A-Changin'
4 Another Side of Bob Dylan
5 Bringing it All Back Home
6 Highway 61 Revisited
7 Blonde on Blonde
8 Greatest Hits
9 John Wesley Harding
10 Nashville Skyline
11 Self-Portrait
12 New Morning
13 Greatest Hits, Vol. 2
14 Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid
15 Dylan
16 Planet Waves
17 Before the Flood
18 Blood on the Tracks
19 The Basement Tapes
20 Desire
21 Hard Rain
22 Street Legal
23 At Budokan
24 Slow Train Coming
25 Saved
26 Shot of Love
27 Infidels
28 Real Live
29 Empire Burlesque
30 Biograph
31 Knocked Out Loaded
32 Dylan and the Dead
33 Down in the Groove
34 Oh Mercy
35 Under the Red Sky
36 Bootleg Series Vols. 1-3
37 Good As I Been to You
38 30th Anniversary Concert Celebration
39 World Gone Wrong
40 Greatest Hits III
41 Highway 61 Interactive
42 Unplugged
Compilations:
C1 Broadside reunion
Videos:
V1 Don't Look Back
V2 Festival
More