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Bob Dylan 2000.03.30 in Ventura, California

Ventura County Fairgrounds Arena, 10 W. Harbor Blvd. , 13,500  tickets
2000: March - April May June

Tour

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Path: Norway.EU.net!EU.net!blackbush.xlink.net!newsfeed01.sul.t-online.de!newsfe ed00.sul.t-online.de!t-online.de!diablo.theplanet.net!news.theplanet.net!n ewspost.theplanet.net!not-for-mail Subject: Re: June 30, 2000 - Ventura, California - setlist From: Ed Nash Date: Sat, 1 Jul 2000 07:58:21 +0100 Organization: Customer of Planet Online X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.00.2615.200 It can't be bad when you can say a setlist is average for a tour despite the fact that it still includes Frankie Lee and Judas Priest, Tom Thumb, and what I assume was the new Cold Irons Bound. Wonder if this is going to carry onto into the UK tour. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Path: Norway.EU.net!EU.net!npeer.kpnqwest.net!news.maxwell.syr.edu!feeder.qis.ne t!newsfeed1.earthlink.net!newsmaster1.prod.itd.earthlink.net!newsread2.pro d.itd.earthlink.net.POSTED!not-for-mail Subject: Re: June 30, 2000 - Ventura, California - setlist From: Dan Erickson Date: Sat, 01 Jul 2000 07:58:55 GMT Organization: EarthLink Inc. -- http://www.EarthLink.net X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.5 (Macintosh; I; PPC) I'm glad I'm not the only one who noticed the dramatic reworking of Cold Irons Bound. Tonight at Ventura is the first time I've heard Bob play it this year. Very very cool. Ed Nash wrote: > It can't be bad when you can say a setlist is average for a tour despite the > fact that it still includes Frankie Lee and Judas Priest, Tom Thumb, and > what I assume was the new Cold Irons Bound. Wonder if this is going to > carry onto into the UK tour. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Path: Norway.EU.net!uninett.no!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsfeed.skycache.com!Cidera !152.163.239.131!portc03.blue.aol.com!nntp2.giganews.com!nntp3.giganews.co m!news5.giganews.com.POSTED!not-for-mail Subject: Re: June 30, 2000 - Ventura, California - setlist From: Date: Sat, 1 Jul 2000 00:42:54 -0700 Organization: Giganews.Com - Premium News Outsourcing X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.00.2314.1300 > 16. Highway 61 Revisited I'm pretty sure Bob played Rainy Day Women, not Highway 61 as the last song -- the improvised/garbled last verse went something like "They'll stone you and then come back again/They'll stone you and you know it's never gonna end." Anyway, here are a few other recollections, for what they're worth. The venue is right on the shore, not too far north of Malibu, and based on the signs on either side of the stage advertising pistons and motor oil, and the dirt-clods at our feet, I got the impression that we were standing on a track used for auto-racing or something like that. The stage area itself was quite picturesque. It was set several feet above the audience's heads and immediately behind it a few palm trees swayed in the cool ocean breeze. A couple of miles behind them, a small mountain peak could be seen. Bob was dressed in his standard black cowboy suit, but he'd added a bit more color than usual -- his shirt was a fairly bright but deep blue, his tie a dark red. As for the show itself, I thought it was much more interesting than the last two (Las Vegas and Irvine). For the first part of the performance, the main strength was the band -- they were playing exceptionally well right from the start, especially David Kemper, who put a real snap and bounce into many of the songs. Up through "Tonight I'll Be Staying Here With You," I was repeatedly put in mind of a show I saw in Carlsbad in 1988 -- both that one and this one had a strong country feel, with several fast, foot-tapping, hoe-down-style numbers. This country feel added a lot to "Maggie's Farm" which, musically at least, was much more enjoyable than usual for me. But while the band was excellent, Bob's singing was for awhile just consistently good, but not exactly thrilling. The one exception early on was "Frankie Lee," performed with a sort of wasted weariness that made the song seem really sad and less absurd than it sometimes does -- even if you'd never heard it before, his tone would probably have tipped you off that the story was going to end badly. (There were also a couple of minor lyric variations, I think.) Anyway, though, an interesting show suddenly became incredible with the pounding, swing-style drumming that opened "Cold Irons Bound." This was the same arrangement as in Europe as far as I could tell, but faster and tighter, I thought. You could see that Bob was getting into the performance -- when he sang "out of control," he flailed his right hand up and back above his shoulder, and after one of the choruses he added a "Yeahhhh" before a great instrumental break. So, in regard to that other thread about whether Bob reached his peak with Rolling Thunder, and aren't we all really just going to shows to see a "legend" who isn't really delivering the goods anymore, etc. -- I don't see how anyone who saw tonight's performance could possibly entertain such an idea. From "Cold Irons" through "Like A Rolling Stone," Dylan and the band gave us about 20 minutes or so of really great live music -- as good as I've heard from anyone. For a moment, I felt a bit let down by the contrast between the eccentric "Cold Irons" arrangement and the much more standard blues of "Leopard Skin," but Bob's enthusiastic (and somewhat eccentric) singing resulted in a terrific performance. And "Things Have Changed" was probably the best version I've heard. They seem to have added a bit more variation to the arrangement, shifting to a quieter, sparser feel on the last verse. And again, Bob was singing wonderfully -- his vocal twists put new ideas into my mind about what the song might mean. He gave a little, shivering paranoid stutter to "Just for a second I thought I saw something mov-v-ve," and sang "Feel like falling in love with the first WOMAN I meet" -- as though the urge to dress in drag had become widespread and was beginning to annoy him. "Like A Rolling Stone" was also excellent. While I'll never be happy with the fact that Bob repeatedly hacks a verse out of this song, the instrumental break that took its place was quite exciting, as was (again) Dylan's singing. After this, "The Times" was a little anticlimactic. It was still a good version, though. Dylan got the words right (I think) and again sang well, especially on the choruses, where in the space of a second or two, he would throw his voice up about as high as it would go then drop it down to a deep baritone on the last word. The problem was that, surprisingly enough, four fast songs in row hadn't been too many, and a fifth upbeat number -- if performed as well as the others -- probably wouldn't have been overkill, either. In fact, a relatively slow song sort of hobbled the pace. Given this, I wasn't too surprised when Dylan and the band didn't come back out for a second encore of "Blowin' in the Wind," as they had at the last two shows -- toward the end of tonight's show, they were charging ahead so forcefully that slow numbers just didn't seem to fit. June 30, 2000 Ventura, California Ventura County Fairgrounds Arena 1. Roving Gambler (acoustic) 2. To Ramona (acoustic) (Larry on Mandolin) 3. Desolation Row (acoustic) 4. This World Can't Stand Long (acoustic) (Larry on mandolin) 5. Tangled Up In Blue (acoustic) 6. The Ballad Of Frankie Lee And Judas Priest (acoustic 7. Country Pie 8. Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues 9. Maggie's Farm 10. Tonight I'll Be Staying Here With You 11. Cold Irons Bound 12. Leopard-Skin Pill-Box Hat (encore) 13. Things Have Changed 14. Like A Rolling Stone 15. The Times They Are A-Changin' (acoustic) (Bob on harp)