David Ford, Scarlet Rivera & Rob Stoner deliver 50 Years of Desire. We are at the Hare & Hounds in Birmingham, to celebrate.

YOUR WISH IS MY…….

Blink and you’ve missed it, but, over 3 days this week something very special happened. It is 50 years since Bob Dylan put out one of his biggest selling albums, Desire, a statistic that might surprise, in both aspects. David Ford has long been a fan of this idiosyncratic masterpiece of the 70s, quite unlike anything Dylan did, before or after, and certainly nothing like anyone else was doing at the time. Much of this is down to the gypsy jazz inflected fiddle tones of Scarlet Rivera, who is all over the 9 tracks. So, when the offer and the opportunity came to celebrate this milestone, not only with Rivera herself, but also with Rob Stoner, the bassist and Bob’s bona fide musical director for the set, it was clearly a yes.

So you got the fiddler, the bassist and the polymath, who plays anything and everything. Is that enough? Not really, so Ford’s buddy book drew forth two further players, celebrated jazz drummer Darren Beckett and, on bass, acoustic guitar, mellotron (!) and vocals, Michele Stodart. To be fair, Ford + Stodart would draw me to just about anything, so the added benefit of playing an album I could sing back to you, instrumental licks and all, well, you’d be a fool not to.

PRESTIGE SHOW

The Hare & Hounds is a veritable jewel in Brum’s gig circuit, my thinking it a coup they had grabbed this prestige show, and, whilst it was not auspiciously rammed, it was certainly comfortably full, with a throng of ageing Bobcats, eager to worship at anything related to their patron saint. Most seemed broadly unaware of Ford and unconcerned, Ford prefects like me in the minority.

APPROPRIATE MYTHOLOGY

A little after 8, the ceremony began. We had an MC for the evening, Kerry Shale, the Canadian but UK based actor who also hosts the Bob Dylan Approximately podcast, there to heighten the appropriate mythology around the album, and the first on stage to introduce the evening and welcome the players. The set was to be in 2 halves, with a selection of other Dylan nuggets to first whet the appetite, ahead, in set 2, of the whole of Desire to be played, in running order, side 1 then 2.

First up were Ford and Stodart, whose Don’t Think Twice certainly amused our bouches. Ford on bass, with Stodart on acoustic guitar, it was an effective and efficient rendition, with pristine harmonies, auguring well. Mr Shale then, to rapturous applause, welcomed on Rivera, for Señor, which she sang. Her fiddle style is immediately identifiable, as she coaxed new flavours into the song, with, this time, Stodart and Ford swapping instruments.

TIME FOR A RHYTHM SECTION

Time for a rhythm section, bringing on Beckett and, then, the ebullient Stoner. A stocky New Yorker, he immediately took control, launching into assured anecdote territory from the start, all deployed in the dulcet tones, and language, of a slaughterhouse worker in the meatpacking district. An engaging presence and no dab hand on his chosen instrument either.

For Rita May, a Desire outtake that was a popular staple on the subsequent Rolling Thunder Revue cavalcade, Ford was now on electric guitar. This, Stoner said, was the live version, and it was a thrashing bar room basher, appropriate for the room, and the show was alive. A totally bonkers bass solo came halfway, as Stoner the showman tackled the fretboard from both front and back, before playing it behind his head, à la Hendrix. Batshit crazy and catnip all at once. He showed himself also to be a singer sufficient to convey the applicable mood for the moment. No polish and a fair bit of spit, there were no ersatz Dylan tropes to cloy the air, and he was in charge, enjoying the experience.

INCENDIARY

A brief onstage chat with Rivera and Stoner seemed a little forced, but delivered good background goss to the sessions that led to the album. The music was more natural, with the hardest rocking A Hard Rain’s Gonna Fall I have ever heard following. Beckett, who had started the evening on brushes, was now fully deployed with sticks, thumping away with passion. For a jazzer, his lack of restraint was wonderful to see. Rivera’s fiddle was by now incendiary. A few words with Ford and it was time to close the first half with the compulsory, as he said, Like A Rolling Stone. Shorn of any organ swirls or, those with a Blackbushe memory, saxophone flourishes, it was robust and muscular, with Rivera swooping across the strings for the familiar riff that announces the chorus. The chorus? Well, 200 or so people were singing it, so it must be.

WORD-PERFECT

20 minutes for bladders and beakers, and they were back. Shale too, clipboard still present, ready to guide us through the songs. The post-Desire history of Hurricane gave the perspective before kicking off with the song of that name. Again, the audience were word perfect, and the performance was broadly faithful to (Stoner’s) original arrangement. Vocal duties, as was the case for most of the rest of the evening, were shared, with Stoner taking a stanza or two, then Ford, before swapping back. Stodart added tremendous harmonies and made impressive shapes as she grappled with the muse. Were she a man, I dare say it would all be ill-chosen gurns and grimaces, but, with her, we get full body posturing, as she bends and twists, high kicking and low crouching, the music moving through her body like electricity.

MAJESTICALLY COURAGEOUS

Isis is an odd song, of which all would agree. Always my favourite, the construction is almost anti-melody, despite then having more notes to play with than most, up down and all over the scale. The band tonight did it proud, drawing out the nuances of the, frankly, sometimes ridiculous lyric. It includes my favourite Dylan rhyme, outrageous/contagious, and the delivery was majestically courageous, SWIDT. Mozambique always struck me as one of the weaker songs, but Shale’s intro actually here had benefit, pointing out the wordplay shoe-horned in to rhyme with the country that, no, Dylan had and still has not ever set foot in.

One More Cup Of Coffee had Stoner finding unexpected treasure in his larynx as he negotiated the Middle Eastern ululations integral thereto, and the realisation was really seeping in as to quite what a privilege it was to be witnessing this show. Stodart then bit into one of the chewier challenges of the record, providing the secondary vocal for Oh Sister. Bear in mind it was Emmylou Harris first time around, so no pressure, but she tackled it both capably and confidently. Definitely one of the evening’s highlights.

MAGNIFICENT MELLOTRON

Weren’t LP sides short came to mind, as Shale returned to bring on side 2, referencing the song that many wondered might be excised, the much maligned Joey, which seems to celebrate the mobster of that name. However, to lose an 11 minute song would leave somewhat of a hole and a word perfect Ford was intent on delivering the whole of it. (Is it controversial to say I always quite liked it, especially the cheesy Little Italy accordion?)

During the preamble, it came to light, not via Shale, but but a front row Dylan scholar, that Dylan didn’t actually write anything other than the tune for this one, the lyrics coming from Jacques Levy, Dylan’s collaborator across the majority of the album. Be that as it may, the song was a tour de force, and Ford was astounding. The accordion, too, was present, via Stodart on a, yes they still make them, or have started again to, magnificent mellotron. Wonderful.

I was never that keen on Romance In Durango either, but the version given was above serviceable, once more having me question my existing prejudice. I think it was here than we got a drum solo from Beckett, something I thought lost to the current day, but it showed off his chops and was more entertaining than annoying. This also saw the first appearance all night of harmonica, with Ford blowing blisteringly. Black Diamond Bay had him switching to mandolin and, once more, this, IMHO, more cliched of Dylan’s oeuvre received a much beneficial transfusion, in part down to the clear enthusiasm of the performers on stage.

IMPECCABLE POLISH

One of the album’s 2 songs written by Dylan alone is Sara, and the quintet gave this an impeccable polish, drawing out all the poignancy of Dylan’s lament to his ex. Leaving the best song to last is a sometimes questionable move on a record, but I guess attention spans were longer in those days. Leaving it to last in a concert setting, it was just immaculate. Once more the swelling of voices around me became apparent without being intrusive. How could that possibly be the end?

It wasn’t, much as it seemed it might be, with Shale embarrassedly shuffling his papers and looking anxiously at the band. Luckily Ford took control. Had there been, I wonder, such a moment, at Dingwall’s, the night before, necessitating swift action? Yes, there were apologies about possibly being less than word perfect, but it was a delightful touch to encore with Forever Young. Rivera took again the microphone, and, having sung along, off-mike, throughout the show, her voice now carried a delightful hoarseness, reminiscent of Lucinda Williams, and perfect for the sentiment.

BAYING BOBCATS

That too wasn’t enough to placate the baying Bobcats, with an even more impromptu seeming Knocking On Heaven’s Door, sung by Ford. This was the ticket and a splendid finale to really a very, very fine night. A show of the year or any year? Definitely! Rivera and Stoner were fabulous, but the fun credit perhaps goes more to David Ford, without forgetting the stellar contributions of Stodart. Once in a lifetime stuff.

Here is a vid of a slightly different and expanded band, from a show in Italy last month, but stil featuring the hard core 4, Ford, Stodart, Rivera and Stoner:

David Ford: Website

Scarlet Rivera: Website

Rob Stoner: Website

Michele Stodart: Website

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