Dylan shills for TIRBD; Newport DVD coming

What did we do before we had the Internet to waste all of our time? Over at the site created to plug the latest Bob Dylan greatest hits album, they have an inventive little toy: You can enter your own message that will appear on Dylan’s cue cards in the “Subterranean Homesick Blues” video. Here’s mine.

The set — which comes in a one-disc standard issue and a three-CD “deluxe” edition — is due Oct. 2, and includes a remix of “Most Likely You Go Your Way (And I’ll Go Mine)” from producer du jour Mark Ronson. It’s fine, with a lot of horns replacing the guitars in the original (and I think, superior) mix. Of course, I’m not the target audience. I’m already hooked, so they’re now trolling for young kids. Good luck.

The more interesting news that I hadn’t heard yet is about “The Other Side of the Mirror,” a DVD featuring 80 minutes of live Dylan at the Newport Folk Festival from 1963-1965. These performances are legendary, as they show the rapid evolution of Dylan’s sound as he moved from warbling acoustic folkie to leather-clad electric rocker. Bootlegs of these shows are compelling, so I would imagine that being able to see these performances for the first time will be revelatory.