#70 SLOW TRAIN COMING by Bob Dylan (1979)

SLOW TRAIN COMING by Bob Dylan (1979)
Columbia - FC 36120

It was November of 1978. Bob Dylan was on tour and had a temperature of 105.  

"Towards the end of the show someone out in the crowd knew I wasn't feeling too well," recalled Dylan in a 1979 interview. "I think they could see that. And they threw a silver cross on the stage. I looked down at that cross. I said, 'I gotta pick that up.' So I picked up the cross and I put it in my pocket. And I brought it with me to the next town, which was out in Arizona. I was feeling even worse than I'd felt when I was in San Diego. I said, 'Well, I need something tonight.' I didn't know what it was. I was used to all kinds of things. I said, 'I need something tonight that I didn't have before.' And I looked in my pocket and I had this cross." Dylan believed he had experienced a vision of Christ in his Tucson hotel room that night. "Jesus did appear to me as King of Kings, and Lord of Lords," he'd later say. "There was a Presence in the room that couldn't have been anybody but Jesus. He put his hand on me. It was a physical thing. I felt it. I felt it all over me. I felt my whole body tremble. The glory of the Lord knocked me down and picked me up." 

David Mansfield, one of Dylan's band members and a born-again Christian, would later say, "The simplest explanation is that he had a very profound experience which answered certain lifelong issues for him." 

Dylan began writing songs that would reflect his new spirituality.  

Meanwhile, Dylan wasn't alone in his religious awakening. Band members Steven Soles and David Mansfield had already joined the Vineyard Fellowship, a Christian organization introduced to them by T-Bone Burnett. Dylan reportedly attended Vineyard home group meetings with Keith Green, Randy Stonehill, and Larry Norman. As Mansfield would say, "A big part of the fellowship of that church was music." 

Under the guidance of the Vineyard Fellowship, Dylan was asked to attend a course held at the Vineyard School of Discipleship. Pastor Kenn Gulliksen described it as “an intensive course studying about the life of Jesus and principles of discipleship.” Bob Dylan was an artist for whom the Bible had previously been little more than a literary source. Now he was digesting it in black in white. In a 1985 interview, Dylan would say, "What I learned in Bible school was just an extension of the same thing I believed in all along, but just couldn't verbalize or articulate. People who believe in the coming of the Messiah live their lives right now as if He was here. That's my idea of it, anyway. It's all there in black and white. I don't have to defend this. The Scriptures back me up." Bob Dylan was baptized at the home of Vineyard pastor Bill Dwyer. 

Through his Bible classes, Dylan became acquainted with the works of Hal Lindsey, who was also closely associated with the Vineyard Church. Lindsey’s best-selling book, The Late Great Planet Earth, became Dylan's second bible and added an apocalyptic edge to his worldview. 

In later shows, Dylan would reflect these beliefs on stage. At one show in the fall of 1979, Dylan said, "You know we're living in the end times. The Scriptures say, 'In the last days, perilous times shall be at hand. Men shall become lovers of their own selves. Blasphemous, heavy and high-minded.' Take a look at the Middle East. We're heading for a war. I told you 'The Times They Are A-Changin' ' and they did. I said the answer was 'Blowin' in the Wind' and it was. I'm telling you now Jesus is coming back, and He is! And there is no other way of salvation ... Jesus is coming back to set up His kingdom in Jerusalem for a thousand years." 

Dylan would later say in an interview taken in 1984, "The songs that I wrote for the Slow Train album [frightened me] ... I didn't plan to write them ... I didn't like writing them. I didn't want to write them." 

In the early months of 1979, Dylan was writing his most message-driven album in sixteen years. 

Before we unpack the album, I’ve got a confession to make. I almost left this record off the list entirely. I was going to put it in the honorable mention category.  

Mainly because, in my humble opinion…Bob Dylan can’t sing. 

There. I said it. The man cannot sing.  

He can whine and growl and screech. But he cannot sing. Another problem with this record is that the instrumentation, to my ears, is nothing special. Very competent, but somewhat sterile and robotic. Now, I am fully aware that many people will accuse me of blasphemy. After all, the blog 500 Greatest Albums in CCM History listed Slow Train Coming at #19, with the author calling it "a masterpiece” (although conceding that Dylan’s vocals were “an acquired taste”). It was listed even higher -- #16 --in the 2001 book CCM Presents: The 100 Greatest Albums in Christian Music. John J. Thompson wrote in that book that the album featured “amazing production” and that it was “one of the most important releases in pop and Christian music history” (although he also allows that Dylan gave “extra effort at singing on key”). Look, the thing peaked at #2 on the charts in the UK, quickly went platinum in the U.S. where it climbed to #3, and won Dylan his first Grammy! STILL, I’m not sold. I just can’t get past what my own ears tell me when I listen to this record. 

When it came out, I was on the road with my family. We were ministering at a church in Pennsylvania. There were two single females in that church – probably in their late 20s – who were roommates. They were SO excited because Bob Dylan had become a Christian. In fact, they gave my brothers and me a copy of the album. Now, we were raised on southern gospel music and later crossed over into Jesus Music. We had never listened to a lot of secular music, so we knew basically nothing of Bob Dylan. We put that album on the turntable…and started laughing hysterically. We just could not reconcile in our minds the reverential and exalted reputation of this artist with the comically bad vocals we were hearing. Again, I’m fully aware that most folks don’t agree. In fact, in their review of Slow Train Coming, Rolling Stone magazine gushed,  

Bob Dylan is the greatest singer of our times. No one is better. No one, in objective fact, is even very close. His versatility and vocal skills are unmatched. His resonance and feeling are beyond those of any of his contemporaries. More than his ability with words, and more than his insight, his voice is God's greatest gift to him. 

Really? 

Really? 

When I think of great singers, I think Matthew Ward…Greg X. Volz…Bob Carlisle. 

The first time my then-preteen son heard Slow Train Coming he asked, “How did that guy ever get a record deal?” 

So Slow Train Coming almost didn’t make my list. But I reconsidered based on the stats given above (sales figures, airplay, and awards) and the historical significance of an artist of Dylan’s stature releasing a definitive statement of faith.  

Slow Train Coming was the nineteenth studio album by Bob Dylan, released on August 20, 1979, by Columbia Records. All of the songs either express his strong personal faith or stress the importance of Christian teachings and philosophy. The evangelical nature of the record alienated many of Dylan's existing fans; at the same time, many Christians were drawn into his fan base.  

Leading up to the making of the album, Dylan had approached famed producer Jerry Wexler to oversee the sessions. Dylan wanted an experienced producer he could trust.  When Wexler agreed to produce, he was unaware of the nature of the material that awaited him. 

Dylan (2nd from left) talking with producer Jerry Wexler

"Naturally, I wanted to do the album in Muscle Shoals—as Bob did—but we decided to prep it in L.A., where Bob lived," recalls Wexler. "That's when I learned what the songs were about: born-again Christians in the old corral. I liked the irony of Bob coming to me, the Wandering Jew, to get the Jesus feel. But I had no idea he was on this born-again Christian trip until he started to evangelize me. I said, 'Bob, you're dealing with a sixty-two-year-old confirmed Jewish atheist. I'm hopeless. Let's just make an album.'" 

The basic tracks for the songs were recorded in just six three-hour sessions over a period of three days.  

Critic Charles Shaar Murray wrote, "Bob Dylan has never seemed more perfect and more impressive than on this album. He has also never seemed more unpleasant and hate-filled." Greil Marcus wrote, "Dylan's received truths never threaten the unbeliever, they only chill the soul.” Another reviewer put it this way: “This was the first (and best) of Dylan's Christian trilogy, beginning one of the strangest chapters in rock-n-roll's most fascinating book.” 

Reviewing the album in Rolling Stone, Jann Wenner proclaimed it "one of the finest records Dylan has ever made.” 

Here’s more from that Rolling Stone review: 

Bob  Dylan has, at long last, come back into our lives and times, and it is with the most commercial LP he's ever released. Slow Train Coming has been made with a care and attention to detail that Dylan never gave any of his earlier records. The musicians on this album are the best Dylan has worked with since Highway 61 Revisited (1965), Blonde on Blonde (1966) and The Basement Tapes (1967). Dylan's new songs are statements of strength and simplicity, and the lyrics again equal his early classics. The words are rich with the ambiguity of great art.  Slow Train Coming's lyrics are timeless, simple, yet rich in potential levels of meaning. There is no letup in the power of the rhythm and arrangements from the opening track through the last, because there's no letup in the message. Over and over again, Dylan tells us that we have a choice of doing good or doing bad. Slow Train Coming is pure, true Dylan, probably the purest and truest Dylan ever. 

On October 18, 1979, Dylan promoted the album with his first—and, to date, only—appearance on Saturday Night Live, performing Gotta Serve Somebody, I Believe in You, and When You Gonna Wake Up. 

Despite the mixed reactions to Dylan's new direction, Gotta Serve Somebody was a hit, and the album outsold both Blood on the Tracks and Blonde on Blonde in its first year of release. 

Meanwhile, Dylan refused to play any of his older compositions, as well as any secular material. Dylan would say he would not "sing any song which hasn't been given to me by the Lord to sing." Fans wishing to hear his older songs openly expressed their disappointment. Hecklers continued to appear at his concerts, only to be answered by lectures from the stage. Dylan was firmly entrenched in his evangelical ways, and it would continue through his next album, whether his audience would follow or not. 

Let’s look at a few of the songs. 

Gotta Serve Somebody opens the album and very much sets the tone; lyrically strong, a tight rhythm section and a female gospel trio backing up on vocals. The song makes the point very simply; 

You may be an ambassador to England or France
You may like to gamble, you might like to dance
You may be the heavyweight champion of the world
You may be a socialite with a long string of pearls. 

But you’re gonna have to serve somebody, yes indeed
You’re gonna have to serve somebody,
It may be the devil or it may be the Lord
But you’re gonna have to serve somebody

Precious Angel is considered by many to be the album’s standout track. It also contains some of the most cringe-worthy, off-key vocals. 

Precious angel, under the sun
How was I to know you’d be the one
To show me I was blinded, to show me I was gone
How weak was the foundation I was standing upon? 

Now there’s spiritual warfare
And flesh and blood breaking down
Ya either got faith or ya got unbelief
And there ain’t neutral ground
The enemy is subtle, how be it we are so deceived
When the truth’s in our hearts and we still don’t believe? 

Shine Your light, shine Your light on me
Shine Your light, shine Your light on me
Shine Your light, shine Your light on me
Ya know I just couldn’t make it by myself
I’m a little too blind to see

I Believe in You is both a statement of faith and an answer to the disgruntled fans who didn’t want their prophet speaking actual Truth in his songs. It’s been covered by Dallas Holm and many others.

They, they look at me and frown
They’d like to drive me from this town
They don’t want me around
‘Cause I believe in You

They show me to the door
They say don’t come back no more
‘Cause I don’t be like they’d like me to
And I, I walk out on my own
A thousand miles from home
But I don’t feel alone
‘Cause I believe in You

I believe in You when winter turns to summer
I believe in You when white turns to black
I believe in You even though I be outnumbered
Oh, though the earth may shake me
Oh, though my friends forsake me
Oh, even that couldn’t make me go back

Don’t let me change my heart
Keep me set apart
From all the plans they do pursue

The title song was less about faith and more about politics. Gonna Change My Way of Thinking was a funky rock number. Do Right to Me Baby (Do Unto Others) was one of the least favorite songs on the record for most people.  

When You Gonna Wake Up finds Dylan in an angry prophetic mood: 

Adulterers in churches and pornography in the schools
You got gangsters in power and lawbreakers making rules

When you gonna wake up, when you gonna wake up
When you gonna wake up strengthen the things that remain?

Do you ever wonder just what God requires?
You think He’s just an errand boy to satisfy your wandering desires

Man Gave Names to All the Animals is one that is complained about – a lot. With its childish charm and reggae beat, it comes off as a nursery rhyme set to music. The song’s ending takes you by surprise the first time you hear it and is a bit eerie. This song doesn’t really hold up well to repeated listenings. 

When He Returns is considered a Gospel classic. The album ends with Dylan looking forward to the second coming of Jesus: 

Don’t you cry and don’t you die
And don’t you burn

Like a thief in the night,
He’ll replace wrong with right
When he returns

Of every earthly plan
That be known to man,
He is unconcerned
He’s got plans of His own
To set up His throne
When He returns 

Robert Zimmerman (born in 1941) is acknowledged by many to be the voice of his generation…music’s greatest poet…and one of the greatest American composers of all time. Volumes have been written about Dylan’s career before the so-called “Christian period” (Slow Train Coming/Saved/Shot of Love) and volumes have been written about his career since. I won’t bother to bore you with all of those details, except to say that Dylan’s faith is really known only to him and God these days. It’s been said that when you examine his musical output since Shot of Love and read his comments from various interviews (despite the frequent profanity), he appears to at least have some sort of a continuing relationship with God, and perhaps with Christ, while remaining aloof from organized Christianity. It’s complicated. 

Bob Dylan today

Let’s wrap this up with another ridiculous quote from Rolling Stone magazine:  

Because he has been so brilliant in the other areas of his craft, Dylan has never been fully recognized as a singer. When he has a song and idea in which he believes, the power, richness and the beauty of his voice are far greater than the words he uses. 

Yeah. Right.