Never Ending Tour Totally Explained

Everything about The Never Ending Tour totally explained

The Never Ending Tour is a popular term for Bob Dylan's seemingly incessant performing schedule since June 7, 1988. Dylan has attributed much of the versatility of his live shows to the talents of his backing band, with whom he recorded the albums "Love and Theft" (2001) and Modern Times (2006). During twenty years of touring, musicians have come and gone, and the band has continued to evolve. Dylan's touring prowess is undiminished by his age - he turned sixty-six in 2007, and in 2006 played ninety-nine shows. According to the count maintained by Olof Bjorner's Dylan web-site Still On The Road

, Dylan played his 2000th show of the Never Ending Tour on October 16, 2007, in Dayton, Ohio. In recent years, Dylan has toured in the summer playing minor league baseball venues .

The Title

The tour's name was cemented when journalist Adrian Deevoy published his interview with Dylan in Q Magazine no.39, December 1989. The critic Michael Gray listened to Deevoy's interview tape, and points out in The Bob Dylan Encyclopedia that though Deevoy's article put the phrase into Dylan's mouth, in fact the label came from Deevoy in the following exchange: ť AD: 'Tell me about this live thing. You've gone straight into this tour again - one tour virtually straight into the next one.'

   BD: 'Oh, it's all the same tour.' ť AD: 'It's the Never Ending Tour?'

   BD: (unenthusiastically) 'Yeah, yeah'.
   Dylan has been dismissive of the Never Ending Tour tag. In the sleeve notes to his album World Gone Wrong (1993), Dylan wrote: "don't be bewildered by the Never Ending Tour chatter. there was a Never Ending Tour but it ended in '91 with the departure of guitarist G. E. Smith. That one's long gone but there have been many others since then. The Money Never Runs Out Tour (fall of '91) Southern Sympathizer Tour (early '92) Why Do You Look At Me So Strangely Tour (European '92) The One Sad Cry Of Pity Tour (Australia & West Coast American '92) Outburst Of Consciousness Tour ('92) Don't Let Your Deal Go Down Tour ('93) & others too many to mention each with their own character & design." (sic)
   The tour was unofficially and unexpectedly interrupted in 1997. Dylan had to cancel dates after suffering a serious medical issue in May. CBS Records announced he was being hospitalized for a "potentially fatal" chest infection. A European tour was cancelled prior to release of Time Out of Mind to allow him time to recuperate. In a 2001 Austrian press interview with Thomas Zeidler, Dylan dismissed the term on the grounds that some day he'll be unable to hit the road.

Dylan's Introduction

Since August 15, 2002, Dylan has been introduced at the beginning of most of his concerts with an announcement made by a member of his stage crew:
The Buffalo News, on August 9, 2002.

Releases, Broadcast & Books

The only officially released live document from the period covered by The Never Ending Tour was a solo set for MTV Unplugged in 1995. Fans, especially on the internet, are known to record, catalogue and trade CDs from his concerts at about the rate of other celebrated live artists, such as Phish and The Grateful Dead. As with those groups, a proper explanation for this is Dylan's tendency to rarely perform a song or even a show in the same manner twice. Amazon.com broadcast a 2005 live performance on their homepage, in celebration of the site's tenth anniversary.
Andrew Muir authored the book Razor's Edge: Bob Dylan and the Never Ending Tour in September, 2001. The book attempts to chronicle the first decade and a half, while exploring Dylan's possible motivations.

Band

Since 2005, Bob Dylan's band consists of the following members:

Bob Dylan — vocals, guitar, keyboard, harmonica
Stu Kimball — guitar
Donnie Herron — pedal steel guitar, lap steel guitar, electric mandolin, banjo, fiddle
Denny Freeman — guitar, slide guitar
Tony Garnier — bass guitar, standup bass
George Receli — drums

During a 2006 interview with Rolling Stone, Dylan spoke about his current band:

Further Information

Get more info on 'Never Ending Tour'.

External Link Exchanges

Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:

<a href="http://never_ending_tour.totallyexplained.com">Never Ending Tour Totally Explained</a>

Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned.