Commissioned to do some soundtrack work, Bob Dylan kept recording with the assembled group – ultimately producing an LP that was loose and so approachable. Together Through Life, released in April 2009, was a revelation in its stubborn unwillingness to move into the realm of Statements, or Big Records, or Career-Defining Blah Blah Blah.
Dylan wanted to make a small, good thing – focusing inward, mostly, talking about relationships with both honesty and a ragged sense of humor. He brilliantly succeeded. Highlights included “Beyond Here Lies Nothin'” and “My Wife’s Hometown,” both of which sound like shambling leftovers from Bob Dylan’s sessions in New Orleans with Daniel Lanois – complete with surprising syncopation, biting guitar (courtesy of Mike Campbell of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers fame), lyrical assists from Robert Hunter and fun, braying vocals.
“She can … make things bad, she can make things worse. She’s got stuff more potent than a gypsy curse,” he sang on “My Wife’s Hometown,” with a sly wink. “One of these days, I’ll end up on the run. I’m pretty sure she’ll make me kill someone.” Only later did we learn that his spouse resides in Hell. The loping “If You Ever Go to Houston” – “you’d better walk right!,” Bob Dylan crooned – was a playful bit of songcraft, too, made complete with this swaying accordion contribution by David Hildago of Los Lobos. “This Dream of You,” in what amounts to a mariachi mash note, was as sweet as it was charming.
There was an intimacy, and a fun musical feel, about the appropriately titled Together Through Life that’s reminiscent of a bottle-passing night of music amongst old friends. It was a welcome return to the kind of collaborative successes he found with Daniel Lanois on Oh Mercy and, earlier, with the Band on recordings like Planet Waves.
Sure, the organic Together Through Life was more pleasing than it was groundbreaking. But that, too, seems brave for someone carrying around the expectations associated with being Bob Dylan. All of the world’s problems, after all, wither under the glare of an angry woman: “State gone broke, the county’s dry,” Dylan sang, “Don’t be lookin’ at me with that evil eye!” He was having fun. And pretty soon, you were too, as Dylan scooted and flirted (no kidding) through a rocker called “Shake Shake Mama.”
He still explores darker emotions on the bluesy “Forgetful Heart” – memorable for a funky, misshapen solo by Campbell at its middle – then opens himself to tender vulnerability on cuts like “Life is Hard,” an almost slow-motion moment of nostalgia. Bob Dylan’s bare-seamed late-career singing is particularly effective on the latter, bringing a broken dignity to a lyric about lost love.
Then Dylan brushes off a lifetime of incessant examination and overthunk interpretations with the Cajun-spiced “It’s All Good”: “Brick by brick they tear you down. … You oughta know, if they could they would,” Dylan sings. “I wouldn’t change it even if I could. You know what they say: It’s all good.”
By turns both chummily tuneful, pungent and toss-off hilarious, Bob Dylan’s unforced Through Life Together was most unlike what your average legend would ever dare be: Real.
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