Steve Howe
's tribute album
Portraits of Bob Dylan
is fundamentally flawed from conception.
Howe
is a gifted, if occasionally bombastic, guitarist, but
Dylan
's simple melodies don't really lend themselves to epic guitar workouts. Furthermore, the list of somewhat-past-their-prime vocalists
gathered to help with this project (former
Yes
bandmate
Jon Anderson
,
easy listening
favorite
Phoebe Snow
Annie Haslam
of
prog
-
classical
explorers
Renaissance
soul
legend
P.P. Arnold
, and former
Hollies
lead singer
Allan Clarke
) are undeniably talented, but, well, none of them are
, and as
CBS Records
was reminding us as early as the mid-'60s, "Nobody sings
like
." What we're left with, then, are 12 perfectly adequate covers ranging from old chestnuts like
"Don't Think Twice, It's All Right"
(done in a rather nice ornate finger-picking style) to the admirably obscure
"Going, Going, Gone"
(from 1974's underrated
Planet Waves
and essayed in a hyper-dramatic style by
Clarke
).
is pleasant enough, and it's a nice gesture toward an obvious hero of
's, but it's not even close to essential for either
or
fans. ~ Stewart Mason