Bob Dylan has delved into the ‘Basement Tapes’ once again, playing ‘I Shall Be Released’ for the first time in 18 years at a recent concert.
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Last week, the Nobel-winning songwriter extended his long-running ‘Rough and Rowdy Ways’ tour into late 2026, adding further North American dates to the run, which took Dylan to Oregon’s Cuthbert Amphitheatre on Tuesday night (June 9).
At that gig, he brought back a song for the first time in 18 years, playing ‘I Shall Be Released’, which was last played at a 2008 concert in Warsaw.
He wrote the track in 1967, and he and the Band recorded it during their ‘Basement Tapes sessions’. The Band also recorded their own version of the song without Dylan, and they used it as the closing track on their 1968 debut ‘Music From Big Pink’.
It comes after he opened a previous Washington gig with another ‘Basement Tapes’ cut in ‘You Ain’t Goin’ Nowhere’. The song, which he hasn’t played in concert since 2012, saw him joined on vocals by his guitarists Doug Lancio and Bob Britt, a callback to the Larry Campbell and Charlie Sexton era in the late ’90s to early ’00s, when it was far more common for his bandmates to sing with him.
The track itself has been covered by the likes of The Byrds and Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, making it slightly less surprising than the addition of ‘Baby’, Won’t You Be My Baby’ to the opening night’s setlist, which he hadn’t touched since recording it some 59 years ago.
Earlier this year, Paul McCartney said Dylan was the one artist that he feels “nervous” to approach, and in another recent interview, he revealed he had recently been to see one of his shows and admitted, “Honestly, I couldn’t tell what song he was doing.”
He said that he understood if he “doesn’t want to do ‘Mr. Tambourine Man’, maybe he’s fed up with it”, but added, “I would like to hear it. And I paid!”
Dylan has spoken highly of McCartney many times, including in 2007 when he said: “I’m in awe of McCartney. He’s about the only one that I am in awe of. He can do it all. And he’s never let up…He’s just so damn effortless.”
Elsewhere, Dylan paid tribute to Shane MacGowan with a cover of ‘A Rainy Night In Soho’ in Dublin back in November, while at another show in Ireland, he performed a traditional folk ballad for the first time in 34 years.
Earlier on the tour, the operator of a Dylan fan site claimed he was asked to leave the venue in Glasgow, after being told he was an “unwanted person”. He said he was removed from the gig because he had been recirculating live photos and footage from Dylan’s tour – which prohibits the use of video cameras and mobile phones.
It was also reported last year that Dylan had been working on new music with “members of his band” in Albany, New York. He has also contributed to Willie Nelson’s new album ‘Dream Chaser’, which came out last month.
