Nashville Skyline
| Bob Dylan
Nashville Skyline
Nashville Skyline is the ninth studio album by American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan, released on April 9, 1969, by Columbia Records as LP record, reel to reel tape and audio cassette. Building on the rustic style he experimented with on John Wesley Harding, Nashville Skyline displayed a complete immersion into country music. Along with the more basic lyrical themes, simple songwriting structures, and charming domestic feel, it introduced audiences to a radically new singing voice from Dylan, who had temporarily quit smoking a soft, affected country croon.-Wikipedia
Critic Reviews
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Rolling Stone
May 29, 1969. Most obviously, Nashville Skyline continues Dylan’s rediscovered romance with rural music (here complete with a more suitable, subtle “country” voice). The new LP represents a natural progression, both historically and emotionally, from the folk-music landscapes of John Wesley Harding into the more modern country-and-western worlds of Hank Williams, Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, Buddy Holly, the Everly Brothers, and Jerry Lee Lewis.
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Rolling Stone
September 12, 2012. He went back down to Nashville to cut a simple country record. If that wasn't enough of a change, he was suddenly singing in a completely different voice; even some longtime fans didn't initially recognize they were listening to a Dylan song when "Lay Lady Lay" came on the radio.
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All Music
It's a warm, friendly album, particularly since Bob Dylan is singing in a previously unheard gentle croon -- the sound of his voice is so different it may be disarming upon first listen, but it suits the songs. And there's no discounting that Nashville Skyline, arriving in the spring of 1969, established country-rock as a vital force in pop music, as well as a commercially viable genre.
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No Depression
April 23, 2014. In 1969, when Country Rock was in it's infancy, Bob Dylan had the foresight to go to Nashville AKA "Music City U.S.A" to make a new album influenced by his close friend Johnny Cash. This may or may not be my personal favorite...but it is in many ways Bob's best!
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The Absolute Sound
March 10, 2017. While the recording isn’t a standout in terms of dimension and depth, there’s now far more atmosphere and sense of place and time. Vocal quarrels aside, Dylan’s Nashville persona worked, and the album became one of the Nobel Laureate’s best-selling efforts.
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Sputnik Music
July 13, 2014. Throughout Nashville Skyline Dylan shows his competence as a musician, sounding more than comfortable playing a style that is somewhat removed from his usual stripped back folk sound or his blues based electric material. In many ways it’s the album’s focus on Dylan’s musical qualities that makes Nashville Skyline such an interesting listen.
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Sputnik Music
January 16, 2005. This album was released in 1969, a time when Dylan was trying hard to shed the claims that he was "the voice of his generation". On this album, he takes on a country feel and a soft, crooning singing voice.
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Countdown Kid
May 31, 2013. Sporting a voice that made him sound like Engelbert Humperdinck’s slightly soused cousin and flaunting a crack studio band that could make even the simplest compositions come to life, Dylan made country music filled with energy and warmth. The album became one of the most popular of his career and includes a few stone-cold classics for good measure.
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Vinyl Reviews
Of course, Dylan’s voice did sound different than before—a result of his having quit smoking and lost some of his prior rasp. And instead of spinning out visionary poetry (with Blonde on Blonde, he had taken that avenue as far as it had ever gone), Dylan accomplished a subtler form of revolution with a pioneering country-rock crossover album packed with songs that both opened the door for country music’s huge expansion and popularity over the last half century—and shaped the course of pop.
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Blog Critics
September 21, 2008. 1969 would find a far different Dylan than just a few years previous. Gone were the angry protest songs and bohemian lifestyle. He was now married with three children and was shunning the limelight. Nashville Skyline, despite being rooted in country music, was a calm and even happy affair.
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Ultimate Classic Rock
April 9, 2015. By exploring country music in a completely non-ironic way, Dylan had shattered a counterculture hipster archetype. "Country music was despised, hick music when Dylan took it up," Michael Gray wrote in the Bob Dylan Encylopedia. "People were divided into the hip and the non-hip." Nashville Skyline ultimately helped kick open the door for the looming Americana movement to follow.
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The Best of Website
Nashville Skyline is part of his Bob Dylan's country faze from the late 60's and early 70's, and his strongest output from that genre.
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Norman Records
1969’s Nashville Skyline finds Dylan going all the way into country music: must be in that Nashville air. Also marks the first appearance of croony singing voice.
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itunes Apple Music
By 1969, Bob Dylan was again changing personas, this time singing country with a throaty drawl and a humble tone. . . .And Dylan proved that he could sing in a warm, liquid croon on the lovely, hushed “Lay Lady Lay.” This often twangy affair ranks as one of Dylan’s greatest.
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Wide Open Country
April 9, 2018. In 1969, Dylan released Nashville Skyline, his ninth studio album. It marked a change for Dylan. Instead of poetic justice, traditional folk or rambling blues, Nashville Skyline was a trim country crooner that found the troubadour as relaxed and comfortable as he's ever been.
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The Benefits of Cold Coffee
September 24, 2012. There’s a warmth here that’s unsurpassed by his other works. No, it’s not any more heartfelt for being simple . . . . Most of the rest are pretty thin on substance, dabbling in clichés hopelessly. So what recommends it? Charm. Warmth. Something that has far more to do with Dylan’s smooth, gentle and sympathetic voice (where was he hiding it all decade?) than the lyrical content of his record. There’s a humble simplicity to it all.
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Alltime Records
April 29 2018. So yes, Nashville Skyline is the first Bob Dylan album I would say contains ditties. But what fine ditties they are! Whilst some of them are better than others, this album surely contains enough moments to make it worth its weight in gold.
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The Current
September 11, 2017. It’s enjoyable listen start to finish. Dylan also showed he was ahead of the curve by predating the “country rock” scene that was to come by a couple of years. I get the impression Dylan wasn’t trying to change the world with Nashville Skyline — he was just having fun.
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Nowhere Bros
July 10, 2013. Released in 1969 during the height of flower power Nashville Skyline was completely removed from much of everything else that was going on musically at the time and saw Bob Dylan build on the rootsy sound of his previous release 1967s John Wesley Harding as he moved head first into country music, leaving behind his politically charged folk anthems in the process.
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TV Tropes
A departure from his previous albums, this album sees Dylan dive in head-first into the developing country rock genre, even singing a duet with Johnny Cash on "Girl From The North Country". Not only that, this album sees a new singing style for Dylan - one that is arguably the most accessible to those who otherwise can't get into Dylan.
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Paste Magazine
April 14, 2017. If Blonde on Blonde was not really a country album at all and if John Wesley Harding was a minimalist retro-country album, 1969’s Nashville Skyline was a contemporary country album, full of smooth, romantic crooning and pedal steel guitar.
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Starling Rinet
Dylan goes hardcore country. Lightweight and short, but unexpectedly enjoyable.
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Wilson & Alroy's Record Reviews
Another huge change for him, straightforward country & western songs with his most direct lyrics ever. Also, his voice is clearer and warmer than any record before or since, thanks to taking a break from cigarettes. I'm no country fan, but somehow Dylan manages to wring a gallon of emotional sincerity out of this concoction.
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Vinyl Me Please
November 16, 2016. . . . Nashville Skyline, an earnest country folk album Dylan recorded with a vocal patois he never used again; he sounds like a frog gurgling water for most of this, but that’s not meant as a negative. It’s just different. The songwriting on this is some of Dylan’s most tender, and most evocative; . . . .
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Rule Forty Two
November 1, 2010. When Nashville Skyline, the last of Dylan’s brilliant ’60s albums, was released, fans examined every one of its twenty-seven minutes for portents of musical revolution like fortune-tellers poring over the intestines of a goat. Now, without the weight of those expectations, Skyline just sounds like a great country-folk record. It’s warm, full of love songs, and even features Dylan employing a baritone croon rather than his trademark wheeze.
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Entertainment
March 29, 1991 A crooning country LP (”Lay Lady Lay”) important at the time for social reasons (by recording with Nashville star Johnny Cash, Dylan introduced the counterculture to country conservatism) but mostly a curiosity today.
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Mark Prindle
It's certainly not the most groundbreaking record in the history of mankind, but it was yet another musical experiment in a career of musical experiments, so you gotta give him credit for that. Plus, all the songs are just fine!
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The Fat Angel Sings
April 8, 2018. Building on the rustic style he experimented with on John Wesley Harding, “Nashville Skyline” displayed a complete immersion into country music. Along with the more basic lyrical themes, simple songwriting structures, and charming domestic feel, it introduced audiences to a radically new singing voice from Dylan—a soft, affected country croon.
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Teach Rock
1969. Taken at face value, Nashville Skyline is a warm, friendly album. In voice and in words, Mr. Dylan has mellowed, calmed down, grown up. It isn't that he has forgotten how to be alienated. He just seems to have learned how to be happy.
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Daily Journal
June 5, 2013. Listeners at the time heard Dylan's "new" voice: a gentle, night club variety. Despite the inclusion of only one track among many cut with Johnny Cash, "Skyline" is an incredibly versatile country album.
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