Gotta Serve Somebody: The Gospel Songs of Bob Dylan is a tribute album released on the Sony/Columbia label in 2003, which features traditional and contemporary gospel singers performing songs written by Bob Dylan during his "born again" period (1979–81). Five songs on the album had originally appeared in Dylan's own performances on his first Christian album, Slow Train Coming, and six songs had appeared on his second, Saved. There are none taken from his third and last album from this period, Shot of Love. Dylan himself performs on the album in a duet with Mavis Staples of "Gonna Change My Way of Thinking," which Dylan completely re-wrote and prefaced by some humorous banter between the two.
The Gotta Serve Somebody CD was Grammy nominated for Best Traditional Soul Gospel Album and also Best Pop Collaboration With Vocals for the Bob Dylan and Mavis Staples duet.
The companion documentary DVD on Image Entertainment premieres 1980 archival footage of Bob Dylan performing "When He Returns" and features interviews with Dylan musicians: Jim Keltner, Spooner Oldham, Regina McCrary, Fred Tackett, Terry Young, Mona Lisa Young and producer Jerry Wexler.
The documentary DVD won Gold Medal for Excellence Audience Choice for Best Music Documentary at Park City Film Music Festival.
Read more about Gotta Serve Somebody: The Gospel Songs Of Bob Dylan: Track Listing
Famous quotes containing the words bob dylan, gotta, gospel, songs and/or dylan:
“... Everything from toy guns that spark
To flesh-colored Christs that glow in the dark
It’s easy to see without looking too far
That not much is really sacred.”
—Bob Dylan [Robert Allen Zimmerman] (b. 1941)
“Haggerty: Girls! Girls! Girls! Be careful of my hats.
Chorus Girl: Well, we gotta get down on the stage.
Haggerty: I don’t care. I won’t allow you to ruin them.
Dressing Room Matron: See, I told you. They were too high and too wide.
Haggerty: Well, Big Woman, I designed the costumes for the show, not the doors for the theater.
Dressing Room Matron: I know that. If you had, they’d have been done in lavender.”
—James Gleason (1886–1959)
“Theologians should not be ashamed to admit that they cannot enter a contest with such antagonists [the sceptics], and that they do not want to expose the Gospel truths to such an attack. The ship of Jesus Christ is not made for sailing on this stormy sea, but for taking shelter from this tempest in the haven of faith.”
—Pierre Bayle (1647–1706)
“And songs climb out of the flames of the near campfires,
Pale, pastel things exquisite in their frailness
With a note or two to indicate it isn’t lost,
On them at least. The songs decorate our notion of the world
And mark its limits, like a frieze of soap-bubbles.”
—John Ashbery (b. 1927)
“When I first heard Elvis’s voice I just knew that I wasn’t going to work for anybody and nobody was gonna be my boss. Hearing him for the first time was like busting out of jail.”
—Bob Dylan [Robert Allen Zimmerman] (b. 1941)