Amazing scenes in the Uncut office last week, when Bob Dylan finally announced Shadows In The Night โ€“ his latest studio album featuring interpretations of Frank Sinatra standards.

Advertisement

Anyone surprised by the news of Dylanโ€™s affection for olโ€™ Blue Eyes would have done well to reach for their copy of Chronicles Volume 1. There, Dylan noted, โ€œI used to play the phenomenal โ€˜Ebb Tideโ€™ by Frank Sinatra a lot and it never failed to fill me with aweโ€ฆ when Frank sang that song, I could hear everything in his voice โ€“ death, God and the universe, everything.โ€

For Shadows In The Night, Dylanโ€™s 36th studio album, he and his band have recorded ten songs popularised by Sinatra during the 1940s. Keen Dylanologists will already know that Dylan previously recorded an unreleased version of Sinatraโ€™s 1967 song โ€œThis Is My Loveโ€ during the Infidels sessions. He also covered โ€œAll My Tomorrowsโ€, from Sinatraโ€™s All The Way album, live in 1986 and delivered a moving version of โ€œRestless Farewellโ€ at Sinatraโ€™s 80th birthday tribute in 1995. Heโ€™s played โ€œThat Lucky Old Sunโ€ in 1986 and 2000. More recently, he unveiled his version Sinatraโ€™s 1964 single, โ€œStay With Meโ€ during his run on shows in December at New Yorkโ€™s Beacon Theatre, a few days before Shadows In The Night was formally announced. The very first episode of Theme Time Radio Hour, broadcast on May 3, 2006, included Sinatraโ€™a โ€œSummer Windโ€.

Anyway, itโ€™s all exciting stuff. What I thought might be instructive is to run below Sinatraโ€™s original recordings (plus Dylanโ€™s currently available versions). That way, it might be possible to get a flavour of what we can expect when Shadows In The Night is finally released on February 3, 2015โ€ฆ

Advertisement

โ€œIโ€™m A Fool To Want Youโ€

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4iQhGb2db-Q

โ€œThe Night We Called It A Dayโ€

โ€œStay With Meโ€

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2I1ctqIR2M

โ€œAutumn Leavesโ€

โ€œWhy Try To Change Me Nowโ€

โ€œSome Enchanted Eveningโ€

โ€œFull Moon And Empty Armsโ€

โ€œWhere Are You?โ€

โ€œWhatโ€™ll I Doโ€

โ€œThat Lucky Old Sunโ€