Santa Cruz
A Bob Dylan road trip that took an unexpected turn
Hello and welcome to another episode of The Drawing Book’s rapidly dwindling Bob Dylan comics! This time we’re taking a fateful trip to California - a trip that would change my life. At that time, I lived in Calgary, and my Bob Dylan travelling friend lived in Toronto. A few years before, we’d both been awakened to the wonders of Dylan’s music while living together as roommates in Toronto. (You can read about that here). But what had sparked that interest? In part, it was thanks to a friend of my roommate’s: a guy I’d never met. He was a Dylan fan who had been sending her mix tapes that we both listened to. Those tapes helped to get us hooked.
Anyway, that guy was now living out in San Francisco, and when we heard that there were some California shows coming up in the spring of 2000, it seemed like a great opportunity to head down. It was cool for me to meet my friend’s friend in person, after all this time – in the drawing book, I described him as “a figure of legend.”
But the shows were not in San Francisco - they were in Santa Cruz, about an hour and a half’s drive south. I think this was the trip where we realized we hadn’t brought any music to listen to (this was before the days of digital streaming)… and we had a strict rule that we could only listen to Bob Dylan music on a Bob Dylan road trip. Luckily, one or the other of us dug up a cassette tape of Street-Legal. And so Street-Legal it was, for the whole trip – on repeat. A road trip that confirmed my especial love for that album, which remains my favourite to this day! (I got to talk about Street-Legal’s greatest song, “Where Are You Tonight? (Journey Through Dark Heat)” on the wonderful podcast Pod Dylan, a couple of months ago.) (That previous link was to the Google version of the podcast, but here it is on Apple Podcasts, too.)
In the picture above, we were sitting on the sidewalk. Why? Because, strange as it may sound, we’d come all the way to California without tickets. It wasn’t the way it is now – like last fall, when tickets to Bob Dylan’s 2023 Toronto shows at Massey Hall sold out within minutes of being released online, at ridiculous prices. Back then, you could expect to buy last-minute tickets at the venue, or get some from scalpers or just folks whose plans had changed. We travelled to all our shows on standby, thanks to my Air Canada flight passes, without knowing for sure that we’d get there - and so it never made sense to buy tickets ahead. We’d always managed to get in, before. But that night proved to be more precarious than most.
The show was about to start, and somehow we heard a rumour that there were a few open spots remaining. It was a small venue - the Boblinks website tells me the seating capacity at the Santa Cruz Civic Auditorium only holds 1957 people. I wish I could find an old photo, which I still have somewhere, of the venue marquee, that still showed the lineup from the night before: Neil Young had just played there.
Word came down the line that the venue was going to release the extra tickets to the first ones in line. Luckily, we were pretty close to the front. We held on to our spots and dreamed about the perfect set list.
We talked to the people near us in line. Waiting just behind us was a long-haired guy in a bright red mechanic’s suit. We remarked on his suit and he told us this story. He was actually a student at Stanford, but some years before, he’d been working as a mechanic. One day, he heard about the chance to see a Bob Dylan show and dashed out to see it without having time to change out of his bright red suit. Ever since then, that had been the lucky suit that he wore to every Bob Dylan show - wearing it, he felt that he was guaranteed to get a ticket. If I remember right, this show would be his twentieth show. I remember that because this would be my twentieth show, too.
But it was not to be. When the venue folks came out to release the extra tickets, they didn’t give them to the first people who were lined up - but, instead, to random people throughout the line. Our Stanford friend wasn’t in luck, but amazingly, the three of us all got tickets, and we were in.
After all that, our hopes were high. Maybe that’s why I felt so disappointed by the show that I called it “The Most Disappointing Show Ever.”
Some of the show reviews I found online confirm that the band wasn’t at its best that night. But… how could I have called that a predictable set list?!? Sure, the then-current standards were all there in their usual places - I’d heard them all before. I guess that’s what I meant. But there were some incredible standouts. Willie Dixon’s “Hoochie Coochie Man,” (made famous by Muddy Waters in performances like this one) one of only three times Bob has ever performed the song; “Pass Me Not, O Gentle Savior” by Frances J. Crosby and William H. Doane, one of only five performances ever; the first time I heard “Drifter’s Escape”… and it was only the fifth-ever performance of “Things Have Changed,” which Bob has since played over a thousand (!) times. (If you don’t know this great song, check out the wonderful video for the original release.) Honestly, other show issues aside, it was an amazing set list, and you can hear the whole show here on the Bobserve site.
But that wasn’t all. There was a second show, the next night. So the next day, we repeated the work of patiently waiting in line on the sidewalk for tickets to materialize. By now, we were getting weary and worn out. Not too weary to quote “Brownsville Girl” in the drawing book, though.
There was something else on my mind, too. At the show the night before, I’d met a boy I really liked. In my drawing book, I’d often drawn pictures of ships, as I imagined myself adrift in a churning sea of changes. Now, I drew my ship running aground, as I sensed that I’d arrived in a new place that I was going to stay for a while. Little did I know what would happen next.
But first, the show on the second night. March 16, 2000. Definitely one of the best and most memorable shows I’ve ever seen. I’m sorry that there are no comics about the show, but there are some great reviews on the Boblinks site. You can also listen to the whole show, here.
And if you do, you will hear some great covers, including “Rock of Ages” (one of only ten performances ever) and Johnny Cash’s “Big River” (one of only six performances). There were songs I had never heard live: the iconic “Song to Woody,” one of the first songs Bob ever wrote, as a tribute to his idol, Woody Guthrie (if you don’t know that song, check out the original version here)… and an amazing rendition of “It’s Alright, Ma.”
And the highlight of the night (and maybe of my all Bob Dylan touring years?) - “Highlands.” He’s only played it nine times in all these years, and this performance was unforgettable. This long story-song was told with so much humour, and audience interaction - it was Bob at his most animated. We were standing on the floor a few rows from the front and got to see him smiling, flashing his teeth and pausing to emphasize every poignant and funny word of this complex song. It was twenty-four years ago and I can still remember it well! You can hear that performance of “Highlands” here, and you can hear the whole show here. (And you happen to be unfamiliar with this long song, you might want to start with the official version: the words are a clearer than on the bootlegged recording from the show.)
It was an amazing show. And that wasn’t all. After the show, I managed to meet up again with the boy from the night before. There was magic happening and we didn’t want to be parted. I changed my travel plans (which created some big inconveniences for my travel companions, to my lasting regret) and stayed in Santa Cruz for another week. The next time I got to my drawing book, I was back at the San Francisco airport, heading back to Canada after a whirlwind week, with the words from another Bob Dylan song in my head: “You’re Going to Make Me Lonesome When You Go.” On this page, I wrote that this this song was there to counterbalance another song I’d written about in the drawing book a while before: “Lucy Ashton’s Song,” which I wrote about in this episode of The Drawing Book called “Flaky Introspection.” I had changed a gloomy song for a joyful one. The opening harmonica on “You’re Going To Make Me Lonesome” still sounds to me like pure joy.
Of course, “You’re Going to Make Me Lonesome When You Go” isn’t really a title that bodes well for a long and lasting relationship, is it? But at the time, I just thought of it as the soundtrack to a new long-distance romance that was going to be defined by meetings and partings. The trip had been magical in so many ways and, for now, I was happy.