"Pat Garrett & Billy The Kid: Original Soundtrack Recording" by BOB DYLAN – July 1973 US LP on Columbia Records and November 1973 UK on CBS Records – Featuring Guitarists Bruce Langhorne, Roger McGuinn, Carol Hunter, Bob Dylan and Stephen Bruton with Byron Berline on Fiddle, Gary Foster on Flute and Recorder, Booker T. of The MG’s and Terry Paul on Bass, Jim Keltner on Drums with Russ Kunkel on Tambourine and Roger McGuinn, Priscilla Jones, Donna Weiss and Brenda Patterson on Vocals (February 1991 UK Columbia CD Reissue) - A Review by Mark Barry

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"...Heaven's Door..."

 

Includes 2022 Update on CD Reissues Available

 

Strong silent types who let the pistolas do the jabbering as they gob beef jerky at lame horses and a trembling sheriff, while Claudine (a tired corporate hospitality employee) stands in the doorway of the saloon scratching her less than immaculate garter wondering if business is going to be slow tonight after the boys let off some Prairie steam, Yellowstone style.

 

Dylan's first soundtrack for a Western came as something of a happy accident – something to do between gigs in 1973. Director Sam Peckinpah was holed up in Mexico with his talented and gruffly photogenic MGM cast - Kris Kristofferson as Billy The Kid, James Coburn as Pat Garrett, Jason Robards as Governor Wallace, Richard Jaeckel as Sheriff Kip McKinney and Katy Jurado as Mrs. Baker. Established acting hands, future film stars and cool musical types also peppered the smaller roles – Dr. Strangelove's Slim Pickens as Sheriff Baker, "Paris, Texas" and "Repo Man" uber-dude Harry Dean Stanton as Luke and complimenting those are singer Rita Coolidge and her Keyboardist Donnie Fritts as Maria and Beaver. And of course perhaps coolest of them all – the old moocher himself Bob Dylan as the appropriately obscure character 'Alias' – looking like he fits right in with all the sputum, blood and brucellosis.

 

Sent to him by writer Rudolph Wurlitzer - Dylan had read the script and liked it and was even inspired. Sessions took place on location in CBS's Mexico City Studios and then back in Los Angeles with Warner Brothers producing a string of quietly majestic instrumentals that countered the bloody mayhem on screen. Even the front cover artwork seemed lean and uncluttered in keeping with the mean and moody themes - a bare black and white title complimented on the rear by sparse musician credits and a startling picture of Kris Kristofferson kneeling in the dirt – hand-cuffed - a show-me-some-mercy grimace on his face as Sheriff Richard Jaeckel points his shotgun down into his chest and cocks the trigger.

 

CD COST ISSUES:

But what of the CD you say... a little explanation is needed.

 

The UK 'public domain' CD Master for Dylan's 1973 soundtrack to Sam Peckinpah's film "Pat Garrett & Billy The Kid" was issued as far back as February 1991 (even earlier in the USA, 1989) and has essentially remained that way for over 30-years. However, don't let that put you off; Pat Garrett is one of only a handful of first vanguard CD reissues that I listen to often and need no more. It sounds lovely.

 

But with that old original untouched by Sony in three decades as a stand-alone purchase – reissue companies have spotted a cult-album slot and a veritable slew of pricey audiophile alternatives have emerged to meet that need. In January 2022 (as I write this), there are actually three options, but unfortunately they will make your wallet feel queasy.

 

Japan did a Repro Artwork Paper Sleeve Mini-LP CD Reissue and Remaster in April 2014 on their BLU-SPEC 2 format (Sony International SICP-30487 - Barcode 4547366215977) that has received unanimous rave reviews. It can be played on standard CD players too and is available from various online sites for anything between £22 and £35 (use Barcode number above to locate).

 

Desirable too is the US-Only Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab SACD Version issued March 2019 as one of their Ultradisc UHR reissues, again in a card sleeve, and again playable on all machines. A limited edition of 2,500 copies worldwide, Mobile Fidelity DSACD 2202 (Barcode 821797220262) sells for anything between £40 and £55 all in - another pricey soon-to-be-a deletion.

 

There is also a Remaster in November 2013's 43-CD Box Set "The Complete Album Collection Vol.1" on Sony/Legacy 88691924312 (Barcode 886919243123). "Pat Garrett & Billy The Kid: Original Soundtrack Recording" was one of the 14 Newly Remastered Titles for that fabulous Box Set - but again – sellers now know it is deleted and rare and therefore 'tis well over two-hundred spackaroonies to find one. So let's get back to single-disc reissue basics...and deal with what we can get easily and without costing a limb...

 

1. Main Title Theme (Billy) – Side 1

2. Cantina Theme (Workin’ For The Law)

3. Billy 1

4. Bunkhouse Theme

5. River Theme

6. Turkey Chase – Side 2

7. Knockin' On Heaven's Door

8. Final Theme

9. Billy 4

10. Billy 7

Tracks 1 to 10 are his twelfth studio album "Pat Garrett & Billy The Kid: Original Soundtrack Recording" (First Soundtrack) – released July 1973 in the USA on Columbia KC 32460 and November 1973 in the UK on CBS Records S 69042. Produced by GORDON CARROLL – it peaked at No. 16 in the USA and No. 29 in the UK.

 

UK-issued February 1991, Columbia CD 32098 (Barcode 5099703209822) sports a puny gatefold-slip of paper as an inlay with ne'er a mastering credit in sight anywhere (35:25 minutes). And yet when you slap on "Main Title Theme (Billy)" - adopted by the public as a walk-in theme song to many a bride arriving for her wedding day - the audio clarity is gobsmacking. This CD may be old and dull to look at (like the original LP with its simplistic artwork and frankly bugger all info front or back) - but it delivers on the audio front with a simple hiss-less beauty that sends this mainly-instrumentals album rattling around your room with impressive power.

 

The album opens with the beautiful and moving instrumental "Main Title Theme (Billy)" – Russ Kunkel shaking a Tambourine (like a backdrop of crickets at night) against one of the true heroes of the album – Guitarist Bruce Langhorne. Langhorne had met Dylan back in 1961 as a young pup hustling his song wares and had a large drum kit that sounded like a tambourine – hence he became the inspiration for "Mr. Tambourine Man". The sheer musicality of his playing here is magical, a subtle Bass line from Booker T. of the MG’s giving a bottom end to the six minute linger. After another instrumental called "Cantina Theme (Workin' For The Law)" that's decidedly less impressive than what went before it, we get Dylan's first vocal on "Billy 1" - our gunslingin' hero playing cards while guns across the river threaten in the distance. 

 

At only 2:13 minutes "Bunkhouse Theme" has only Carol Hunter and Bob Dyan dueling on Acoustic Guitars (although they make it sound like there are two more) and again, a gorgeous audio. "River Theme" has a wall of three humming voices 'la-la-la-ing' their way into your heart (Byron Berline, Priscilla Jones and Donna Weiss) - whilst Booker T. Jones (Priscilla is his wife) holds the Bass and the acoustics of Bruce Langhorne and Bob set the slightly doomy mood for this faraway-getting-too-near chant.

 

Side 2 opens with Byron Berline on fiddle while Roger McGuinn posing as Jolly Roger plucks a banjo on "Turkey Chase". It's never been a fave instrumental on the album for me, but it is followed by a barnstormer - "Knockin' On Heaven's Door" smooching into your air with a brilliantly placed Harmonium (played by Carl Fortina). Roger McGuinn of The Byrds doubles with Bruce Langhorne on guitars for "Knockin'..." - the ooh-ooh-ing ladies including Carol Hunter, Priscilla Jones, Donna Weiss and Brenda Patterson. Terry Paul plucks his Bass, Jim Keltner taps his Drums while Dylan sings of the darkness getting too thick to see. Even now, it's a stunner.

 

I can't be the only listener who thinks Dylan could have called Billy 4 "So Far Away From Home" and Billy 7 "Might Be Thunder" instead of the lazy numbers system he applied. And speaking of re-arrangements, surely the magisterial flute and instrument-building instrumental "Final Theme" should indeed have been the finale song? I often program the CD to run Tracks 9, 10 and then 8 – just sounds more coherent that way.

 

Dylan would do two on Asylum of a frankly ho-hum nature in 1974 – "Planet Waves" in January and the live double "Before The Flood" in June – both in collusion with his old muckers The Band (the less said about the contractual 1973 "Dylan" album, the better). But it wouldn't really be until the monumental "Blood On The Tracks" album in January 1975 that he would regain the awe he was held with in the 60ts – a musical and lyrical milestone ever since.

 

The Original Soundtrack to "Pat Garrett & Billy The Kid" could be construed in a Dylan Multi-Verse as a chucked-together quickie with one huge hit on it whilst the rest of it is just a bunch of lumbering guitar, vocal and fiddle noodling. But I suspect that for many fans of the enigma that is the Bobster and his sparing 'Mr. Tambourine Man' guitarist partner-in-crime Bruce Langhorne – this a regular port of call when many others have lain on their bulging CD shelves, untouched for years.

 

"Billy, they don't like you to be so free..." Well my crazy faces, bullet holes and four more aces - feel free to investigate this forgotten corner of the Zim's incredible Seventies legacy - because it's never too dark to see new light in old windows like these (and it's cheap too)...