Stream ‘The New Basement Tapes’ Featuring Elvis Costello and Jim James
The entirety of Lost on the River: The New Basement Tapes – a collection of lyrics that Bob Dylan wrote during his legendary Basement Tapes sessions that have been given fresh music by the likes of Elvis Costello, Marcus Mumford, Jim James and more – is now streaming on iTunes.
Producer T Bone Burnett handpicked each of the musicians, which also include the Carolina Chocolate Drops’ Rhiannon Giddens and Dawes’ Taylor Goldsmith, based on their abilities as songwriters, and encouraged them to serve as the bandleader for the songs they wrote. Johnny Depp even stopped by for a session. Burnett then recorded them in a studio appropriately located in the basement of the Capitol Records building in Los Angeles. The record will be available to purchase on November 10th.
“What transpired during those two weeks was amazing for all of us,” Burnett said in a statement. “There was a deep well of generosity and support in the studio at all times, which reflected the tremendous trust and generosity shown by Bob in sharing these lyrics with us in the first place.”
A documentary about the sessions, Lost Songs: The Basement Tapes Continued, will air on Showtime on November 21st at 9 p.m. EST. Last month, Rolling Stone premiered a clip from the film showing Costello leading his de facto bandmates through the New Basement Tapes song “Six Months in Kansas City (Liberty Street)” to get a taste of the sessions. The doc will also include a new interview with Dylan.
In related news, Dylan recently issued a box set of all 138 tracks he recorded with the Band during the original Basement Tapes sessions in 1968. A history of what has become The Basement Tapes Complete: The Bootleg Series Vol. 11 is the subject of Rolling Stone‘s current cover story.