Diehard

I was whitewashed and wasted professionally.

— Bob Dylan

Urban Dictionary defines a "diehard" as a fan who's "completely 100% obsessed." When it comes to Bob Dylan, that fits me to a T. 

There are millions of us Bob Dylan diehards around the globe.

Upon meeting, we can size up one another's standing as Bobcats readily, merely by asking whether our devotion extends even to Dylan's early-'80s albums like "Shot of Love," "Infidels," "Empire Burlesque," and "Knocked Out Loaded," released during a period of his career he would later call "wasted."

If the answer's yes, we know definitely we're dehards, companion members of the species Dylanus invictus.

So it's like a diehard's Christmas to listen to the latest Bob Dylan album, "Springtime in New York," Volume 16 of "The Bootleg Series."

On five CDs, "Springtime" packages nearly 60 alternate versions, rehearsal tracks, and outtakes from Dylan's albums of the early '80s, with the result that you are immersed for over two hours in works of unmistakable lyrical and melodic genius.

Stripped of '80s synthesizers, gated reverb, and digital overengineering, the recordings sound live and "unplugged," like classic Bob Dylan tunes. Some stripped-down versions of the songs are so well performed, they put the haphazard versions released in the '80s to shame.

The alternate versions of many of the songs, moreover, offer you a chance to follow a tune's development, and to ponder why Dylan would recast lyrics another songwriter would have sold his soul for.

All in all, "Springtime in New York" will remind you how vastly rich Dylan's song catalog is—even his catalog from the early '80s. 

NOTE: Should you want a distilled edition of the five-CD album, a two-CD edition is available for one-fifth the price of the "deluxe" one.