Album: Bob Dylan, The Witmark Demos (Columbia)

Forty-seven solo recordings made between 1962 and 1964 for Dylan's first music publishers; little that Bob nuts haven't already devoured illicitly, but nice to have it all packaged up with customary Bootleg Series finesse.

And if what we look for here (apart from songs which never previously reached the world) is telling variations on what we already know, that's not to say that the genius of Dylan isn't everywhere to be heard, stark, relaxed, withering, totally unburdened in its self-conviction. Quietly gripping.