Steve Howe's tribute album
Portraits of Bob Dylan is fundamentally flawed from conception.
Howe is a gifted, if occasionally bombastic, guitarist, but
Dylan's simple melodies don't really lend themselves to epic guitar workouts. Furthermore, the list of somewhat-past-their-prime vocalists
Howe gathered to help with this project (former
Yes bandmate
Jon Anderson, easy listening favorite
Phoebe Snow,
Annie Haslam of prog-classical explorers
Renaissance, soul legend
P.P. Arnold, and former
Hollies lead singer
Allan Clarke) are undeniably talented, but, well, none of them are
Dylan, and as CBS Records was reminding us as early as the mid-'60s, "Nobody sings
Dylan like
Dylan." What we're left with, then, are 12 perfectly adequate covers ranging from old chestnuts like "Don't Think Twice, It's All Right" (done in a rather nice ornate finger-picking style) to the admirably obscure "Going, Going, Gone" (from 1974's underrated
Planet Waves and essayed in a hyper-dramatic style by
Clarke).
Portraits of Bob Dylan is pleasant enough, and it's a nice gesture toward an obvious hero of
Howe's, but it's not even close to essential for either
Dylan or
Howe fans.