On this day in 1965, Bob Dylan released Bringin' It All Back Home.   Bob pushed the envelope on his 5th album, devoting one side to acoustic tracks and the other to ones with him backed with an electric band.  Songs for the album were banged out on a typewriter in a room Dylan and Joan Baez shared in the Woodstock home of Bob's manager, Albert Grossman. In the midst of writing songs for the album, Dylan went to New York and met with the Beatles in the hotel they were booked in. That August, 1964 meeting is thought to have convinced Dylan that shifting  into an electric mode was the right path for him musically.  Having made the decision, he contacted Robbie Robertson, Levon Helm and Garth Brooks, members of the Hawks, a bar band he'd encountered in 1963, but the future members of The Band were not brought in on the sessions for Bringin' It All Back Home. A number of the musicians that were entered and exited sessions without contributing anything Dylan was satisfied with. Once things jelled, the recording of the electric side of the album came together quickly. 

The release was met with raves and pans. His decision to go electric cost him some fans but gained him considerably more than he lost.

 

Other Noteworthy Classic Rock events on May 22 include...

 

1980 U2 opens 11 O'Clock Tic Tock toru in London.

1997 Fleetwood Mac reunite to record MTV special.

2002 Steely Dan honored with Founders Award at ASCAP Music Awards ceremony.

2007 Ozzy Osbourne releases Black Rain.

2010 Bono undergoes emergency back surgery in Munich, Germany, next US Leg of 360° tour delayed.

2010 Clarence Clemons of E Street Band performs and gets degree during graduation at University of Maryland Eastern Shore...