Thank you for buying this record. What follows is its documentation: the pressing identified, the matrix / runout transcribed by hand from the dead wax, and the condition as assessed before it was listed. It is yours to keep with the record.

— Paul, Vinyl Curator

Bob Dylan

Biograph

1985 · CBS S5BP 703 · Stereo · CBS international pressing (catalogue number S5BP 703 was used for this box in the UK, continental Europe, Australia and New Zealand, as distinct from the US Columbia C5X 38830 issue); no country text is visible on the jacket of this copy · 5xLP, box set · 33 1/3 RPM

Pressing details

Label	CBS
Catalogue number	S5BP 703
Year	1985
Mono / Stereo	Stereo
Country	CBS international pressing (catalogue number S5BP 703 was used for this box in the UK, continental Europe, Australia and New Zealand, as distinct from the US Columbia C5X 38830 issue); no country text is visible on the jacket of this copy
Format	5xLP, box set
Speed	33 1/3 RPM
Genre	Rock - Folk Rock / Singer-Songwriter
Producer	Jeff Rosen (reissue/compilation producer, as credited)
Composer	Bob Dylan, except "Baby, Let Me Follow You Down" (Eric Von Schmidt)
Musicians	Bob Dylan (vocals, guitar, harmonica, piano) throughout; backing musicians differ by track across sessions running from 1961 to 1981 and include, at various points, members of the Band, the Rolling Thunder Revue band and Nashville session players

Condition

Cover: VG+

Variant chronology

1985 - US Columbia C5X 38830, 5LP box, Carrollton Press pressing
1985 - CBS International S5BP 703, 5LP box (UK/Europe/Australasia issue)  <- this copy
1986 - Japan CBS/Sony 00AP 3136-40, 5LP box with obi and booklets

The Album

Biograph was assembled in the mid-1980s as the first large-scale retrospective of Bob Dylan's recording career, drawing material from his earliest Columbia sessions through to the turn of the 1980s and mixing well-known hits with a substantial run of previously unreleased recordings and alternate takes. The set was compiled with Dylan's cooperation by a young member of his management team working through the vaults, and it arrived with an extended set of liner notes built from new interviews with Dylan himself, giving fans rare first-person commentary on individual songs. Spanning folk protest material, the electric mid-1960s run, the Nashville-era recordings, the Rolling Thunder years and the gospel period, the box presented Dylan's catalogue as a continuous artistic arc rather than a series of separate albums. Dylan's importance to American song had already been long established by 1985, and Biograph reinforced his standing as the songwriter whose work reshaped the vocabulary of popular music; the project also helped popularize the multi-disc career-retrospective box set as a format for major artists more broadly. Critics greeted it as a generous and surprisingly cohesive overview, praising both the unreleased performances and the candour of the new interview material, and it remains a frequently cited entry point into Dylan's work for new listeners.

Tracklist

Side 1

1. Lay Lady Lay
2. Baby, Let Me Follow You Down
3. If Not For You
4. I'll Be Your Baby Tonight
5. I'll Keep It With Mine

Side 2

1. The Times They Are A-Changin'
2. Blowin' In The Wind
3. Masters Of War
4. Lonesome Death Of Hattie Carroll
5. Percy's Song

Side 3

1. Mixed-Up Confusion
2. Tombstone Blues
3. Groom's Still Waiting At The Altar
4. Most Likely You Go Your Way
5. Like A Rolling Stone
6. Jet Pilot

Side 4

1. Lay Down Your Weary Tune
2. Subterranean Homesick Blues
3. I Don't Believe You (She Acts Like We Never Have Met)
4. Visions Of Johanna
5. Every Grain Of Sand

Fidelity

The unreleased performances on Biograph were newly mixed for the set at the Record Plant in New York, while the previously issued tracks were drawn from Columbia's existing masters; the whole package was mastered digitally by Greg Calbi at Sterling Sound. Collectors generally regard the original 1985 vinyl cut as a solid, listenable transfer rather than an audiophile-grade pressing, with the digital mastering step drawing some comment relative to all-analogue Dylan pressings of the era. No audiophile remaster of this specific box (Analogue Productions, Mobile Fidelity, etc.) exists, so this pressing and its Japanese counterpart represent the top of the format's fidelity hierarchy for Biograph on vinyl.

Notes

This box is the CBS international (UK/Europe/Australasia) issue of the five-LP Biograph box, identified by the catalogue number S5BP 703 printed on the front cover, as opposed to the US Columbia C5X 38830 pressing. The label design, mono/stereo text and pressing-plant marks are not shown; the jacket and back-cover credits (Jeff Rosen, Cameron Crowe, mastering by Greg Calbi at Sterling Sound) are consistent with the title's original 1985 release. The box is dated 1985 by its copyright line; without the label shown, no finer distinction within the S5BP 703 pressing run can be made.

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