News

Searching For A Gem: News

[Home] [The Official Rarities Yearly Lists] [Traveling Wilburys] [Online Performances (bobdylan.com)] [Online Performances (Other)] [Interviews with Bob] [VHS & DVD]
[International Mono Releases] [International Stereo Releases] [Questionable Releases] [Released Rarities] [Honourable Mentions]

[Updates] [Red Herrings] [Trading] [Other Pages]

2 Apr 2024: A copy of the Searching For A Gem web-site is now situated here: SFAG - Searching For A Gem | The FM Club. This copy is not being updated, so until the new web-site is up and running it is no longer possible to submit contributions.

30 Mar 2024: The web-site is now frozen and no further contributions will be accepted. The Easyspace contract has been cancelled from 1st May although I am keeping the Searching For A Gem domain name. Please continue to follow the Searching For A Gem page on Facebook and my tweets on X/Twitter for news of when the site reopens in its new location. Thanks to all my contributors for everything submitted since 1998!

22 Mar 2024: Thanks to Sergio Mariano Romay for information that Sony Music is planning to release a boxed set of live recordings of Bob Dylan and The Band from Jan-Feb 1974 in 2024. A double LP was released by Asylum as Before The Flood in June 1974. Even though a wide range of songs were performed during the tour, including non-album songs Hero Blues (twice) and Nobody ‘Cept You (eight times), the tracklist of the double album stuck to 1960s favourites, so the new set will be very welcome.

18 Mar 2024: I am currently working on a new format for the Searching For A Gem database on a new platform. Someone is kindly doing all the coding so I shall add the data. This will be a considerable task so you will have to be patient until the site is restored in its new format. My aim is that registered contributors will add their own Dylan items to the online database.

16 Mar 2024: I have been notified about multiple errors on the Searching For A Gem website including broken links and missing pictures. These problems are caused by the HTML software Expression Web 4 and are far too extensive for me to fix.

Firstly the navigation bar links at the top and bottom of each page throughout the website were generated by MS FrontPage and Expression Web 4 does not support them. FrontPage has been discontinued by Microsoft and does not work with Windows 11. The navigation bars would all have to be recreated manually. Secondly the website is divided into seven folders, from the 1960s to the 2020s. FrontPage allowed links between folders but Expression Web 4 does not. For example, all the broken links for Blonde On Blonde are from the 2020s and my source page is correct. Expression Web 4 incorrectly tries to find them in a 2020s folder inside the 1960s folder instead of the right place. To correct this I would need to make copies of all the referenced pictures in the 1960s folder and so on throughout the site.

Easyspace and a couple of Dylan webmasters I’ve spoken to all say I should have the website rebuilt using modern software but I cannot do this myself or afford to pay a software company to do it. I have therefore decided to cancel the Easyspace contract from 1st May and close the website permanently. Sorry to be closing down after 26 years!

"By popular demand", the latest Bob Dylan Rarity News notified to me. If you have any news not shown that will interest site visitors, please contact me here. Please make sure the subject of your message includes the word "Dylan"- this will ensure it's not put in the trash by the site's Spam filter. This is absolutely vital - incoming Spam can be as much as 13,300 messages per day, and I'm sure some of your valuable messages have been missed! Please retry if your message was rejected or if you haven't received a reply.

[Updates] [Red Herrings] [Trading] [Other Pages]

The font used for the titles of each page is appropriately called "Jokerman", if you can't see it, download it here:

Contacting Bob Dylan

This is a fan site with no connection to Bob - that means you can't contact him through me! I used to have a postal address for Bob's New York business office that I thought was correct, but I have since been informed by someone who wrote to that address that their mail was returned. I have never had an email address. I can only suggest you contact Bob's publisher Simon & Schuster or use the feedback page at www.bobdylan.com. I also have no means of helping anyone who wants to meet Bob Dylan or obtain his autograph!

For much wider news coverage of interest to Bob Dylan fans, see Karl Erik's amazing "Expecting Rain" site . It's always up-to-date thanks to his astounding dedication!

News and Updates are now two separate pages - for Updates (including all site structure changes), see here.

Revised: 02 April, 2024

30 Mar 2024: The web-site is now frozen and no further contributions will be accepted. The Easyspace contract has been cancelled from 1st May although I am keeping the Searching For A Gem domain name. Please continue to follow the Searching For A Gem page on Facebook and my tweets on X/Twitter for news of when the site reopens in its new location. Thanks to all my contributors for everything submitted since 1998!

Older News

Old news items are kept on here until the rarities referred to actually surface, or until it becomes clear that they're not going to!

30 Jul 2022: The previous Web Counter has now been discontinued by the provider. There have been around 12 million visits since mid-1998. New statistics for Searching For A Gem from end Jun 2022 are here.

14 Jan 2022: Thanks to Geoff Lambourn for news that James Mangold has been chosen to direct a new film for Searchlight Pictures provisionally called "Going Electric" about Bob's adoption of electric music in 1965, starring Timothée Chalamet as Bob. More details will be added when available.

18 Oct 2020: The Yahoo! web-site is reporting that George Clooney will direct a film version of John Grisham's baseball novel "Calico Joe". The exciting news for Dylan fans is that Bob is scheduled to write the soundtrack. Bob is known to be a huge baseball fan and has recorded Catfish (a Desire out-take released in 1991 on The Bootleg Series Vols. 1-3) and Take Me Out To The Ball Game from his Theme Time Radio Hour With Bob Dylan: Baseball in 2006. Thanks to Jürgen Wasser for information that John Grisham's book has been translated into German with the title "Home Run", and is also available in French and Italian. More information about the film and the soundtrack will be added when available.

24 Nov 2015: Please note, in order to reduce the huge number of submissions, only submit scans of new items. If you have variant copies of items already listed on the site, please submit only a text description of your item that can be pasted into the web page. That will make the additions significantly easier to handle, and avoid web pages becoming too long. This is a new permanent policy for the site. Thank you for your co-operation.

26 Nov 2013: So long, eBay! This web-site has an ongoing huge backlog of additions, all with high quality artwork, and several important new Dylan releases to add between now and Christmas. In view of the poor quality of description and illustration of items from eBay and other online auction sites, together with the high probability that items are counterfeit, no more items from such sites will be considered for inclusion here. I've also been told that featuring eBay items on this web-site has led to higher prices. Thanks to those who have submitted eBay links in the past, but please don't do so in future under any circumstances.

As an example, look at the scan by Manuel García Jara and a photo of the same single from an online auction site. The digital photo is slanted (and shows the wrong side of the sleeve)!

[Updates] [Red Herrings] [Trading] [Other Pages]

A Flying Pig production

The previous Web Counter has now been discontinued. There have been around 12 million visits since mid-1998. New statistics from end Jun 2022 are here.

Site hosted by