"It's hard for me to relate to that. I mean, people enjoying that kind of pain."

-- Bob Dylan, on the success of "Blood on the Tracks"

Bob Dylan's album "Blood on the Tracks" was released 50 years ago last week.

Back then, records were released on Tuesdays, mainly because Billboard and other chart-tracking publications started their sales week on Tuesdays, and the labels wanted a new album to have the benefit of a whole week of sales before the charts updated to maximize its chances of having a splashy debut. The record labels shipped product to retailers over the weekend, and boxes of new records typically arrived on Monday afternoons. Still, the latest records weren't available until the stores opened on Tuesday mornings.

When a big album was being released, lines would sometimes form outside the stores. There was no line when I went to Stan's Record Shop on the corner of Texas and Commerce Streets in Shreveport, the same store where Elvis Presley used to sign autographs. The album cost $6.98, about $40 today. I remember the transaction. The store clerk, who was only a couple of years older than me, gave me a slight smile that seemed to affirm my choice.

I took it straight home and played it six or seven times before midnight. Did it change my life? Honestly? In a way, maybe.

I had a Yamaha FG-75 acoustic guitar and was beginning to fill up spiral notebooks with my lyrics. I knew a few chords and could change between them reasonably well. Singers like Dylan and Leonard Cohen gave me hope that my voice might be passable for the songs I wanted to write and........

© El Dorado News Times