Bob Dylan - Oh Mercy

In 1988, Bono put Bob Dylan in touch with producer Daniel Lanois. What came out of that introduction was Oh Mercy, released September 12, 1989, and the first Dylan record in most of a decade that critics could praise without qualification. It was recorded at night in New Orleans, on Dylan's own rule that the sessions only happen after dark, and it sounds like it.

Lanois wraps everything in humid, low-lit atmosphere without smothering the songs. "Political World" opens on dobro and swampy percussion. "Ring Them Bells" is Dylan alone at a piano writing something close to a hymn. "Man in the Long Black Coat" plays like a Johnny Cash murder ballad that wandered into the wrong bayou, and the second half turns inward, trading politics for regret across "Most of the Time," "What Good Am I?" and "Shooting Star."

It reached number 30 on the Billboard chart, Dylan's best showing in years, and number 6 in both the UK and Norway. Rolling Stone ranked it number 44 on its list of the 100 greatest albums of the 1980s, and Dylan devoted an entire chapter of Chronicles: Volume One to how it came together.

This 2026 Columbia/Legacy reissue puts the album back in print on vinyl. The best Dylan record of the eighties, and the one that made Time Out of Mind possible.