Bob Dylan’s ‘Ionic Original’ re-recording of ‘Blowin’ In The Wind” sells for £1.48million

A one-of-a-kind re-recording of Bob Dylan singing his 1963 classic ‘Blowin’ In The Wind‘ has sold at auction for £1.48million ($1.78million).

The re-recording, which sits on a one-of-one Ionic Original format disc, has marked the first time in 60 years that Dylan has re-recorded the song that was written in 1962 and released as part of the 1963 album ‘The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan’.

Today’s (July 7) live bidding at Christie’s in London topped out at £1.2million, reports Variety, but an official release sent out by the auction house cited the higher price including commissions.

The price was well over the estimate the auction house had posted for the recording, which was in the range of £600,000 ($716,000) to £1million pounds ($1.19million).

First announced in April by producer T Bone Burnett, the Ionic Original format used for the re-recorded Dylan track is “lacquer painted onto an aluminum disc, with a spiral etched into it by music. This painting, however, has the additional quality of containing that music, which can be heard by putting a stylus into the spiral and spinning it”.

Burnett has touted the new high fidelity format as “the pinnacle of recorded sound. It is archival quality. It is future-proof. It is one of one”.

Meanwhile, last month Dylan closed his ‘Rough And Rowdy Ways’ North American tour and included a cover of The Grateful Dead in his set.

The star has been on the road in support of his latest album since November 2021, taking a break between December 2021 and March 2022.

The dates concluded on June 11 at Oakland, California’s Fox Theater – his third of three nights at the venue. For the final song in his set, Dylan swapped the tour standard of ‘Every Grain Of Sand’ for a cover of The Grateful Dead’s ‘Friend Of The Devil’.

Meanwhile, in May Post Malone revealed that Dylan had “kind of slid into my DMs”.