The Snint Report: “Shot of Love” — A Review by Marjorie Snint (if such a person exists)

 Some albums are sermons. Others are séances. “Shot of Love” is a motel Bible with lipstick on the cover—half salvation, half smudge.

Bob Dylan’s 1981 offering, Shot of Love, is often described as the final installment in his so-called “Christian trilogy.” But to call it a trilogy implies coherence, and coherence is precisely what this album resists. It’s a spiritual tantrum, a gospel record that keeps forgetting it’s supposed to behave.

The title track opens like a revival tent collapsing mid-chorus. Dylan’s voice is all gravel and urgency, but the production feels like it was mixed in a hurry, as if the engineers were afraid the Holy Spirit might change its mind. “Property of Jesus” is less a song than a dare—Dylan snarling at the secular world with the fervor of a man who’s just discovered martyrdom and wants to test-drive it.

Yet for all its righteous fire, Shot of Love is haunted by doubt. “Every Grain of Sand,” the album’s closer, is the kind of song that makes you wonder if Dylan’s conversion was ever about certainty. It’s tender, weary, and strangely precise—like someone whispering theology to a dog. It’s the only track where the production steps back and lets the lyric breathe, and it’s the only moment where Dylan sounds like he’s not trying to convince anyone of anything.

The rest of the album is a tug-of-war between conviction and chaos. “Heart of Mine” wants to be playful but ends up sounding like a drunk uncle at a baptism. “Lenny Bruce” is a eulogy written in crayon—well-meaning, but emotionally incoherent. Dylan seems to admire Bruce’s defiance but doesn’t quite know what to do with it, so he wraps it in a melody that feels borrowed from a less complicated song.

If Slow Train Coming was the altar call and Saved was the sermon, Shot of Love is the walk back to the car—confused, exhilarated, and already wondering if it was all a bit much. It’s not a great album, but it’s a fascinating one. It’s the sound of Dylan trying to reconcile the ecstatic with the everyday, and failing in ways that feel mythic.

Verdict: A holy mess. But then again, holiness was never tidy.