While Slow Train Coming saw Dylan expanding his folk palette with progressive rock and gospel colors, Saved is almost exclusively a gospel record. The restraint shown by its predecessor is often shed entirely, and background singers, Hammond organs, pounded pianos, and raucous tempos are par for the course here, with Dylan himself even improvising vocal fills between lines like he’s wearing a robe and swaying along in the choir box.

Where Slow Train Coming felt a bit like a Christian show in a concert hall, Saved feels like it was recorded in an air-conditioningless church service in July where the congregation somehow manages to fight the heat and sing their hearts out anyway. It’s the sort of music that conjures in my mind images of women in their Sunday best using their bulletins to fan themselves.

Lyrically, Dylan is less outwardly focused than on Slow Train Coming. These songs are mostly between the Lord and himself, thanking Him for saving his soul, ruminating on His betrayal in the Garden Gethsemane, and declaring his devotion. He breaks the conversation three times–once addressing a woman (Covenant Woman) and twice preaching (opening cover A Satisfied Mind and closer Are You Ready). Only the closer, with its verse, “Are you ready for the judgment? Are you ready for the terrible sword? Are you ready for Armageddon? Are you ready for the Day of the Lord? I hope you’re ready” shows hints of the dogmatic strain that critics panned this album for. Myself, despite the joyous congregational fury of the first half, I see this album as intensely personal as Blood on the Tracks, another collection of conversations that Dylan invites the listener to sit in on, only he’s much more at peace this time around.