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Great White Wonder was released in July 1969 on the TMOQ (Trade Mark of Quality) label, which was created by two Los Angeles-based men named Ken and Dub.
It was a double album with an unmarked plain white cover with the title “Great While Wonder” simply stamped on it. This is most likely because it was a bootleg album.
Radio stations throughout Southern California picked up on it and began playing tracks from the bootleg album.
The double album contained 24 tracks, most of them from the early ’60s. However, seven tracks were from the 1967 sessions with The Band at the Big Pink House.
These heretofore unknown and original compositions of Dylan sparked tremendous interest from his fanbase. They revealed a softer Dylan, which some speculate reflected a spiritual side of Dylan that had yet to be revealed to his fan base.
Eventually, after a contract dispute that saw Dylan leave Columbia for a short spell, the label had one of its greatest stars return in 1975 with the Blood On The Tracks album.
Now that Dylan was back ‘home’ at Columbia, the label chose to release a double album from the now famous sessions in ’67 at Big Pink. It was appropriately entitled The Basement Tapes.
The sessions in Big Pink’s basement were recorded using two stereo mixers and a tape recorder borrowed from Dylan’s manager, Albert Grossman, and microphones borrowed from friends Peter, Paul, and Mary.
However, Columbia’s release of the double album, which didn’t have the same sound quality as typical studio albums, is well worth it.
The original bootleg album Great White Wonder launched what became a novel industry that lasted for several years. Other well-known artists, such as the Beatles, Pink Floyd, Led Zepplin, Jefferson Airplane, Rolling Stones, the Who and more, had bootleg albums released by the same TMOQ (Trade Mark of Quality) label.
Everything else is just history
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