We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.
... then there’s plain sonic impact: Even his earliest important songs have a cerebral and reverberating authority in the recording, his voice sometimes filling the speakers, his primitive but blistering guitar work adding confrontation, ease, humor, anger, and contrariness, presenting all but the most unwilling listeners with moment after moment of incandescence.
And, finally, a key component often overlooked: Dylan’s artistic process. On a fundamental level, he doesn’t trust mediation or planning. The story of his recording career is littered with tales of indecisive and failed sessions and haphazard successful ones, in both cases leaving frustrated producers and session people in their wake. You could say the approach served him well during his early years of inspiration and has hobbled him in his later decades of lesser work. Dylan doesn’t care. During the recording of Blood on the Tracks, which may be the best rock album ever made, one of the musicians present heard the singer being told how to do something correctly in the studio. Dylan’s reply: “Y’know, if I’d listened to everybody who told me how to do stuff, I might be somewhere by now.”
Feeling old? Not Dark Yet (1997). It's some sort of personal hymn or prayer, I think. Just another Dylan masterpiece, hauntingly-rendered, and it can bring a tear if you aren't careful.
Fun song from 1962. So many of us all have had hard times in NYC at some point in life, but it was mostly for the good in the end. It worked out for Bob, who still loves NY.
At the end of this clip, Ms. Gooding comments jokingly about how Bob might someday be rich and famous. Lyrics here.
Bob Dylan might be a poet, a thief, a genius, or a fraud. He might be stone-cold crazy, like the Dylanologists who worship him. But he’s not what you thought he was. He’s much more interesting than that.
Somehow I completely missed Dylan's 2012 album Tempest.
From one review:
Tempest is certainly his strongest and most distinctive album in a decade. The sound is a distillation of the jump blues, railroad boogie, archaic country and lush folk that Dylan has been honing since 2001's Love and Theft, played with swagger and character by his live ensemble and snappily produced by the man himself. A notoriously impatient recording artist, Dylan seems to have found a style that suits his working methods. Drawing on the early 20th-century Americana that first grabbed his attention as a young man (and that he celebrated in his Theme Time Radio Hour shows) and surrounding himself with slick, intuitive musicians capable of charging these nostalgic grooves with contemporary energy, his late-period albums seem a continuation of his tours, as if he rolls right off the stage and into the studio and just keeps rocking.
Seven Questions for Bob Dylan - He has given countless interviews, cowritten a movie about himself and authored an autobiography, released 35 albums, and toured for half a century. So why do we know nothing about this man?
Two Legends Together! In the spring of 1963 Studs Terkel introduced Chicago radio listeners to an up-and-coming musician, not yet 22 years old, "a young folk poet who you might say looks like Huckleberry Finn, if he lived in the 20th century. His name is Bob Dylan."
Dylan had just finished recording the songs for his second album, "The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan", when he traveled from New York to Chicago to play a gig at a little place partly owned by his manager, Albert Grossman, called "The Bear Club". The next day he went to the WFMT studios for the hour-long appearance on "The Studs Terkel Program". Things were moving fast in Dylan's life at that time.He was just emerging as a major songwriter. His debut album from the year before, Bob Dylan, was made up mostly of other people's songs. The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan, which was finished but hadn't yet been released, contained almost all original material, including several songs that would become classics, like "Blowin' in the Wind," "Don't Think Twice, It's All Right" and "A Hard Rain's a Gonna Fall.
Within a few months Dylan would make his debut at the Newport Folk Festival and perform at the historic March on Washington. But when Dylan visited WFMT, it's likely that many of Terkel's listeners had never heard of him. In the recorded broadcast he plays the following songs:
1) Farewell 2) A Hard Rain's a-Gonna Fall 3) Bob Dylan's Dream 4) Boots of Spanish Leather 5) John Brown 6) Blowin' In The Wind
It's an intriguing interview.This was at age 20 or 21:
In our mens' Bible group this morning, reading Peter, we stumbled on the topic of death and a satisfied death. Christians would have no fear or dread of death without our animal survival instincts. Life can be a trial at times, and often feels more like a burden than like a gift. Notwithstanding that, we all have it darn good, materially and comfort-wise, compared to our ancestors. Not to sound like a Puritan, but does anybody say, on his deathbed, "I thank God that I had flush toilets"?
Well, maybe some might. It's chilly out there with your trousers down.
An old gospel tune: Hallelujah, I'm Ready to Go. Lyrics here.
Yes, it's a bit over the top but there are a lot of people out there who know their Bob lines better than they know Scripture. On the other hand, I know people who know their Billy Joel lines better than Scripture.
This is pretty good, I think, and from the soul. What are the images?
The cutting-room sweepings suggest the chief errors in Dylan's recording career were his tendencies to discard gems and cede power to producers. Stripped of overdubs, the new Portrait has a mellow, natural beauty. In stark, porous arrangements, the music is vibrant and urgent, driven by Dylan's raw, potent vocals.
I've always felt that his singing voice - or rather voices, because he has tried a few over time - never was either pretty or beautiful. At this age, he mostly croaks like a frog. Many or most male folk singers and rock singers are the same. What his voice has is character, expression, remarkable phrasing. I've never heard anybody cover a Dylan song more effectively than he sang it - even songbirds like Joan Baez and Emmylou.
The Band got closest, but even then, not quite the real thing.
I don't think "beautiful" is the point. Expressiveness is the point. I can appreciate Sinatra's polish, Pavarotti's mastery, but it's not them. What's your opinion?
"A life of perpetual motion, not rootedness, is 
For some fans of Bob Dylan, 