Oh, boy! Finally a thread for my favorite musical era! I know you're all thinking now: "Oh no, there he goes again with his ramblings on Bob Dylan!" ... And you're right!
In my next post, I'll talk about all the other artists, but if there was *one* artist who changed the face of popular music forever in the 1960's, it's Bob Dylan more than anyone else --yes, even moreso than The Beatles.
While The Beatles are often credited with injecting meaningful, thoughtful poetry-like lyrics into rock 'n roll, Bob Dylan most certainly beat them to it. Dylan fused the great sounding, but meaningless sounds of rock 'n roll with lyrical gems that haven't been matched as of yet. In the process he single-handedly invented a whole new genre, the folk-rock. All musicians who came after him owe an enormous debt to him in that way. Dylan was also the first artist ever to put out a double-album in 1966 (
Blonde on Blonde), which was filled with psychedelic music and abstract lyrics.
Subterranean Homesick Blues is considered the first 'rap song' ever.
Before all that, he was a folk singer who, at age 22, made music that was so mature people thought he must have been at least in his 40's. He was a white kid from the middle class who recorded songs about the plight of African-Americans fighting for Civil Rights. He stood beside Dr. Martin Luther King during the march on Washington when he sang
Only a Pawn in Their Game, about the assassination of black Civil Rights activist Medgar Evers, which Dylan blamed not on the murderer, but on white people in powerful positions who instructed common people that racism is a good thing. He also recorded
The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carrol, the true story of the murder of a black maid by a Soutern politician, who was barely punished for his evil deed. And of course we all know
Blowing in the wind, which became sort of the iconic song for the Civil Rights movement. Meanwhile,
Masters of War harshly criticized the military-industrial complex in a straight-foward manner not seen before. On the same albums he put out in that period, Dylan also included beautiful poetry in the form of sensitive, never-clichéd ballads like
Girl from the North Country and
Boots of Spanish Leather.
Then, he suddenly stopped with acoustic music and 'protest songs' and angered all his fans by going electric. Fans went to concerts just to boo at him for supposedly 'selling out', but he didn't care. Dylan just upped it a notch and gained worldwide fame with
Like a Rolling Stone. But he never conformed to expectations of fans and critics and put out insanely long and abstract songs like
Desolation Row, in which Kain and Abel, the Hunchback of Notre Dame, Einstein disguised as Robin Hood, Cinderella and T.S. Elliot (among many others) all play a role in a dramatic and unsettling tale.
After having succesfully done traditionals, folk music, and rock (all in only four years), he decided to change once again and recorded a country album! I'm sure everybody knows the classic
Lay, Lady, Lay. He also recorded
All Along the Watchtower, one of the most covered songs of all time. After Jimi Hendrix popularized it, Dylan has only performed the song live on stage with Hendrix' arrangement, which he thought was better.
Apart from the originality, the musicality, the talent, the iconic value of Bob Dylan's songs, why do I love them so much? Because they're all authentic; they're so real. There's not a shred of insincerity in any of them; they all come right from the heart, and if you hear him sing, it's like he's singing his soul out. His lyrics have the power to move and touch me like nobody has ever achieved. A lot of people have complained about his voice. He doesn't sing clean, they say. That's right, he doesn't have a beautiful voice. If you have to be honest about it, he has a rather bad voice. But he can *work* with it like nobody else can. He can use it in all possible ways, to achieve all possible effects with the listener. His phrasing is unmatched.
And now some of his best and/or most iconic songs, aside from those named above:
The Times They Are A-Changin'
I Want You
Rainy Day Women #12 & 35
Love Minus Zero/No Limit
Mr. Tambourine Man
Visions of Johanna
A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall
It's All Over Now, Baby Blue
House of the Rising Sun
It's Alright, Ma (I'm Only Bleedin')
Ballad of a Thin Man
With God on Our Side
One of Us Must Know (Sooner or Later)
Stuck Inside of Mobile with the Memphis Blues Again
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