In 1985 a 12-inch piece of plastic saved my life, at least metaphorically.
At 21 years of age, a bit lost and studying at college I found a record, which renewed my love of music and reflected the times I lived in. Britain was gripped with the callous leadership of Margaret Thatcher, the once proud industrial heartllands were all but extinct and my own city of Glasgow suffered more than most.
The record was This Is The Sea by The Waterboys, my love of this record made me search out live tapes by the band, the one recurring theme was the number of Bob Dylan songs they covered.
So I discovered Bob Dylan by that very method he once described himself as “links in a chain”.
It was a discovery that was to become a passion and on the eve of his 60th birthday here are my thoughts on the great man.
There is a lot of mythology surrounding Dylan.
To me he basically represents an America that now longer exists and has taken popular songwriting forward to an area that no one since has been able to take any further.
The stupid artistic debates that existed in the UK in the early 90’s, which asked if he was a better poet than Keats, missed the point you may as well ask was Keats a better guitarist than Dylan?
Probably the one thing that has kept Dylan going through his career is the fact that he never took himself as seriously as others and basically let the music do the talking.
In the 60’s Dylan took the centuries-old folk format and dragged it screaming into the modern world with a natural poetic brilliance.
Both influencing and being influenced by The Beatles he returned to his first love of rock and roll and created a trilogy of records arguably unsurpassed in the history of popular music (Bringing It All Back Home, Highway 61 Revisited and Blonde On Blonde).
Since then Dylan has continued to intrigue and bewilder those brave enough to stay along for the ride.
In 1991 the Bootleg Series was released a 3CD collection of unreleased material, this illustrated the whole range of Dylan’s career with unreleased material…an amazing feat proving once and for all that he was without equal in the history of popular songwriting.
He has made many bad records along the way; in the early 90’s his voice hit an all time low but in the tours of 2000 he gave concerts considered to be amongst his greatest ever.
In 1975 he released Blood On The Tracks considered by many to be his greatest record-not too many all-time greats have given us such a great record
Dylan represents the history of American music from old murder-ballads, country music, folk, pop and rock he has written songs in most styles and whatever criticism you can throw at him, you simply cannot put him in one box.
He is also something of a visionary, reflecting America and the world in his songs and this darker aspect of his musical output and insight meant that he would never have the popular impact of the Beatles.
During a drunken speech at a CORE gathering he was booed as he stated he could see himself in Lee Harvey Oswald, it was a remarkable thing to say. Despite the freedom the 60’s would bring Dylan could see that society was cracking and there was a dark underside to America.
He would never state it as plainly again but his songs continued to reflect the world as he saw it.
The appeal of Dylan is a mystery to many, his voice never had total appeal but if you listen to popular music at all you cannot doubt his impact.
Even for those who gave up on him, there are gems of songs to be found scattered even amongst his poorer output.
Always one step ahead Dylan has been both a traditionalist and a challenger of the status quo.
His influence is everywhere and I would argue any other single artist cannot challenge his collection of songs.
He is a genuine genius in a genre where the word is used too freely.
I’ll leave you with a top ten of lesser-known Dylan songs.
1.Blind Willie McTell-The Bootleg Series
2.Up To Me- Biograph.
3.Every Grain Of Sand-Shot Of Love
4.Brownsville Girl-Knocked Out Loaded
5.Silvio-Down In The Groove
6.Series Of Dreams-The Bootleg Series
7.Last Thought On Woody Guthrie-The Bootleg Series
8.Highlands-Time Out Of Mind
9.Most Of The Time-Oh Mercy
10. The Man In The Long Black Coat-Oh Mercy
Thank you Robert Allen Zimmerman and happy birthday Bob Dylan.
Charlie Zappa
