Like a Rolling Stone - Looking for great live Dylan

"... the song is not a ballad."

It's funny to see someone saying this about a Dylan song. It's a ballad if someone wants to perform it as such. It could also be done as a reggae tune, a straight-up rocker, a waltz, a punk song, a country number, a gospel blaster, a disco song ...

There's no one who has messed with his own songs more than has Dylan. Others covering them ought to be afforded that same luxury, don't ya think?

True story: The second time I saw Dylan -- it was, if memory serves, in the early-1980s at the New Haven Coliseum -- a friend of a friend who attended, a guy who'd liked Dylan way back in the day but hadn't kept up, said as we were leaving that he'd enjoyed the show, but that he'd really wanted to hear Bob play "Blowin' in the Wind."

At the same moment, my friend and I both responded: "He did!"

He had, of course, but not on acoustic guitar. He played it with a full band, all rearranged.

You're right Hodu, people can play rockers as ballads. I guess I should have said that I didn't like the song redone as a ballad because it diminishes what makes it one of the all time great rock songs. And yes, Dylan has done a lot of diminishing of his catalog himself.

Eddie still needs to learn to play guitar properly though.

One bonus for the BS V.4 version is that you get to hear an audience member shout "Judas" and then Dylan replies "I don't be-LIEVE you!"

FWIW I did not care for the version in that video although they have obvious talent. Just not a good match for me.

fwiw -Dylan's reply never to that charge really made sense to me. Though I
guess you could try to adopt a Dylan mindset from back in the day and maybe it
would gather some significance. In a bunch of the reading I was doing looking
for that perfect live version, came across an explanation. Apparently, there was
more that followed the "Judas" shout (though unheard except in a
few recordings of that exchange), with the heckler subsequently
saying something like, "I'm never going to listen to your records
again!" To which Dylan replied, "You're a liar!" followed by,
"I don't believe you!" (or vice versa).