Quote:
Originally Posted by j.w.
Dylan is a historian. Tempest is filled with sounds & styles that shouldn't be popular in 2012/2013, but Dylan is keeping that stuff alive. His throwaway early '90s stuff, the traditionals, are half-assed contractual obligation albums, but are brilliant at the same time. I love his take on Sittin' On Top of the World, & bringing You Belong To Me back into the vogue on the Natural Born Killers soundtrack was a brilliant move. He was essentially retreading what he started out doing in '63, & still had an impact 30 years later. (The Flat Duo Jets recorded You Belong To Me & Frog Went A Courtin', which Dylan did on Good As I Been To You, on Go Go Harlem Baby a short while after, & that record was a huge influence on Jack White early on. Jack got the rights to reissue it on vinyl last year.) And you can't beat his Theme Time Hour radio shows.
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Not sure how something that is 'throwaway and half-assed' can be brilliant at the same time. But I do agree that those two 'Americana' albums are brilliant. They even woke up the "National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences" to how brilliant Dylan is as a singer and musician that they nominated
Good As I Been To You and awarded
World Gone Wrong. They've been watching him closely since. But they sadly missed the boat on
Tempest (no pun intended). Nothing more IN-YOUR-FACE than Dylan performing at the Grammys. I think Dylan scares them.
The reason for those two albums in my opinion was that Dylan was having writers block which could be seen suffering in
Under The Red Sky. That album was considered a throwaway or half-ass in many circles and definitely was far from brilliant. In the bottom 5 for me as Dylan material goes. But being on the bottom doesn't mean I didn't find some redeeming value in that album.
To understand where Dylan has been musically since '97's
Time Out of Mind you really have to listen to those two traditional folk/blues albums. I'm grateful he decided to release them instead of just tossing them in a closet. I really enjoyed the solo Dylan aspect of those recordings. Brought me back to the acoustic intimacy he had on the
John Wesley Harding album. You can feel he was seriously exploring his muse at that time and it sparked another great run of creativity that has now lasted over 15 years.
As songwriters I would say Bob is a par up from Neil just in the greater wealth of influences that he taps into. Dylan's venture into being radio host of his own roots music Theme Time Radio Hour does demonstrate how much of an historian he is and how serious he is about our American musical heritage. Neil has done a lot as well in preserving that heritage through the years.
As performers they are both on similar planes as singers and musicians and in having such incredible careers. In my opinion they are the most legendary live music performers in the world. I've seen them a crazy amount of times since '78 and I can be witness that they can both be bad-ass MFs when they jam on stage but Neil is one par up from him in that department. Just see how he steals the spot light during
My Back Pages at Bobfest.
I listen to Dylan songs a lot more than Neil Young's and Dylan would take most of the spots in my top 100 songs because I'm such a Dylan fanatic. It takes something monumental to steal spots on that list and Neil does it a number of times.
Powderfinger from
Rust never Sleeps has got to be one of the greatest storytelling joyride songs ever put on record.
This thread got me listening to Neil today. Just got thru
Time Fades Away and now leading into
For The Turnstiles from
On The Beach.
Great thread.
