Bob Dylan's music. A quick guide to Bob Dylan's musical movement in America. Bob Dylan walked into a spot that folk fans wanted to fill; they were younger Americans getting interested in music that said something...
Bob Dylan walked into a spot that folk fans wanted to fill; they were younger Americans getting interested in music that said something political. A large amount of it was leftist politics, especially in New York. Young people were not real happy with the way things were going and pop music and even rock and roll had nothing political to say. That became the place to go, music to listen to, music to learn to play and music to talk about. Dylan walked into that spot where politics were front and center and he just happened to be a brilliant writer, too. Most folks would just play traditional songs; songs passed down through the years and so you were getting a lot of 20's and 30s politics in the late 50s and early 60s. That's all well and good, but there was nothing talking about civil rights, nuclear fallout, or the Cold War. So Dylan comes in and at that point, he writes about it and so the folks just latched onto that. Then you could see electric instruments, drums and such as being a mode of expression. Somebody as artistic as Dylan apparently was on stage by yourself just playing a little acoustic guitar or a little harmonica becomes boring. If you have a bunch of friends with you, it's far more fun playing rock and roll. And it can combine poetry and politics with something that sounds great. That gives a lot more force. Before that, pop stars didn't say very much they had better tunes and better guitars, or some guitars at least. So Dylan was like "hey, why not play some rock and roll, but have a point." It was poetry, but still largely meaningful. When you hear something explode like that, it has poetic words with something that's bluesy or tempo rocking; it is fairly likeable. By that point the Beatles were also talking about stuff that actually meant something. Dylan specifically was saying "we can really combine these things." He has released dozens and dozens and dozens of records and he still releases records and still plays with the band and still has interesting songs.
He first came on the scene with his first record in 1961 or 1962. He released several records pretty quickly and by 1963 and 1964, he had four records behind him. That's another thing; today people take seven years to release a CD and we are accustomed to that. Then, people released two albums a year and to write down so much interesting new material and not just fluff crap is pretty surprising.
His first record is mostly covers of blue songs and folk songs. By his second album onward, his music was 100% full on original. The best song to start with for anybody interested with Dylan is "Rolling Stone." That song is great; it was full electric band up-tempo rock. The song is six and a half minutes long. I guess a lot of people today really aren't thrilled with a song that it is four minutes. It is a real poetry; quite electric and quite thrilling. It's a good place to start. There are some really nice acoustic songs like Maestro's Award, which I guess is fairly appropriate these days. It's about people who are the defence company; they make bombs and make guns, but don't actually fight, and all that unfortunate war business, which is front and center today. Maestro's award is a great song and Tambourine Man is a great song. It's one of the many "homesick blues" of the 60s. I would definitely recommend his new work. The last one that came out in 2001 is a great one. The one that came out before that was in 1997 called "Time Out of Mind," it won a Grammy. It's really good; it's actually quite mysterious and dark and it's good for late night drives or dark rooms. It's ghostly and smoky, but quite cool. Those are great. But this voice is quite gaunt and old and all scraggly. I am sure lots of people would really think it is awkward at first but, you will grow used to it and people come to love it. His voice is just getting better as his age increases.
