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31.8.06

Nerd Alert! Bob Dylan is the man


Confession time. I'm a Bob Dylan nut - just got the new album (and DVD) Modern Times from Amazon - I also got Blonde on Blonde as I don't have it on CD. Yes I don't do iPod!
God! What a fantastic man! What a fantastic album visit him now at Bob Dylan. The Rolling Stones haven't had a decent album since the late 70s but Bob still keeps cranking them out at 65 years of age.
This is His Bobness' first studio album in almost five years and has been hailed as a "masterwork", "enchanting" and "full of prophecy" by impressed US critics.
"This music is relaxed; it has nothing to prove," Rolling Stone magazine said of the 10 songs on Modern Times.
Within "about 30 seconds", listeners would discover they were "in the presence of greatness", said USA Today, which praised Dylan's wit and imagery.
"Nobody can stop him, and the world is better for it," Blender magazine added. I agree
Modern Times is the third part of a "simultaneously startling and backward-looking series", referring to Dylan's earlier albums Time Out of Mind, from 1997, and Love and Theft (buy it now), released five years ago.
Rolling Stone agreed, describing the release as Dylan's "third straight masterwork".
The publication awarded five stars to the album, saying it was "evenly divided between blues ready-mades, old-timey two-steps and stately marches full of prophecy".
I can't point at any one track and say it is the best - they are all great. Dylan just glances at current events and that's all it takes for him to conjure up the dread of the age following 9/11 and all the other shit that's going on in the world.
Bob keeps the faith - as someone else once said Dylan provides us with "the most direct love lyrics, vindictive vendettas, meditations on mortality, pointed political commentary, dry wit, apocalyptic imagery and head-scratching flights of fancy".
Sometimes these are all in the same song.
I went to see Bob live last year, with my 14-year-old son, as we walked out of Manchester Arena the first thing he said to me was: "Dad, I've got to put more Dylan on my MP3 player."
Yes my son - you do.
Apologies for being so gushing but I've been this way since I was 14.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Great stuff. I'm the same about George Michael. :)

I'll get my coat.

News Update said...

No, no - one of the greatest pop songwriters - up there with Elton John, when he was still good.