Urban75 Home About Offline BrixtonBuzz Contact

Bob Dylan at 80 - favourite song?

I had the original Dylan Greatest Hits, then the Greatest Hits vol. 2/More Greatest Hits for years and loved some of it, but found some of the famous folk strummy hits a bit boring and the famous sneering electric stuff a bit painful. It was only when a friend stuck Blood on the Tracks on that I really got into Dylan. Maybe it's the Dylan LP for people who think they don't like Dylan.

Simple Twist of Fate is one of my favourites - I didn't really listen to the lyrics for ages, thinking that it was just a nice love song - then I realised it was quite baffling - a sort of collage like the track that it follows on the album.
 
I had the original Dylan Greatest Hits, then the Greatest Hits vol. 2/More Greatest Hits for years and loved some of it, but found some of the famous folk strummy hits a bit boring and the famous sneering electric stuff a bit painful. It was only when a friend stuck Blood on the Tracks on that I really got into Dylan. Maybe it's the Dylan LP for people who think they don't like Dylan.

Simple Twist of Fate is one of my favourites - I didn't really listen to the lyrics for ages, thinking that it was just a nice love song - then I realised it was quite baffling - a sort of collage like the track that it follows on the album.

Twist of Fate seems like a pretty strsightforward story to me, in contrast to Tangled Up In Blue which Dylan composed as if it were a painting where you could see the whole thing all at once.

Idiot Wind is another one that seems more like a collage of different moments, where you could rearrange all the bits and tell several different stories with them.
 
Twist of Fate seems like a pretty strsightforward story to me, in contrast to Tangled Up In Blue which Dylan composed as if it were a painting where you could see the whole thing all at once.

Idiot Wind is another one that seems more like a collage of different moments, where you could rearrange all the bits and tell several different stories with them.
I've seen a lot of debate about Twist of Fate. At first, from the pleasant sound, it slips past like a simple love song. But the lyrics:

"Hunts her down by the waterfront docks
Where the sailors all come in.
Maybe she'll pick him out again. How long must he wait..."

Past, present, future, all in the same room? Prostitution?

Not exactly a simple boy meets girl romantic tale... It is very similar to Tangled Up In Blue in shifting from third to first person, and everything is very Norman Raeben.
 
I'm not sure how that will be proven. 56 years after the (alleged) offences. Presumably her lawyers have some decent evidence though if they're even going to bother filing.
 
These things are usually not isolated incidents either so if she's telling the truth expect more to come forward :(
 
Can't speak for the others but (as Dylan fan) currently cannot listen to his output, because of recent allegations. Which should be taken seriously & if it all amounts to nothing, might be listening again.
 
Can't speak for the others but (as Dylan fan) currently cannot listen to his output, because of recent allegations. Which should be taken seriously & if it all amounts to nothing, might be listening again.
I'm actually pretty much teh same, though I only listen to him speriodically now anyway. but that version of that song came up in my feed and it's now on about ten times a day - i thought it was Dylan at his utter best, so strange and beautiful, fitting for this thread.

if the allegations are true then he will never sound quite the same :(
 
One of my all-time favourites is "All along the watchtower ", the version by Hendrix. He transforms it into a piece of music like no other. Fab.

Without question, the definitive version (as Dylan himself acknowledged). And one of the rare instances where a cover version exceeds the original version by a country mile. Just goes to show how totally brilliant Hendrix was and is - over half a century after his death, and he still sounds ahead of the curve.
 
i can't go into how much i love this song without sounding like a wanker.

his genius probably stops me in my tracks at least a few times in a year. literally has me stop. i don't listen to him that much, but he will come and i suddenly get that flash again adn think all the hyperbole written abotu the man is true. genius in the truest, most expensive use of the word.

 
fan boy alert

was reading some encounters with dylan stories. my fav one was of a surf instructor, in mexico i think. There were two lads on holiday and they asked him to teach them to surf. They spent two weeks riding teh waves together and really bonded. He asked them what they done for a living "entertainment" was teh response. on teh last night one of them played by the camp fire a song called "tangled up in blue" and the surf teacher was struck by how cool it was. Later that year long after the two had left he heard the same song being played on the radio and he joined up the dots when he saw a pic of Dylan. it was dylan who he had taught.

not sure if that is true, but what a great story!
 
IT'S NOT JUST THE WORDS, IT'S THE ADOPTING AND PERFORMANCE OF CHARACTERS TAHT ARE NOT ACTUALLY HIM. THAT IS THE HEART OF DYLAN'S UTTER GENIUS.
 
I keep getting Facebook adverts for his paintings at the moment. They're really not very good.
Yes me too :D
I have seen some before, there's a little gallery shop in Covent Garden that sells them, I didn't know he painted before seeing them there, was pleasantly surprised.
 
That is one weird fucking photo. And boy did dress sense skip the 90s altogether ...

Who's that top right next to Jools? Not Trevor, the other one.
 
Back
Top Bottom