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Fun Stuff => BAND => Topic started by: Slick on 08 Mar 2009, 17:34
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Which album is his best album?
I think Hard Rain is hands down the best live album, and I really think the freewheelin is his best studio but people have been known to argue.
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Bob Dylan's best album. Hmmm.....
Right now, just thinking about it, there are NO Bob Dylan albums that aren't the best albums.
That said, my favorites are The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan, Blonde On Blonde, John Wesley Harding, The Times They Are A-Changin.
Obviously, I am a fan of early Bob Dylan music.
I will have to ponder this some more.
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Blonde on Blonde is funny to me because I still do not get it. The first track is just 'uhhh, what?' to me, it doesn't seem to be doing much and I don't really like most of the album.
The freewheelin' was the first I really listened to, and several tracks stick out. Blowin' in the Wind, A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall, and Don't Think Twice It's All Right are some of my favorites. Don't Think Twice may be my favorite Dylan song and I regularly introduce it as the best song about a breakup ever.
The Times They Are A-Changin is a brilliant protest album. The title track is and probably always will be a classic. Solid and epic. I'm not sure if it's more important than a hard rain's gonna fall or not. With God On Our Side and Only A Pawn in Their Game are both great songs, and I think everyone should listen to what he's saying in pawn in their game.
John Wesley I personally don't see as in the running but I haven't listened to it that much
(I do not want to sound dismissive I am just saying my thoughts they are just mine)
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Maybe it's just because my parents played it a lot when I was a kid but I've always really liked Desire.
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Hurricane's pretty amazing, but it goes on for, like, eight minutes. By the end of the song, I find myself thinking 'OK Bob, this is great, you've got me ready to rock, can the rest of the album start now?'.
Hard Rain:
http://www.mediafire.com/?c1k5omadifd
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Same as Retrospectre. I know Desire isn't his best album, but it's my favourite. I feel like it's more accessible than any of his others. Sure Hurricane and Joey get a bit long, but I don't actually get tired of them. This probably has to do with the fact that they're stories, and his style is such that you listen to what he's saying.
Have any of you heard the soundtrack from I'm Not There? If you haven't, you really should, it's an excellent compilation of covers of his songs.
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I just found out this weekend that a friend of mine received one of Bob Dylan's harmonicas as a gift when he was a young boy.
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Blood On The Tracks is an album I do not listen to often enough. Shelter From the Storm is way up there for me as a song. I think I have disassociated that album from the rest of the work because it is clearly while he's transitioning from the old folk sound. I will listen to it more.
I've only listened to Desire the whole way through once, so I don't mind the violin that much.
Highway 61 Revisited is what I think of as the best album to put on when you need an album to put on. I would put that on for my parents over supper. I would put it on before going out for a show. I would put it on upon bringing a lady home. I would put it on to fix bikes. That first track sounds so sweet so fast I don't know if it could ever sound bad in some context.
The problem is, the rest of the album doesn't rock as wonderfully so if you put it on you need to be sure that you are actually in the mood to listen to the rest of the album, that you are leaving before that's a concern, or you have something else to switch it to.
The Basement Tapes is good but I am just not that big of a fan of The Band, so I stick to Hard Rain over that. It's just got a rock sound and you can feel the energy on each track.
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Hurricane is probably my favorite Dylan track, but I just can not sit through the rest of Desire. It just bores the hell out of me.
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At least it's not as wrong as Joey from later in the album.
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'Hurricane' the song is a good song but very factually incorrect (http://graphicwitness.com/carter/song.html).
I don't know why this bothers me, it just does.
Now it's going to bother me too. Thanks a lot, I really liked that song!
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Man, I just don't give a shit about that. It's not like the song's a book posing as nonfiction or anything. It's just a song. Creative license and whatnot.
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I tried to listen to Hard Rain yesterday, but I couldn't even stand listening to "Maggie's Farm", because that version is so different from the one on Bringing it All Back Home, which I like very much. I might try again tomorrow.
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It's not like the song's a book posing as nonfiction or anything.
It's a song posing as a non-fiction which strongly implies that the most likely suspect in a brutal murder was framed, when he almost certainly wasn't.
It's a really good song though.
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Hard Rain is underrated as hell. I love how he just makes thigns into hard-rock, and that crazy like, reggae-metal version of 'Shelter From The Storm.' I think I heard somewhere that Sara was at the side of the stage during this gig, hence him being so angry. To the person who didn't like it because it's different... THAT'S THE POINT. Dylan has always done this. And if it was exactly like the album version it'd be boring as fuck.
I think his best live album is Live 1966 from the 'Albert Hall' *cough*. The 'Judas' gig. Amazing stuff on there. The Highway 61 stuff on there, I still prefer the version of 'Just Tom Thumb's Blues' to the album version.
As for his best album... I'd say as far as flat-out best, it's Blood On The Tracks. There's one song on it that I occasionally skip, and the rest I just love front-to-back. If you want a great representation of the guy, I'd say Bringing It All Back Home because it perfectly bridges the gap between the weed-and-folk and speed-and-rock eras.
I also love Desire, because I love how unique it is in his catalogue. I think it's got a very lush, full sound for the time - and 'Isis' is my favourite ever of his songs.
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Man, I know that is the point, I just don't really like it (yet), is all.
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Find Bootleg Series Vol. 5 instead to ease you in. That has him changing the songs, but not beyond recognition, because the live band is more or less the same one that recorded them on the album.
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I just might do that, thanks!
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I saw Niel Young cover Hurricane earlier this year. It was excellent.
The time they are a changing' was my first, and holds a place on the podium, but freewheeling Bob Dylan and Highway 61 revisited are my two favorites.
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'Hurricane' is OK but it always feels a couple minutes too long. Actually, a lot of the songs on that album are, for me. I'm not a big fan of 'Desire' on the whole. I agree that the violin is a weird choice. My favorite is probably 'The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan.'
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Personally, I love Love & Theft, mostly because it's the album that really got me into Dylan.
Out of his other work, I'd probably go with Blood on the Tracks.
By the way, anyone have any news on his new album?
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It's just Guthrie stuff, isn't it? Like the Mermaid Avenue records.
"Love and Theft" is a magnificent record. Doesn't have the cloying production of its predecessor, and it's pretty fucking funny in places too. Plus the drum sound on 'Honest With Me' is magnificent.
Current favourite Dylan songs:
'Blood In My Eyes,' which I think is a piece of beautiful, romantic simplicity.
'Changing Of The Guard' because of the spiralling imagery of it. Shame that the sax sounds like the theme to GMTV or something.
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On my other forum there's a very long and particularly nasty thread in which you have to vote for either Bob or Neil. As far as I'm concerned that's the hardest musical vote imaginable.
I saw both live last year.
It's Neil.
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So what's so great about Bob Dylan anyway?
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He changed music.
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From ... into ... ?
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He released approximately 73% of all the worlds music.
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From ... into ... ?
He made it allowed to be literate and intelligent with your music. He made rock slightly harder-rockin'. And he managed to change directions with your music completely and still be called a genius.
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You mean his music right?
I saw both live last year.
It's Neil.
It's Neil covering Dylan songs.
Mr. Young cover All Along the Watchtower was one of the greatest things I have seen/heard
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He made it allowed to be literate and intelligent
He opened the doors of literacy and intelligence to everyone.
I'm sorry but that's a completely ridiculous argument that stems from the common belief that popular music started in the 1950s with the creation of rock 'n' roll. Here are some very literate and intelligent songs that were extremely popular in the 1930s. You might recognise them:
"I Get a Kick Out of You", by Cole Porter:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FtwO2tKZmwQ (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FtwO2tKZmwQ)
"Isn't It a Pity", by George & Ira Gershwin (hey, check out the full lyrics here (http://www.hotlyrics.net/lyrics/E/Ella_Fitzgerald/Isn_t_It_a_Pity.html) - Ira Gershwin name-checks Schopenhauer!):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BMefeMj1s9s (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BMefeMj1s9s)
Here's a couple of great ones: "Manhattan" by Rodgers and Hart is from 1925!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMy7q1sQalw (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMy7q1sQalw)
Basically what I'm trying to say is that there was a period in American popular music decades before Bob Dylan came along where every songwriter was trying to out-do the others in the cleverness and wittiness and topicality of their lyrics.
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people came to believe that popular music was capable of inspiring or documenting change in public opinion.
A return to old ways (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lillibullero), perhaps?
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Fine, add the word 'again' to my post. I'm not saying music was never smart, but in the 50s and 60s, rock 'n' roll stars didn't tend to have a great deal to say other than an admiration for say, their favourite milkshake.
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After two world wars, I think there was a period when people were quite pleased not to be thinking of much more than milk shakes (or frothy coffee!). But of course, it needed to come to an end, and Dylan was a part of that.
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Okay, brilliant, thanks. Now maybe I can place him better. Maybe even learn to appreciate him.
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The fuck? I could have sworn that I had posted in here.
Has anyone heard much about his new album (to be released)?
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It's Woodie Guthrie tunes with an all-star cast, isn't it?
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Don't think so.
My father's a huge Dylan fan (read: Has all albums, bootlegs, posters, labels, stickers, buttons, etc.) and doesn't know that much about it. Apparently he references Billie Joe Shaver in one song, but that's about all I know.
I don't think Shaver was alive when Woody Guthrie was.
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Well either way, I'm buying it on release. I'll always buy a new Dylan record. I think his last two are among his greatest ever. I'm not fond of Time Out Of Mind, though.