Bob Dylan's Never-Ending Tour of The Self

Reason's Nick Gillespie & Brian Doherty, and The Daily Beast's Andrew Kirell discuss the Nobel laureate's anarchic individualism and cultural influence.

1x 1.1x 1.25x 1.5x 2x 3x

:15 :15

Download

Bob Dylan's Never-Ending Tour of The Self

Nobel Prize winner Bob Dylan (let that sink in for a bit) has been on "a never ending tour" since 1988. For nearly 30 years, the man behind "Like a Rolling Stone," "All Along the Watch Tower," "Tangled Up in Blue," and dozens of other classic tunes has stayed on the road, playing concerts all over the planet.

Nick Gillespie is joined by his Reason colleague Brian Doherty and The Daily Beast's Andrew Kirell to talk the influence and meaning of Dylan, who has resisted all political and cultural categorization. What are the politics of Bob Dylan (which is different than Bob Dylan's politics), who made his early bones by writing protest songs but also claimed kinship to Lee Harvey Oswald? Admired for his authenticity, Dylan is a cultural escape artist who has regularly changed his persona and style and alienated his most-loyal fans by going electric, disappearing from view, becoming a born-again Christian, and more.

If Dylan is the "Shakespeare of our time," what does he for an encore now that he has joined the ranks of Eugene O'Neill, Saul Bellow, and Toni Morrison as a Nobelist?

Each participant also names his favorite Dylan record and defends his choice.

Click below to listen. About 40 minutes. Produced by Ian Keyser.

Don't miss a single Reason podcast or video!

Subscribe to our audio podcast at iTunes.

Subscribe to our video podcast at iTunes.

Subscribe to our YouTube channel.

Like us on Facebook.

Follow us on Twitter.

Comments

[(((Renegade)))]

Lay Lady Lay was the anthem of my misspent youth.

[SoCal Deathmarch]

Bob Dylan sucks.

[A frilly pink thing]

Newsletter.

[Rockabilly]

A song to King Obama

Oh you Master of War
Oh you that fire the Imperial Drone
Oh you that shred the US Constitution
Oh you that continue the racist war on drugs
While smoking some herb in your Executive Suite
Hoping that Queen Michelle won't smell it

[AlmightyJB]

Dylan's cool

[Chipper Morning Wood]

He'll be even cooler when he is dead.

[AlmightyJB]

I thought he was dead

[Mongo]

I've mentioned this before but there's a jaw-dropping mural of Dylan in downtown MPLS.

[Animal]

I would think it would be in downtown Hibbing.

If Hibbing, you know, had a downtown.

[The Fusionist]

Groovy

[Fist of Etiquette]

Okay, I was going to let this slide, but since apparently we're not letting this go any time soon... If we're calling lyrics literature, I can think of a few singer songwriters with more talent than Dylan. This is not to take away from his talent, but for fuck sake. If you haven't learned any credibility lessons from the Obama Nobel fiasco, why not give Hillary the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences before she even takes office because you to nudge her toward Berninomics.

[The Hyperbole ((Very Tall))]

I can think of a few singer songwriters with more talent than Dylan.

Neil Diamond? It's Neil diamond isn't it?

[Fist of Etiquette]

Every time that flag's unfurled.

[Ted S.]

But it don't sing and dance and it don't walk.

[Paloma]

And no one heard at all not even the chair.

[AlmightyJB]

Pfft. He was referring to Rebecca Black of course.

[Pan Zagloba]

She can wait her turn in 50 years!

[Chipper Morning Wood]

Didn't you know that Friday is a libertarian anthem?

[Heroic Mulatto]

Tucker is incorrect.

The song that is really a "underlying celebration of liberation" is Alison Gold's Chinese Food.

[Chipper Morning Wood]

It's a lyrical celebration of comparative advantage.

[Heroic Mulatto]

That would be this paean to the Chinese automotive industry.

[commodious plays tuna piano]

Hungry after hugging?

Goddamnit I've had it all wrong all along!

[commodious plays tuna piano]

Rebecca Black is looking good here btw.

[AlmightyJB]

Alice Cooper actually blew the school to pieces.

[Trigger Warning]

I can think of a few singer songwriters with more talent than Dylan.

Who? Honestly curious. Dylan isn't my jam, but comparing a guy to Shakespeare is heavy shit. I think that comparison is ludicrous and not apt; it's as stupid as saying Paul Dirac is the modern Marguerite of Navarre. It's not even wrong.

[The Hyperbole ((Very Tall))]

Barry Manilow? It's Barry Manilow isn't it? I mean he did write the songs...

[Ted S.]

Wasn't that written by one of the Wilsons from the Beach Boys?

[pauses to check]

Bruce Johnston, but he was one of the Beach Boys.

And the song was apparently written for the Captain and Tennille.

[Ted S.]

Love didn't keep them together, of course

[Tagore Smith]

Hey, Marguerite is my great-grandmother several times removed.Don't be disrespecting her.

[Homple]

Dylan may well be the Shakespeare of our times, which is a reminder that there are drops as well as rises in the trajectory of human intellectual achievement.

[Pan Zagloba]

Hopefully Leonard Cohen can win the next year's for his body of work, including The Most Important Song of 20th Century.

[The Hyperbole ((Very Tall))]

Leonard Cohen wrote "Boom Boom"?

[(((Renegade)))]

Dylan. Cohen. Notice (((something)))?

[Pan Zagloba]

Boomers trying to get their idols in before they die?

[Rufus The Monocled]

I think he meant they're....JOOOOOS!

[Zeb]

It wasn''t too subtle.

[Tagore Smith]

I think everybody knows.

[Tagore Smith]

I thank you for those items that you sent me. I'd especially like to thank you for the monkey- we've become best buds. And that plywood violin- turns out the monkey is a really great violinist. Who would have thunk it? Well, I told you.

[commodious plays tuna piano]

I love so many of Cohen's songs, and I'd love them so much better sung by other singers.

[Tagore Smith]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RaJAxdGeZ4E

[commodious plays tuna piano]

Joey, baby, don't get crazy.

[Tagore Smith]

God I hate that song.

[commodious plays tuna piano]

Really? It's not so bad.

[Derpetologist]

I knew a stand-up comedian who did a Bob Dylan version of Mary Had a Little Lamb. It was pretty funny.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

I prefer Porky Pig's "Blue Christmas".

[Rufus The Monocled]

No. They should create an entire category in her honor.

The Nobel Prize for 'Powering Through'.

Or 'Biggest Cunt'.

[Derpetologist]

I'd like to see her power through about 10,000 volts in a chair with leather straps .

[Heroic Mulatto]

If we're calling lyrics literature

I think we lost that battle around 500 BC or so.

[The Hyperbole ((Very Tall))]

That's a sculpture HM, not even close to spoken/written expression.

[Heroic Mulatto]

These are my thoughts.

[Chipper Morning Wood]

Words are just sculptures of air.

[Fist of Etiquette]

What are the politics of Bob Dylan (which is different than Bob Dylan's politics)...

Speaking of the latter, can you imagine how much fun that could be had if Dylan came out for Trump?

[The Hyperbole ((Very Tall))]

?Who's gonna keep those Muslims out
Donald's gonna keep those Muslims out
Who's gonna Build a wall so high
Donald's gonna build a wall so high

Wall so High, Muslims out

Must be Donald
Must be Donald
Must be Donald

Donald Trump.?

[C. Anacreon]

The most underplayed Santa Claus song! Now I've got that stuck in my head.

[Thymirus]

Next winner -

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TzRdhfrou4g

[Ted S.]

what does he for an encore now that he has joined the ranks of Eugene O'Neill, Saul Bellow, and Toni Morrison as a Nobelist?

Reveal that the physics laureate has been replaced by a look-alike?

[Rufus The Monocled]

I don't leave until we get Lou Reed's political stance.

[GILMORE?]

Someone fix the quote for me = If i werent bob dylan, i wouldnt listen to anything bob dylan said about anything

[GILMORE?]

sorry mangled it =

If I wasn't Bob Dylan, I'd probably think that Bob Dylan has a lot of answers myself.

[Rufus The Monocled]

First, you would have to understand him.

Rumor has it only Tom Petty understood anything he was saying while with 'The Traveling Wilburys.'

There's a legend where Roy Orbison was so upset he removed his glasses and threw them at Dylan yelling, 'Speak English! You speak like you were electrified!'

[DenverJ]

I'm surprised any of them understood each other. Also, Tweeter and the Monkey Man is a great song.

[Chipper Morning Wood]

That is my favorite song of theirs.

[RBS]

Boomhauer also understood Dylan.

[DenverJ]

Oh Lord. West Texas conversing with whatever accent Dylan has. And both would tell you that they're speaking English.

[Paloma]

He does kinda sound like Eddie Murphy/Buckwheat when he sings.

[Jerryskids]

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Always my favorite Dylan lyrics.

[C. Anacreon]

He did name himself after Dylan Thomas, after all.

[The Laissez-Ferret]

+1 Back to School

[Derpetologist]

Is this a good place to talk about libertarianism and pop culture? I saw a bit of a Tim Allen sitcom the other day. The scene was a discussion about how it was impossible to fire an alcoholic employee because he was classified as disabled. The plan was to fire the drunk so a neighbor down on his luck could take the job, but it turned out the safer option legally was to fire a model employee. The boss character said something like "yep, we have to fire the good ones and keep the bad ones." Allen's character said "I'm pretty sure that's chiseled in stone in front of every government building."

Not surprisingly, the series has been panned by critics for reasons that have *nothing* to do with politics.

Ah, here's the problem:

Tim Allen as Michael "Mike" Baxter
Mike is a father of three daughters and the director of marketing for the Outdoor Man chain of sporting goods stores. He fervently supports traditional American values, is a devout Christian, and is politically conservative.

In another snippet from the show, the free market was described as a good thing. The horror!

[Pan Zagloba]

Is it sad that my first thought was "how did something that subversive get past censors?" Is it an All in the Family situation, where an ostensible buffoon ends up as a sympathetic character?

But I love this IMDB answer to question of "Is Mike Baxter a conservative"?

The best label for Mike is Libertarian because of his strong belief in free markets, limited government, and personal freedom.

There are also the hunting parts which are as far right ( and repugnant to veg/vegans which the world is journeying to) even though the show deals with it via other guest stars, sort of ) as you can get, and hate basically of anything Obama which puts him in square parallel with all republicans who goals have nothing to do with liberty as in statue of liberty and what that represents ) . 'Free choice' that libertarians associate with ,aren't always , under all circumstances the best paths for peace and justice for all .

[Derpetologist]

Leave it to the Hallmark Channel to pick up the slack left by all the other faux subversives.

[westernsloper]

"There are also the hunting parts which are as far right ( and repugnant to veg/vegans which the world is journeying to)"

That person has not traveled much out of their neighborhood in LA I take it.

It is good to know that "Liberty" means the statue of Liberty though. That was something I was wondering about.

[Ted S.]

It's not as if the politicians in Washington are offering any liberty.

[C. Anacreon]

Yes, mass underclass immigration, as in 'statue of liberty'

[Pat (PM)]

Is it an All in the Family situation, where an ostensible buffoon ends up as a sympathetic character?

Pretty much exactly, except the characters aren't as good and Tim Allen is too much of a goofball to make it work in the way Carroll O'Connor did.

[John Titor]

Hell, I keep rewatching King of the Hill and realize how little of it would fly nowadays. I mean, slightly lowbrow uptight moderate Christian father who is mildly judgmental but also intelligent, sane and sympathetic? And he's not framed as a buffoon or a dumb caricature and actually presents his positions rationally? And oh man would some of those episodes about Hank trying to influence Bobby drive the social justice crowd into hysterics.

[__Warren__]

Hank was one the best representations of a father/breadwinner/husband in the history of TV.

Most of the dads were shown as good people. Khan was deeply caring of Connie. Dale loved Joseph and showed it.

John Redcorn though, was a complete shit.

[Agammamon]

Redcorn, to his credit, knew that.

[geo1113]

"Like a Rolling Stone," "All Along the Watch Tower,"

I'll take the Hendrix versions.

[Rufus The Monocled]

Like a Rolling Stone and Positively 4th Street. Love those two songs.

[geo1113]

Positively 4th is good. I like Highway 61, Subterranean Homesick Blues, and Rainy Day Woman #12 and 35.

[Rufus The Monocled]

Those too.

Look, no one can really dispute his impact and great stuff...but literature?

Moliere, Dante, Shakespeare, Dumas, Tolstoy, Milton, Bellow...Dylan?

[Rufus The Monocled]

...Goethe.

[Heroic Mulatto]

The more shocking thing is that an American actually won.

[RBS]

You misspelled Goatse.

[geo1113]

And what about Iceberg Slim!

[Pan Zagloba]

Honestly I like to imagine committee going:

"Which next obscure, near-death, right-thinking writer is next in line?"

"Err...dunno..."

"You know, fuck it, how about Bob Dylan? At least people heard of him, and if we are not mocked, there's a slew of singers and scriptwriters we can start nominating"

"Eh, worth a shot"

[Zeb]

People with PhDs in English think it's literature, so it must be.

I think if you write it down, it's literature. I'm not convinced Dylan deserves the prize. But for a lot of history, poetry and song were more or less one thing, so it seems appropriate to consider song writers.

[geo1113]

Poetry and song were used because it was easier to remember the story and pass it down to the next generation.

[Zeb]

I'm sure that's true.

[Rufus The Monocled]

Maybe that's a little lose a definition I dunno but the thought of our comments being classified as 'literature' is troubling to me.

[Chipper Morning Wood]

SugarFree might have something to say about that.

[John Titor]

You think that's bad, wait until the future remnants of humanity find Agile Cyborg's writings and form a religion around them. A thousand years from now and his statues will dot Asia.

[Chipper Morning Wood]

Nice, one hand on the titty and the other one grabbing the pussy. I bet they let him do anything.

[AlmightyJB]

Lol

[Paloma]

Moliere, Dante, Shakespeare, Dumas, Tolstoy, Milton,...only Bellow won a Nobel. And there are others on the Nobel Lit Prize who are a lot worse than Dylan.

[DenverJ]

Yeah, but who wrote em?

[Lee Genes]

Dude, Dylan's tunes saved the human race from destruction by the Cylons

[John Titor]

More like he plagiarized the intergalactic area code for Earth.

IT'S COMING FROM THE FRAKKING SHIP.

[Slumbrew]

Thank you for reminding me how that one-time excellent show ended up as a steaming pile of shit.

[AlmightyJB]

Tricia Helfer so very hot

[Agammamon]

Dude, they just copied that from Robotech.

[The Late P Brooks]

God said, "You can do what you want, Abe, but- next time you see me coming you better run."

Abe said, "Where you want this killing done?"

[Mike Laursen]

The Bob Dylan Translation of The Holy Bible would be the greatest thing ever.

[DK]

Taylor Swift will be the first laureate once millennials take over the Nobel committee.

[The hand that whips the orphan]

This would be the same committee that handed Obama and Arafat the Peace Prize and Krugman the economics Prize, yes how dare they soil its good name!!!

[Pat (PM)]

In fairness to Krugman and the prize committee, the work for which he was awarded the prize was both interesting and decades prior to his career as the left's official water carrier.

[Chipper Morning Wood]

Crusty would be over the moon if Taylor Swift won the Nobel Prize for literature. People haven't always been there for him, but her music always was.

[AlmightyJB]

CNN Money's ad invested website says Ken Bone is a sell out for doing an Uber tweet.

http://money.cnn.com/2016/10/1.....index.html

[AlmightyJB]

ad infested dammit

[straffinrun]

Yes. I gave up. Bad enough it was CNN.

[westernsloper]

The only thing I can take from this is that the entire Nobel committee must have been baked out of their gords. The only time I thought I understood what the hell he was getting on about was one time listening to him while eating mushrooms and dancing around a bonfire on the beach in Hobe Sound in the '80's.

I then left town for a few weeks leaving my car with my friends. They went to a Dylan concert in Miami. They returned my car with a couple bent rims, no brakes, and no hub caps. Fuckers.

[straffinrun]

I always assumed I was just too stupid to "get" Dylan. The Nobel committee confirmed my assumption. Therefore I'm Socrates.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

*covers my eyes, puts envelope up to forehead*

NICK GILLESPIE!

*looks*

Boom.

[straffinrun]

I'm having a grand time posting juicy pieces of Podesta's Wiki leaks revelations on FB. The fracking one in particular is causing my Berniebot friends trouble squaring the circle. The best they've come up with is that her private position is really her public position and vice versa. The one in which she admits to knowing the Saudi's are funding ISIS is also worth some jaw dropping contortions.

[geo1113]

I have a real proggie friend. We don't talk politics very much, but when we do I get a lot of uh uh uh uh.

[Heroic Mulatto]

You talk politics while sodomizing him or her?

[geo1113]

He must be sodomizing himself. I'm usually drinking beers and smoking doobies.

[Heroic Mulatto]

This doesn't rule out blackouts.

[geo1113]

Chances of me blacking out are nil.

[Chipper Morning Wood]

You have a high tolerance for pain?

[straffinrun]

It's odd because I actually like her private positions better than her public positions for the most part. They don't.

[geo1113]

It isn't about their true position on issues. It is to gain the most amount of power by duping the highest number of people.

[straffinrun]

No doubt.

[Derpetologist]

The Nobel Prize was invented by a guy who felt guilty that the explosives he invented ended up killing tons of people. In fact, he died while on the run after being accused of "treason against France" for selling explosives to Italy. I'm sure how you can commit treason against a country you aren't a citizen of, but there it is.

His brother was killed in an explosion while mixing a big tank of nitroglycerin with a big paddle.

[Derpetologist]

A French newspaper mistakenly published an obituary for Nobel after his brother died which said:
"Dr. Alfred Nobel, who became rich by finding ways to kill more people faster than ever before, died yesterday."

And that's what got the ball rolling on the Nobel Prize.

[The Fusionist]

To be fair, they've given the Peace Prize to some very kill-y people.

[C. Anacreon]

Yassir, that's true

[Ted S.]

I figured he was talking about Obama.

[John Titor]

He also owned Bofors and turned it into the cannon manufacturing company it is today. If Nobel was really that guilty you'd think he'd drop the whole cannon business and start producing cast iron pots or something.

[Heroic Mulatto]

if u see this comment while scroling
u have been visited by trumpet skelton of the abyss
good bones and calcium will come to u
but only if u reply
'thank mr skeltal' to this comment

[Ted S.]

You're almost as bad as Eddie going on about that Civil War cadaver.

[Heroic Mulatto]

You misspelled 'thank mr skeltal.'

[The Fusionist]

Look, at least the body ended up being buried and I shut up about it.

When is mr. skeltal's funeral?

thank mr skeltal

[Heroic Mulatto]

When is mr. skeltal's funeral?

Whenever peace accords that will hopefully end the Skeleton War conclude. Analysts predict we might have a breakthrough before Nov. 1st.

[Jackand Ace]

John Wesley Harding. Not a bad song on it, including All Along the Watchtower, Dear Landlord, I Dreamed I Saw St. Augustine, and more. With just the right amount of religious mysticism, anger, hope, and yes, poetry.

[Chipper Morning Wood]

Why am I not surprised.

[__Warren__]

Apparently it's Wear Your Pajamas to Work Day in the NFL.

[geo1113]

How else could San Diego be up 7-0.

[Pat (PM)]

God Gillespie is an insufferable cunt. For as much as people whinge about Millennials, for my money you can't get beat the boomers for self-absorbed navel gazing and self-congratulation.

[geo1113]

Fuckers give us semi-sane boomers a bad name.

[The Fusionist]

Now that there aren't public phone booths any more, where do you semi-sane boomers hold your annual national convention?

[geo1113]

In the comfort of our own homes.

[The Fusionist]

I'm just messing with you, I know there's lots of you.

[geo1113]

I took no offense. I'll tell you who has to deal with shit. It is my son at UMass.

[The Fusionist]

Best wishes!

[geo1113]

That isn't the worst part. He is a journalism major!

[The Fusionist]

Hmmmm...

[geo1113]

He had a teacher who said she didn't think that Hillary's health should be an issue. He said it was good to know her bias.

[The Fusionist]

They should follow the example of Obama's peace prize and give the Nobel in Literature to some guy who always wanted to write a novel but never got around to it.

[geo1113]

The 2017 Noble Prize in Literature goes to geo1113.

[John Titor]

Ah hell, I knew the Nobel Prize thing would result in another round of Nick Gillespie's Dylan musings.

Just drop the pretext Nick, when Dylan dies we'll make sure to put you on his longboat before we push it out to sea and burn it.

[Nativist, Racist & Xenophobe]

Dylan is a good writer of commercial melodies (plenty of people had pop hits with his stuff even de-emphasizing the lyrics), and his lyrics weren't so much story lines as a sequence of wild, yanked out of the ass images, like "Upon the beach where hound dogs bay At ships with tattooed sails". But it's really less literature or poetry than it is an aural cartoon. He has a gift for sounding profound without actually saying anything. Mostly, his stuff sets a mood, which is pretty much the same formula as for every other pop singer as well.

Ultimately I think his stuff will die with the boomers. You can hear bands playing and even charting with other 50's or 60's or 70's stuff, like remakes of Beatles songs, but rarely do I hear Dylan covered anymore. To the extent that I ever hear someone cover him at all, it's usually covers of other band's arrangements of his stuff. You can hear a band do All Along the Watchtower ala Hendrix or Mr. Tambourine Man like the Byrds, but I don't think many artists look to Dylan as an original source anymore. I even hear things like "Stairway to Heaven" more often than anything by Dylan.

He does have his moments of wry wit and insight though:

A self-ordained professor's tongue too serious to fool
Spouted out that liberty is just equality in school
"Equality, " I spoke the word as if a wedding vow
Ah, but I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now

[John Titor]

Also, let's be real Nick:

The Band is better than Dylan himself. There, I said it.

[geo1113]

John. You nailed it. I saw Bob Dylan and The Band.

[John]

The Band was great. Not sure I would go that far however

[commodious plays tuna piano]

Springsteen is a better songwriter than Dylan. Maybe not in terms of lyrical poeticism, but certainly for performance and heart.

[commodious plays tuna piano]

Also, songwriting is poetry without the rhyme or reason. It's a bastardry of the art. And poetry is a horrendous imitation of the reason and rationale of prose. It's prose's simpler cousin. And prose is just a technical document that nobody wanted and nobody wants to read. The truest art form is the economist's manifesto. It captures the human condition without all the boring distracting bits.

[John]

Springsteen is a rock and roll composer who never wrote a decent guitar riff in his life. And he never wrote a song that had any swing to it. His songs always just clunk along and never roll.

[commodious plays tuna piano]

I'm not a music guy. I listen to podcasts mostly. But when I'm feeling maudlin, I like some Springsteen. It's mawkish, stupid shit, and it hits the mark.

[John]

He has some great songs. I love Atlantic City. I just wish he had had a better producer and someone to collaborate with that had a funkier sense of rhythm.

[commodious plays tuna piano]

I like Nebraska. It's... uh, very dispiriting.

[Rufus The Monocled]

Don't listen to Nebraska after losing your job, your girlfriend left you and there's no Nutella in the pantry.

[geo1113]

Fuck...no Nutella!

[John]

Wow dude. That is a tough night.

[geo1113]

John, Kitty's Back is a great song.

[Rufus The Monocled]

Who cares? He can play. Go look up Springsteen helping out Zevon on his final album on youtube. Look at everyone's faces as he plays.

There are few better live performers on the planet in rock history. Very few. Live at the Hammersmith is a wonderful live performance.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HYo3NONWAQs

[Paloma]

Exactly John. Springsteen mostly writes dirges. Every couple lines throw in a girl named Mary and then down by the river and you've got the essence. Smile once in awhile, mi hijo.

[geo1113]

When I think of Springsteen and heart, I go right to Kitty's Back.

[John]

As much as anything Dylan hates hippies and folkies. Whatever his politics are, they can't be that bad.

[geo1113]

Brings back thoughts of the Rolling Stone interview were they tried to get him to say how wonderful Obama is and he wouldn't take the bait.

[John]

When Levon Helm was taking the folkies booing pretty hard Bob told him "let them boo all they want. It is good publicity and sells tickets". He really didn't care. He does his music for his own reasons.

[commodious plays tuna piano]

Familiarity breeds contempt?

I really have no idea with Dylan. I listened to some of his stuff growing up because my mom was a fan, but I never endeavored to explore his oeuvre till a bit later, and found myself bored. Then I saw him in concert, and he seemed like he wanted to phone the thing in. Like he was performing for alimony payments a la Robin Williams. He mumbled through his set. The headliners were John Mellencamp and Willie Nelson, and they rocked the show. Dylan opened and sat sadly through his set. It was awful and dispiriting.

[John]

He still does very good records but I have never heard a good word about his shows over the last 20 years.

The thing about Dylan is that much of the time there isn't anything more there that what there seems. He is very much a primitivist. And lyrically sometimes there is a lot of meaning, other times he is just throwing words up for how they sound.

[commodious plays tuna piano]

He sounds like someone whose artistry might have benefited mightily from inducting in the 27 club.

[John]

Not so. He has done some very good records in the last 30 years. I think he just lost interest in performance and does it for the money.

[commodious plays tuna piano]

I guess I have some lernin to do.

You understand how upsetting it is for someone to put on a bad performance in Albuquerque? It feels like watching someone who's reached rock bottom find out that he can plateau even lower.

[JayU]

If I remember correctly, he said exactly this in his 60 Minutes Interview.

"Sometimes there is no deeper meaning."

[Paloma]

Dylan is mostly Naturalism. Think Ibsen. Hippies are half assed Romanticists. They mostly clash.

[Sevo]

"Hippies are half assed Romanticists"

Half-assed is true enough, because none of them thought through the results of their desires. "Simplistic" works, too.

[DOOMco]

Exciting 3rd for the bruins.

[Crusty Juggler]

I've urinated in Pete Seeger's front yard. It may have been a random home somebody told me was Seeger's, but that does not diminish my accomplishment.

[Brochettaward]

You sicken me. Not because of this story, but just in general.

[geo1113]

You deserve a Noble Prize...I'm thinking chemistry.

[Crusty Juggler]

"Overcome that, Commie," I exclaimed as I shook off one last drip.

[geo1113]

More than 2 shakes?

[Crusty Juggler]

I am a leaker, so I'm extra cautious.

[geo1113]

I guess you can't have a roll of TP when you are pissing on Seeger's lawn

[commodious plays tuna piano]

What about Bob Seger? Is he okay? I like some of his stuff.

[SIV]

Get Out of Denver

[commodious plays tuna piano]

Snake Plissken stars in... Escape from CO.

[Tagore Smith]

+++++++

[Tagore Smith]

This resonates with me- my grand-dad was an actual commie from Colorado. He had a rough time in the McCarthy era, but went on to be the head of public relations for the AEC.

[SIV]

I like Dave Edmund's cover even better than the Seger version

[C. Anacreon]

My favorite concert of all time was seeing Rockpile live in a small theater in Chicago in 1981. Dave Edmunds and Nick Lowe together were just amazing, and the rest of the band were dynamite too.

[SIV]

Ramblin' Gambolin'

[Paloma]

LOVED that song. They don't have it on Spotify.

[Tagore Smith]

"Ain't good looking but I ain't shy" is pretty rapey, tbh.

[Jerryskids]

Bob Seger is The King.

[SIV]

^THAT is bad Bob Seger

THIS is good Bob Seger

[Butts Wagner]

I've urinated in Pete Seeger's front yard.

Not nearly as impressive as destroying Neil Armstrong's mailbox

[Rufus The Monocled]

Next up: Palestinian poet who elegantly expresses his people's oppression with 'Blow this bitch up' and 'Throw the Jews into the sea because Jews'.

[Pat (PM)]

Plus his hit single Throw the Jew Down the Well

[__Warren__]

I love stories like this.

[Jerryskids]

Along those lines - I've got a nephew that drives for a food service company and he worked extra days just before the hurricane getting out orders to restaurants that wanted to make sure their deliveries weren't delayed. I mentioned this to a neighbor who thought it was kinda strange - why would the restaurants want to stock up on food when if the hurricane hits and the power goes out they're liable to lose thousands of dollars worth of food? Well, what if the power doesn't go out but the highways are shut down where they can't get food in? One of those risks you gotta take - power goes out and you lose a ton of food, power doesn't go out and you lose a ton of sales if you don't have food. Too many people think of those evil corporations and their greed and their profit motive - profits can be negative, competition demands you gotta take risks and sometimes you lose. Owning a business isn't the cash machine some people seem to think, Bernie.

[Tagore Smith]

I saw Dylan in concert once. He fell asleep during his set.

[Winston]

When's Kanye going to get his Nobel?

[Butts Wagner]

Hipster or Homeless? Neither, Kanye

[Winston]

So apparently tomorrow Obama will decide whether or not to bomb Assad's forces. Since this will kill Russians too and the Russians claim they will shoot down US planes we could have WWIII very soon. Does anyone care? Nope. But then again no one expected WWI until literally a few days before it started...

[SIV]

The upside is if the Russkies nuke D.C. they might hit the McSuderman residence.

[Sevo]

I attended one of the concerts where BD did the first half of the show acoustic and the second half electric. It seemed over-blown at the time and still does that some of the audience walked out when he picked up the electric guitar.
I got laid as a result of going to the concert, so I've always been appreciative, but his music and 'poetry' never approached that level of importance. THAT was important!
Or gravitas. Shakespeare? I don't think so.

[__Warren__]

I never played O-line but how fucking hard is it to not hold? If I was a coach and your stupid holding penalty cost me a score you are fucking benched.

Holding and false start penalties are inexcusable.

[Jerryskids]

You've obviously never played O-line - you hold every single play. You just try not to get caught.

[__Warren__]

Do you hold by grabbing the guy around his neck when he was out of the play?

[AlmightyJB]

This is true. Holding takes place almost every play which is why 10 yards for it is ridiculous. Drive over. Should be 5 yards.

[Sevo]

Wanna explain to Kaep about that clock staring him in the face? How 40 seconds is actually an objective measure of time and won't change 'cause he feels it should?
I'll bet Chip Kelly hasn't been any more effective than you might be; SF gets stomped...

[Butts Wagner]

Chop Block. Georgia Tech.

[Jimmy Free Trade Pirate]

Hey man with all t is going on all I have to say s this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I0AxrOUJ62E

[commodious plays tuna piano]

Can't help but agree, that was a mistake.

[Jimmy Free Trade Pirate]

BTW I left your mother her cab fare on my nightstand before she left. =D

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xeGhazPjhoA

[Jerryskids]

Not Peter Gabriel?

[Jimmy Free Trade Pirate]

How about some Airship Pirates ?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZrh6eooyrg

[Tagore Smith]

That's not only the worst Peter Gabriel song, but.. honestly I've been meaning to fly to London and beat him to death with a shovel for a long time now- since '84 at least. I just never seem to find the time The years, they go by..

"We're kissing baboons in the jungle. It's a knockout" would be the worst lyric ever if it weren't followed by the even worse "except for little Taigu (sp?)"

[AlmightyJB]

Better Peter Gabriel song

https://youtu.be/g93mz_eZ5N4

[Tagore Smith]

Yeah, much better.

[Butts Wagner]

Hide out in the cellar

[SIV]

The best Dylan is covers of Dylan songs. Or better yet,a cover of The Turtles covering a Dylan song

Johnny Thunders

[Troy muy grande boner]

I would have thought that a post on literature would have more Sugarfree love. Sugarfree, if you are still alive and haven't killed yourself with that Costco sized bag of M, I love you man. And you should have at least been nominated. And shame on the rest of you for ignoring this hidden gem of True American literatiure

[SIV]

While the Byrds were the best Dylan cover band ever, Johnny Thunders could do a Dylan song better than Bob too.

[Jimmy Free Trade Pirate]

God Dammit
You people call yourselves Libertarians, and no one has poste this video on a Bob Dylan post !!!!!
AC would be ashamed !!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=67u2fmYz7S4

[AlmightyJB]

Nice

[Nativist, Racist & Xenophobe]

I don't really take Dylan winning a Nobel as a vindication of Dylan so much as I see it as boomers shitting all over a venerated institution. Again.

[Michael S. Langston]

Agreed.

I'd only add the whole "what's his politics" is an unnecessary and nauseating confirmation that nothing in life has any useful value if it cannot be politicized in such a way that weak, intellectually lazy people have yet another arrogance affirming signaling device.

In addition, he's like one of very small percentage of artists/celebrities/et al who isn't ceaselessly pushing how their beliefs/politics/sexuality/eating choiese/etc are morally superior to all other possible alternatives, including all that have been known, are known, or will ever be known, throughout this universe and all other universes, to infinity.

But instead of thanking him, he's pushed to spill his political secrets.

And while I agree with others that he's not Shakespeare, I will say he's smart enough to likely take these secrets to his grave. His image gains a lot by remaining undefinable. Add to that any gain he might secure by answering 30 year old questions, no matter how big or how long lasting, would be temporary. But the loss of being mysterious would be permenant.

Of course humans do weird things, especially as the edge closer to death, so who knows.

But if I had a vote: I'd vote that all media should stop asking him what his politics are ever again, even show him more respect in an effort to incent others like him to shut the hell up.

Though maybe he's so smart he encourages the questions to highlight his refusal to answer 🙂

[Jimmy Free Trade Pirate]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xCipKmyngLY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ivzVgsR2yEc

[Tagore Smith]

Joe Jackson should get a Nobel prize. "Skateboards- I almost made them respectable." might be the best lyric ever.

[Butts Wagner]

Comments still on topic? ::rubs eyes, blinks::

[__Warren__]

http://www.gocomics.com/lunarbaboon/2016/09/26

[Butts Wagner]

The Slice of Bread says "My wife's a slut"

[Tagore Smith]

I've met your wife, and frankly, she's no John F. Kennedy.

[Butts Wagner]

::knocks over everything on the desk:: You are comparing me to JFK?

[Jimmy Free Trade Pirate]

Liked. =D

[Butts Wagner]

There's no sound in my nightmares

[frankania]

Around 1960, when I was a student at LSU, we were in New Orleans one weekend and I heard a street musician on Canal Street singing strangely. Bob Dylan was unknown at the time, but I think that it was him because of his voice that I later recognized from his first hit songs. Anyone know if he was there at that time?

Also, related mystery. In about 1954, I saw on the Baton Rouge High School stage, a "Jim Priestly" who also performed strangely, like ELVIS before HE became famous. Could it be him, Jim Priestly?

[DWC]

I wonder if Kanye will be at the ceremony.

[lukashik]

While coming to education, the technology has brought many advantages to students and as well as teachers. showbox For example, students can do their homework or assignment with ease and can complete it faster by using the Internet.