Justin Wrote:
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> I followed along the lyrics to "Leopard Skin Pill Box Hat" (I
> now moved on to Blonde on Blonde) and found myself
> laughing at the great lyrics.

That song is especially funny, since a lot of people in 66 hadn't got over that Dylan didn't continue to support the "folk movement" and "fight for freedom" -if he ever did that. Some kind of u-turn he took - from those "fans" point of view....
There's a guy shouting to the camera in some Dylan 1966 footage :
"He's a traitor!! How DARE he sing these trash lyrics - about...Leopard skin hats!?! He's garbage, man!"....or something like that. Gazza will correct me...
"I don't mind him cheating on me - but I sure wish he'd take that off his head, your brand new leopard skin pill box hat" - excellent lyrics

Hard Rain is one of the most interesting albums from one of the most interesting tours ever by a musician. I was fortunate enough to see the RTR in Mobile, AL in 1976. Something very magical about Dylan just suddenly appearing at the microphone, guitar held way up high and launching into Mr. Tamborine Man. Very emotional moment for a 19 year old kid.

Still, the bootleg series 1966 is, in my opinion his finest live recording.

Go wherevever you have to go to see this National Treasure live in person while he's still on the road. You'll be moved too!

Thanks Gazza and Erik re your Dylan gigs thoughts.

Justin, A rainy weekend is a good time to get into Dylan. Some of my best listening comes when I am organizing my version of Rockman's bunker. Takes some time to mull over his songs, and those early albums were and are powerful listening.

"Another Side of Bob Dylan". I love the humour in that album and the amazing songwriting. The best of his early acoustic albums.

"Bringing it all Back Home". Probably his best album - the last half is astounding. My first Dylan album, so that might explain my fondness for it over "Highway 61" or "Blonde on Blonde".

"Blood on the Tracks". The best one of the 70's and 80's. I never get tired of it.

"Love and Theft". Hilarious lyrics, wonderful bluesy playing. A good choice from his more recent material.

Some people just don't get Dylan, even after giving it a good try. That's just the way it goes. Not liking the Stones, however...now that is something I never understand!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2007-09-28 06:02 by Angus MacBagpipe.

Thanx for sharing your first impressions Justin.
I hope you will follow.

Glam Descendant Wrote:
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> >a finale at Blackbushe in front of a crowd of
> 200,000 and the longest set of his career.
>
> You mean up to that point or ever? I thought his
> show at Toad's Place in 1990 held the record
> (close to 4 hours as I recall).



Up to that point (it was about 3 hours) - but as the Toads show was actually EIGHT sets of around 45 mins each, with breaks, I suppose its still possibly his longest ever. Fair point, though.

The RTR shows in 1975 were often up to about 4 hours, but obviously Dylan was only onstage for just over half of the show.

Justin Wrote:
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>
> But I feel those are "easy" songs to get...and I'm
> sort of still waiting for that Dylan-epiphany that
> everyone here seems to have gotten. I feel like I
> have to train my brain and ears to listen to Dylan
> in a specific way and style. Did anyone find this
> to be true for them? Did you ease into Dylan
> easily?
>

This is exactly what I had to do myself. I felt like I had to train myself in order to be able to grasp Dylan's music. This may be even more true if you're used to listening to pop music on the radio which usually doesn't involve too much thinking as those tunes are made for being easily remembered and listened to.

The lyrics section on bobdylan.com helped me a lot, too... especially as I'm no native speaker (or listener, haha) of the English language.
(Frankly, I have this feeling that Dylan helped me a lot to improve my English, but then again... maybe I'm attributing him too much importance there ;-) )

I´ve been listening recently to the two acoustic albums, Good As I Been To You and World Gone Wrong and they are great. Hadn´t heard them for many years now and they are much better then I remembered. I wish he could do a tour in this format, that would be something...

There is only one way to start, with the pure folk/protest of "Ihe Times They Are A'Changin'". This, his third lp, is the one that made him the unchalanged leader of the protest movement It is the place to start before moving on to his electric stuff. His previous LP "Freewheelin'" should be heard as a compianion piece. Then I would procede chronologicly.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2007-10-07 03:16 by keithfan64.

Well, I came across Dylan by ways of the Traveling Wilburys, and he was somewhat my least liked Wilbury then, so I just gotten interested in his post-Wilbury period. The Wilburys were not a novelty project, they had things to say and fun to have together, so they're definitely worth checking out.
My 1st album of solo Dylan then became "Under the Red Sky". It's not a stinker, as some forespeakers of mine on this thread have stated, but I must admit that it tends to have nursery rhyme lyrics. Taking into account that he had a little daughter at the time, this becomes understandable, but it's not really a children's album either.
Then, I skipped "Good As I Been To You" and still haven't gotten it to this day. It just sounded somewhat bland to me.
Opposed to that, "World Gone Wrong" (and Clapton's "From the Cradle") got me interested in the blues and folk music. I still rank WGW above his widely praised Time Out Of Mind.
The next for me was "Oh Mercy", produced by Daniel Lanois in his New Orleans phase, and it's quite unique in that capacity.
Then I got "Greatest Hits 3", my only Dylan compilation so far, and there are quite a few gems on there from the 70s onwards, which are somewhat essential, like Jokerman or Hurricane or Groom Still Waiting At the Altar. And it takes the best tracks from his weakest albums ("Down in the Groove" and "Knocked Out Loaded") and puts them onto one disc, together with the studio version of Dignity.
What I would recommend you to start with is his "Unplugged" album, since this comes closest to a recording of a show in which he mixes old and recent songs with his touring band.
I felt a bit let down after the long wait by "Time Out Of Mind", though, since in places, its lyrics are too dark for my taste, and its arrangements too quirky, but there are still some solid songs on there.
"Love And Theft", on the other hand, is my choice for the top spot out of the Dylan albums I got. But some background knowledge of the history of the blues is highly recommended to enjoy it in full.
His Academy Award winning song "Things Have Changed", also from that period, should not go without being mentioned.
It was very hard for me to sit through the German-dubbed version of his early 2000s movie "Masked And Anonymous" - something which I would only recommend to Dylan fans. But the songs he recorded for the soundtrack are really good. Too bad they didn't all make the soundtrack album.
And that leads us to "Modern Times", the album that was greeted by lots of internet publishing hype, but lived up to that only in sales figures, and not quite in quality. With songs getting long and monotonous at times, it can be a bit of a bore, I have to admit, though of course, there are some good ones in there, too. It also shows that the band has evolved since the previous record (both guitarists changed).

So for newbies, my recommendation would be Unplugged, and from then on, you can decide what period of his you're most interested in. And don't rush it, take your time. These lyrics are layered and don't always jump at you right away.