Bob Dylan's Blog, page 15

Bob Dylan keeps old classics fresh and edgy with reinterpretation of hits on 'Never Ending Tour'

From New York Daily News

** Two Stars

Bob Dylan keeps old classics fresh and edgy with reinterpretation of hits on 'Never Ending Tour'

JIM FARBER

Tuesday, November 23rd 2010, 4:00 AM

Seeing Bob Dylan play live these days is like watching an outlaw hide in plain sight.

He's a virtual fixture on the concert scene, turning up every year as part of his "Never Ending Tour." Yet, onstage he seems mainly remote - mumbling little, if anything, to the crowd and offering no gestures that can be easily read. Likewise, he's genial enough to play lots of hits everyone knows. But he delivers them in versions that can bear as much resemblance to the originals as an aging Hollywood wife's worked-over face does to her natural one.

Dylan proved mainly true to form Monday night as he kicked off a three-night stand at the 2,900-capacity midtown club, Terminal 5. He didn't speak a word until he introduced his band at the end, and, for much of the one hour and fifty minute show, he remained at the side of the stage, plunking the keyboards. As usual, Dylan, 69, reinterpreted much of his material wildly enough to engage listeners in the world's trickiest game of "Name That Tune."

"Tangled Up in Blue" became as much a soliloquy as a song, one matched to a staggered new rhythm. "Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues" received a punched-up melody, elaborated by a guitar solo from lead player Charlie Sexton you could almost call suave. The band's run at "Desolation Row" sounded nearly sprightly, adding a new strangeness while giving a fresh inflection to its old sarcasm. Dylan opened the night with something of a wild card, the rarely played "Gonna Change My Way Of Thinking" from "Slow Train Coming." Its lyrical vow of constant reinvention could serve as the icon's most enduring mantra. He added an equally graceful, and new arrangement to "Shooting Star," from his most under-rated work, 1989's "Oh Mercy."

Of course, Dylan's vocals remain freakish wonders. He's so hoarse these days, he makes Tom Waits sound like Julie Andrews. And his phrasing just keeps getting more fitful and bizarre. Then again, those things also give him an on-going edge.

Though much of the show Dylan stressed coiled blues, including, archetypically, "Highway 61 Revisited." Here and elsewhere Dylan played more organ solos than he has on recent tours. He also went back to guitar for about a quarter of the show, a change from recent stints where he left the six-strings entirely to others.

Dylan's latest band has a flinty, easy-going charm, highlighted by Sexton's jagged leads. But it lacks the fire and thrills of his groups from the '90s, featuring the lightning-fingered Larry Campbell. "Cold Irons Bound" arose as one of the few numbers last night to bring out genuine intensity in the band. While Dylan's demeanor added to the distance, it had its own mystery. Lit in jaundiced yellow, Dylan appeared like a character out of his own David Lynch movie. If the particular performance he gave proved far from one of his recent best, at least it served to remind us that any Dylan experience has a singular allure.

jfarber@nydailynews.com

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/music/2010/11/23/2010-11-23_bob...

No depth to the Farber review whatsoever. This reviewer has obviously read other reviews online and cobbled his review together from that. - The Windy Kid

Larry Campbell was an atrocious guitar player for Dylan - a hyped up version of G.E. Smith. I think Dylan took a liking to him for some reason but obviously at a certain point couldn't stand it anymore. - Stan

When Larry Campbell was in Bob's group he stomped all over everybody including the drummer. Farber has no idea of the path that Dylan's music has taken. - Plain Jane

Farber's review is mainstream conservative never ending tour blab. Whenever you see the term "never ending tour" applied to Bob's shows you can be sure the reviewer has no stomach for it and must be on the job too long. He should stick to Beyonce, Eminem. U2 and Tom Waits. - Little Anthony

Farber is the Mister Jones that Bob sings about. Isn't that clear by now? - Reggie

Amherst concert review

From Seth Rogovoy's Dylan Prophet blog

CONCERT REVIEW: Bob Dylan at Amherst, Mass., 11-19-10

BOB DYLAN

MULLINS CENTER

UMASS-AMHERST

Friday, November 19, 2010

Review by Seth Rogovoy

(AMHERST, Mass., November 19, 2010) - Bob Dylan is seemingly unstoppable. Merely a half-year away from his 70th birthday, he shows no sign of slowing down, still performing approximately 100 concerts per year as he has for the last two decades-plus. No one at his age or level of achievement has kept up a record such as this - he has truly become the Lou Gehrig of rock 'n' roll, as well as the voice of a generation and a prophet, mystic, and poet -- yadda yadda yadda.

Even with hardly any singing voice left, as was the case at the Mullins Center on Friday night, Dylan has found a way to command a stage for two hours and keep an audience enthralled through his enigmatic charisma (or is it some formula of anti-charisma?), his remarkable body of songs from which to draw, and his mercurial, ever-changing musical arrangements, all of which he employs to find new meaning and immediacy in songs five, ten, twenty, thirty-five and in a few cases nearly fifty years old.

After steering his band and music toward some timeless blend of pre-rock, blues, folk, country, and early rock influences over the past 15 years of concerts in some seeming pursuit of a quintessential Americana roots sound, Dylan seems to have dispensed with much of it this time around in favor of a more unified, coherent aesthetic - a dark, noirish, spooky, almost Halloweenish style -- that recontextualizes much of his work, putting it solidly in the prophetic mode that lends ballast to oft-sung lines from songs like "A Hard Rain's a-Gonna Fall," so that instead of sinking under the weight of its own legacy, it builds to a stupendous climax that sent a visceral wave of emotion through the crowd when he sang at the end:

And I'll tell it and think it and speak it and breathe it

And reflect it from the mountain so all souls can see it

Then I'll stand on the ocean until I start sinkin'

But I'll know my song well before I start singin'

Indeed, this is exactly what he was doing, aided by his terrific band that, unlike in the past when it was employed to barrel through numbers with bluesy bluster and bravado, favored the subtle, minimalist touches that allowed every small phrase to count for even more. This approach was particularly effective in the hands of lead guitarist Charlie Sexton, who returned recently to Dylan's band after more than a half-decade hiatus. Here, Sexton lent functional rhythm and harmonics to the songs, only adding about one phrase or riff per number for color or variation. But oh, when he played those phrases, they spoke nearly with as much power and glory as Dylan's vocals. Which of course is how it's supposed to be.

Working with a severerly constrained voice, Dylan himself used every tool and technique at his disposal to overcome those limitations and still get his message across. He did this through new, unique, or odd phrasing; through biting off lyrics or only pressing down on the key words of a phrase; through channeling the pure emotion - humor, rage, what have you - of a particular word, line, or song; and of course, through his musicianship.

Whereas for much of the past decade Dylan confined himself to behind his keyboards, this time out Dylan mixed things up throughout the evening, bouncing around from his organ (which, for the first time this reviewer ever noticed, could actually be heard - and what we heard was evocative playing that formed a latticework not unlike that of Al Kooper's signature riffs on Dylan's mid-1960s albums but more importantly, added to the haunting, post-blues quality of the arrangements) to his guitar front and center - including several well-played lead figures as well as chunky, loud, rhythmic riffs; and perhaps most surprisingly, singing several numbers crooner-style, into a hand-held mike, replete with gestures of his free hand and occasional recourse to a mouth harp. (For the full effect, view this wonderful video of the terrific stop-start arrangement, so typical of the overall approach of the evening, of the fan favorite, "Tangled Up in Blue."

After years of relying heavily on pretty standard 12- and 16-bar blues arrangements for many of his songs (especially on recent recordings), even songs originally written in the country, rock or folk veins, Dylan has finally found his way to a kind of post-blues style all his own - a distant cousin of his mid-1960s metallic rock sound, but much darker and ominous. It still has blues DNA, but it's all twisted and bent, forged with rockabilly more than the jump blues and swing styles he also favored in the early aughts, for an end result that sounds like something Quentin Tarantino might choose for his next soundtrack.

Even the stage setup seemed shaped to emphasize the darkness verging on claustrophobia; the dark gray drapery forming a room within which the band performed, and the back scrim serving as a screen for subtle projections - mostly vintage photographs of European arcades and such, but also the first introduction of live video of Dylan and his band - again, subtly, not like any Jumbotron, and very much in keeping with the flavor of the show.

Half of the songs from Dylan's 16-song setlist were from his last four albums; the other half drawn from the early- to mid-1960s, a couple from the 1970s (including the funky, rocking opener, "Gonna Change My Way of Thinking"), and one from the late 1980s. All of the songs were in some way political and prophetic - "Thunder on the Mountain" evoking the sound and light show that greeted the Israelites when Moses ascended Mount Sinai (a metaphor, really, for a Bob Dylan concert); "Ballad of a Thin Man" no longer merely castigating a clueless chronicler or journalist, but rather an assembled crowd of Mr. Joneses (yes, each and every one of us) who have no idea what is happening here (or else, for example, how could we stand by and let our nation be taken over by wingnuts?).

Dylan sang of the disappointment of being a prophet without honor in "Honest With Me" ("Well I came ashore in the dead of the night/ Lot of things can get in the way when you're tryin' to do what's right/ You don't understand it -- my feelings for you/ You'd be honest with me if only you knew") and of the sense that judgment day has already begun in "Can't Wait" ("It's way past midnight and there are people all around/ Some on their way up, some on their way down/ The air burns and I'm trying to think straight/ And I don't know how much longer I can wait.") After he sang about his prophetic mission in the aforementioned "Hard Rain," he retold the Biblical story of Abraham's devotion to G-d in "Highway 61 Revisited," which, like "Tangled Up in Blue," built to a stunning crescendo that was as scary and chilling as it was dramatic and exciting.

That Dylan can still conjure up these sorts of moments and sustain this sort of mood night after night, over the course of two-hour long concerts, playing before multigenerational audiences and affecting new or casual listeners equally as well as hardened, nearly jaded loyalists, is just more to his credit. There is simply nothing else like a Bob Dylan concert, no one else like Bob Dylan. He truly is in a league of his own. The only league in which the beginning of the end of time, in Dylan's words, is "mighty funny." And the only league in which the singer, the player, the bandleader, is truly "like a rolling stone," gathering no moss into his eighth decade.

Seth Rogovoy is Berkshire Living's editor-in-chief and award-winning music critic, and the author of Bob Dylan: Prophet Mystic Poet.

How Does It Feel (To See Bob Dylan Live in Concert)?

By Micah Mintz

"Ladies and gentlemen please welcome the poet laureate of rock 'n' roll. The voice of the promise of the '60s counterculture. The guy who forced folk into bed with rock. Who donned makeup in the '70s and disappeared into a haze of substance abuse. Who emerged to find Jesus. Who was written off as a has-been by the end of the '80s, and who suddenly shifted gears releasing some of the strongest music of his career beginning in the late '90s. Ladies and gentlemen — Columbia recording artist Bob Dylan!"

That is how Bob Dylan is introduced at his concerts. Last night, the never-ending tour made a stop at the Mullins Center on the UMass Amherst campus. Bob Dylan has been touring with his band since 1988, giving his legion of fans a myriad of opportunities to see him. Consequently, there are a number of clichés surrounding Dylan concerts. Namely, his voice is gone, he can be almost impossible to understand, and that he reinvents songs however pleases him and is there to play his music, not please his fans. These stories are largely true. This does not render the concert unenjoyable, however.  Far from it!

Bob Dylan's voice has always been unconventional. He's perhaps best remembered for his dry, nasal vocals on "Blowin' in the Wind" and other protest songs from the early 1960s. But he left that behind pretty early. His enunciation was always idiosyncratic, but he was a tremendously expressive vocalist in his prime. Nowadays, however, Zimmy's voice has deteriorated. There's no way around it. He's reduced to talking on pitch, resembling—in an odd way—Rex Harrison. This does make him difficult to understand. Dylan's concerts necessitate an encyclopedic knowledge of his catalog and ability to recall song lyrics verbatim. Fortunately, there were few songs with which I wasn't familiar, and a great many classics included in the evening's set. Dylan is no longer a great vocalist. He is still a great artist. Though his vocal range was limited, his use phrasing and intonation was superb.

Dylan played his way through 16 songs without any patter, any introduction for the songs, just playing them. The concert was very much in the rollicking, bluesy rock vein that has characterized Dylan's recent albums, and most of the songs were transposed to that style, whether or not they were originally written that way. This was Dylan doing his thing, and he did it well. He spent most of his time playing the keyboard over to one side of the stage, but would periodically wander over to center stage, sometimes with a guitar. His black suit had gold piping on the jacket and a gold strip down the trousers, and his broad-brimmed white hat was hard to miss.

Dylan at the keyboard for "Highway 61 Revisited"

Bob Dylan was clearly energized, bobbing behind the keyboard as he played. His harmonica solos were nothing short of inspired. His vocals were limited, but delivered with great gusto. Actually, he would have been a great deal easier to understand if the band wasn't amped up quite so loud. But that is beyond the point. That's how Dylan likes it, that's how it is. The band provided some cracking accompaniments. They were led by virtuosic guitarist Charlie Sexton, who ended up in center stage most of the time that Dylan wasn't. Sexton clearly enjoyed the attention, but was a bit distracting. Bob is a legend and can do as he pleases. Charlie, you aren't.

The set list was extraordinary. With a catalog as vast as Dylan's, there is so much to choose from, but he delivered a well-rounded set on Friday. I was hoping to hear something from Slow Train Coming. Dylan did not disappoint, starting off with "Gonna Change My Way of Thinking." I had actually never heard "Shooting Star" before last night, but Dylan made it a touching ballad. There was plenty from his recent, bluesier albums like Love and Theft, Modern Times and Together Through Life. But there were also plenty of classics.

Dylan thrilling the crowd with a harmonica solo during "Shooting Star"

"Tangled Up in Blue" was a crowd-pleaser. It was a substantially different melody at times, but it's a song that any halfway-credible Dylan fan can follow along. "Ballad of a Thin Man" was exceptional (see below), perhaps better than his original recording of it. The stage was lit severely as Dylan barked and growled ominously at the fictional Mr. Jones. This was not a young man who was peeved, this was a reckoning. Each time the chorus rolled around and Dylan asked Mr. Jones if he knew what was happening, it was as if the subject of the song was being interrogated by the jaws of Hell itself. "Like a Rolling Stone" ended the concert on a high note. Bob Dylan couldn't hold the notes like he had in decades gone by, but age hadn't withered his spirit at all. Miss Lonely still got raked over the coals with every "How does it feel?"

Some will complain that Dylan isn't what he was. Obviously, he sounds different now than on most of his records, or on the legendary Rolling Thunder Revue. Some people are not just glad to see a living legend; they want to say the emperor has no clothes. Bob Dylan is not what he was? Hogwash, Bob Dylan is exactly what he's always been: Bob Dylan. And I now have a 16-song playlist that is an excellent synopsis of his career. Not an exhaustive one, certainly; no concert could do that. But I heard protest music, folk-rock, gospel, blues and more, accompanied by bravura harmonica solos. All interpreted by a living legend. Good enough for me.

Your humble correspondent after the concert

Friday evening's set list:

Gonna Change My Way Of Thinking
Shooting Star
Stuck Inside Of Mobile With The Memphis Blues Again
Spirit On The Water
Rollin' And Tumblin'
Tangled Up In Blue
Honest With Me
Can't Wait
Tweedle Dee & Tweedle Dum
A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall
Highway 61 Revisited
Workingman's Blues #2
Thunder On The Mountain
Ballad Of A Thin Man
Jolene
Like A Rolling Stone

Dylan's Singing, But What's He Saying?

Boston Globe

MUSIC REVIEW

11-22-2010

Dylan's singing, but what's he saying?

Icon's performance lacks connection

LOWELL -- No matter where he stood, Bob Dylan cast a tall shadow on the curtain backdrop at the Tsongas Center Saturday night. It had to have been 20 feet high and towered over the stage, often the only visual you could see clearly if you were far from the action

Not just a feat of clever lighting, that shadow also spoke volumes about Dylan's stature and prestige at 69. The older he gets, the more his influence looms over the history of popular music. That's undeniable.

That did not, however, distract from the reality that seeing Dylan live is a tricky proposition these days. In the right venue and from the right seat, he's glorious -- gruff, yes, but sage and omnipotent as if descended from the mountaintop. His shows at the Citi Wang Theatre last year were testaments to that.

The reviewer doesn't like the venue! - Adelle

More often, though, Dylan's concerts are frustrating -- not just for the state of his voice, but rather his inability (or perhaps refusal) to communicate his message all that well. And if you're not seeing him in a theater, where the sound isn't as diffused, you spend half the show nudging the stranger next to you: "What's he saying?''

This man lets his past get in the way of his present. He is unable to think on his feet. - Billy T

What he's singing isn't nearly as crucial as what he's conveying. At the Tsongas Center, the sound mix was predictably not on Dylan's side, but that might not have mattered, really. His voice -- so grizzled and garbled that it's now approaching Tom Waits's timbre -- was hard to parse not only for the lyrics but also Dylan's connection to them.

Is this a put down of Tom waits? Is this man a Tom Waits fan? - Joey

Fans have grudgingly settled for less in exchange for the privilege of seeing such an important pop-culture icon.

I'm a fan and this reviewer has insulted me. He deserves a kick in the pants. - Laurie

They've learned to savor the crumbs: snatches of familiar lines ("It ain't me, babe / No, no, no'' -- aha!), fleeting moments when Dylan plays something besides keyboards, and the realization that he says nothing except for his usual, "Well, thank you, friends'' before introducing the band at the end of each show.

This reviewer should obviously stick to performers like U2, Springsteen, Roger Waters who love to talk. This reviewer is not qualified to see Bob Dylan who is unlike any of these performers. A reviewer like this can only superficially connect with Bob Dylan. When's the last time you went to see a Shakespeare play and saw Hamlet stop what he's doing and say to the audience, "Hi everybody, how are you doin?" Musical performers who like to talk to the audience are a load of crap. They should do lectures. Me for one, I'm there to hear music. -Fran

Those are all long-established facts, yet you can't help but want more sometimes. He delivered on a few songs, particularly with emotive renditions of "Tangled Up in Blue'' and "Not Dark Yet.'' It was telling that for both songs Dylan stepped up to a microphone front and center of the stage and played nothing more than a showman.

Anchored by ace guitarist Charlie Sexton, his backing band was uniformly excellent, skirting the line between workmanlike precision and casual dexterity.

Dylan's band is powered by the base and drums rhythm section and the riffs that he and Donnie play. Lets not confuse the issue Mr. reviewer. - swifty eddie

The shifts in mood were subtle but relevant, from the chugging freight-train blues of "Rollin' and Tumblin' '' to the supple starkness of "Visions of Johanna.''

When Dylan wasn't behind his keyboard, his own guitar licks, jagged and clanging, were highlights on "Stuck Inside of Mobile With the Memphis Blues Again'' and "A Simple Twist of Fate.''

By the time "Like a Rolling Stone'' closed the show, a sea of hands recognized the melody enough to sing along. It was a touching scene -- the voice of a generation leading the crowd in an anthem. A final question sprang to mind: Why can't that voice connect on that level more often?

Bob Dylan Brings It All Back Home at Stabler Arena

From Lehigh Valley Music Blog

Review: Bob Dylan brings it all back home at Stabler

Posted by John J. Moser at 12:51:54 PM on November 13, 2010

The answer, my friend, is blowing in the wind.

The question is what made Bob Dylan, at 69 years old and having muddled through a mediocre show last summer at Allentown's Coca-Cola Park, put on a performance Friday at Bethlehem's Stabler Arena that was vital and exciting - a near masterpiece far better than anyone had a right to expect?

For 103 minutes, Dylan became an animated performer, broadly and intently gesturing as he stood at a microphone in front of the stage and sang - really sang, infusing his vocals with texture and emotion.

Or dancing as he stood adding inspired flourishes at his keyboard. Or playing rich, inviting harmonica.

Dylan's five-piece backing band, again being led by guitar wiz Charlie Sexton, was just as good - crackling and tight, urgent and intuitive.

It wasn't that Dylan - who was playing his sixth headlining show at Stabler; a record for the venue -- changed his set list that much from last year's show. Eight of Friday's 16 songs also were played at Coca-Cola Park (though the show was one song longer). He simply played them so much better.

Such was the case on the opening "Leopard-Skin Pillbox Hat," with which he also opened last year. In a wide-brimmed white hat, he twisted his shoulders and kicked his legs as he played keys; his singing and phrasing were animated.

And he only got better as he went. He strapped on his guitar for a jaunty "Don't Think Twice, It's Alright" and croaked and growled the lyrics, sometimes spitting out the words as he and Sexton - playing his guitar like a gunslinger or playing from his knees - dueled to a hootchie-kootchie finish. On "Things Have Changed," Dylan's singing was sly, raspy, fun and at the end forceful; the band both chugging and sinewy.

The band was wonderfully expressive on "Just Like a Woman," and Dylan was at his playful best, pausing during each chorus to let the audience sing "just like a woman" before he did. He played his keyboard like a carousel calliope as Donnie Herron accompanied him on lap steel guitar.

Dylan played lead guitar - surprisingly touching - on "Simple Twist of Fate" and sang gently - so good the audience spontaneously broke into applause mid-song. He was at stage front with just a microphone on a thundering and rocking "Cold Iron Bound" that was so searing that Dylan high-stepped as he sang, did deep knee bends as he wailed on two harmonica solos and brushed off his shoulders at the end.

And his singing was exceptional - that's a compliment you don't hear much these days - on "Summer Days." His voice reached high - also something you don't hear these days - to compliment his keyboard playing, during which he shook his shoulders for emphasis on a long solo.

But the highlight was "Tangled Up in Blue." In a spotlight at the front of the stage, backed by a stunningly sympathetic band, Dylan performed his mid-career masterpiece as well as he ever has. He transformed it from a young man's searching to the studying, understanding and regret that comes with age.

"I'm still on the road/Trying to stay out of the joint!" he sang in the voice of a grizzled veteran, slightly changing the words and adding wonderfully warm harmonica. The audience cheered every time he sang the title.

But that was simply the mid-point of the show. He followed it with a nine-minute churning, burning, steamrolling "Highway 61 Revisited," yelling the lyrics and duck-walking at the piano. He traded keyboard riffs with Sexton's guitar while drummer George Receli laid down an incessant gunshot beat.

And Dylan's voice was again wonderful on a shuffling, tender "Working Man Blues #2." As he sang, he pointed to the audience, reached out his hand like a carnival barker, or sang open-armed. "Ballad of a Thin Man" found him again in the spotlight, gesturing as he snarled out the words, singing with disgust and using his harmonica to drive home his point.

And the requisite closer, "Like a Rolling Stone," was, of course, wonderful - both beat-heavy and chiming; Sexton's guitar swirling amid Dylan playing the familiar keyboard riff. It, too, became less a tale of spite and revenge than Dylan imparting knowledge: more knowing, less hurt, acceptance replacing bitterness.

Dylan went nearly the entire night without speaking to the mixed-age crowd of something more than 3,000 people, finally saying, "Well, thank you," before the encore and playfully introducing his band members.

But throughout the night, his music spoke volumes to the crowd. And they clearly understood - not just the songs' meanings, but that they were seeing something special at Stabler.

During yet another wonderfully voiced song, "Spirit on the Water," in mid-show, Dylan sang, "You think I'm over the hill."

"No!" the crowd roared back.

"Think I'm past my prime/Let me see what you got/"We can have a whoppin' good time."

Friday was, indeed, a whopping good time. As good as you'll ever see Bob Dylan.

Jason Moser contributed to this report

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***** Review of Bob Dylan's Recent Concert in South Carolina

From Death and Taxes, a review by Jason Hartley of a recent Bob Dylan concert in Clemson, South Carolina:

This past Sunday, I went to see Bob Dylan live for the first time, which may be surprising given that he is one of the two most Advanced musicians of all time (Lou Reed, who I've seen three times, is the other).

Britt Bergman, the co-creator of the Advanced Genius Theory, came with me to the show, which was in Clemson, South Carolina. It's a two-hour drive, which gave us ample opportunity to listen to Dylan (Overt and Advanced era) and talk generally about our expectations for the show. We were particularly excited about a recent development for Dylan: he is playing guitar again. For a while he was playing only keyboards, which I had praised as an extremely Advanced move for a man famous for playing acoustic guitar and harmonica. Now, not only was he playing guitar (electric), he was supposedly playing solos.

When Britt was 12, his dad took him to see Dylan during the G.E. Smith era. He told me that he was disappointed in the show because instead of hearing the Dylan he knew from listening with his father, he got the guy from Hall and Oates playing nine-minute guitar solos. Obviously this was pre-Advancement. We both agreed on Sunday that if we were to see that same concert today, it would be immensely enjoyable. In fact, once you have embraced Advancement, it is literally impossible not to enjoy a Bob Dylan concert. If he plays all the songs you want to hear and they sound exactly like the records, then that is fantastic. If, instead, he plays nothing but reggae versions of his least-known works from the early 1980s, then that would be awesome, too. He could play nothing but Bangles covers, and it would be one of the most moving concert experiences of my life. There aren't many sure things in life, but an adherent of Advancement enjoying a Bob Dylan concert is surely one of them.

We entered the arena full of confidence (and salad), and walked down to our floor-level seats, about 50 feet from the stage. There was no opening act, which was perfectly fine with me. At this stage of my life, anything more than an hour and a half of rock is beyond my capability. The crowd around us was a mix of middle-aged artistes, old hippies, country-biker weirdos, college students, and a family of four wearing matching handmade Dylan shirts. I worried at first that attendance was going to be not so great, but by the time the lights went down the arena was basically full.

Before the band appeared, an announcer from offstage read a recap of Dylan's career—voice of a generation in the 1960s, drug haze in the 1970s, born-again Christian, washed-up, resurgence, Grammy awards. Britt and I both laughed about this because it is such a simplistic description of Dylan, one that you would expect him to reject. But he knows that people are going to believe what they're going to believe, so there's no point fighting it.

The band took the stage in light-gray (I think) suits, while Dylan wore a black version of the same suit, though he added a matching hat. I knew beforehand that Dylan is not the kind of performer to talk a lot between songs, and he certainly didn't disappoint on this night. He launched directly into "Leopard-Skin Pill-Box Hat," without even a look into the audience. Some find this off-putting, but between talking too much on stage and not talking enough, the former is by far the greater crime. And besides, this was a rock concert, not a meeting of Toast Masters. He didn't owe us a speech or even a thank you, as long as he was prepared to put on a great show. In this, too, he didn't disappoint.

I got the sense that the band, featuring Charlie Sexton, Stu Kimball, Donnie Herron, Tony Garnier, and George Receli, were sort of feeling out the room during "Leopard Skin." There was plenty of energy, but there was a palpable "we're just getting started" vibe, though Sexton was on fire (and man-crushingly cool looking) pretty much the entire night. The exception to this was when forced to do dueling leads with Dylan, who went back and forth from keyboards and guitar. Dylan is far from an accomplished soloist—this is not necessarily a bad thing—but he seems committed to adding this trick to his repertoire.

Britt's theory is that Dylan just decided that he was going to learn how to do it, and since he's on a nonstop tour, we get to pay to watch him practice. Of course, we are completely fine with that because it's far more interesting seeing Dylan try to find new ways to express himself, even within songs that he has played for more than forty years, than a note-for-note performance of tunes we've heard hundreds of times.

My theory about his soloing was that he has lost expressiveness in his voice, so he is looking for ways to compensate for that loss. But I realized after a few songs that I was completely wrong. Dylan still uses his voice in fascinating and surprising ways. Fascinating because at times it sounds like he can barely talk, and surprising because at times he sounds like Dylan from the 1960s—sometimes in the same song. For instance, he closed with "Like a Rolling Stone," during which he went from sounding like Tom Waits with laryngitis to hitting the notes just right (or, at least, just like the record).

In retrospect, I realize that he used his most extreme voice for the older songs, while bringing something a bit more melodic to his newer tunes. In other words, I believe that the voice he uses now is more of a choice than most of us realize. I'm not saying he can sing like Christina Aguilera if he wants to, though I wouldn't be surprised if he could sing like, say, Amy Winehouse.

The most amazing aspect of a Bob Dylan concert these days is that he can play a song that you know but you can't indentify it until midway through the song. It took me a few verses to realize he was playing "Simple Twist of Fate." Britt and I wouldn't have known he was playing "Visions of Johanna" unless the guy next to us hadn't loudly told his wife. How he knew I couldn't say, because not only could I not recognize the tune, but Dylan also sang in an exaggerated staccato style that I can't say I've ever heard anyone use before. It is certainly not in the original of "Visions of Johanna." It's as if Dylan is looking to use up every ounce of potential energy available in his songs, and I'm happy to say that he hasn't nearly exhausted it.

While I fully expected a satisfying show, I didn't expect it to rock so hard. The group sounded like a world-class bar band on songs like "Rollin' and Tumblin'" and "Stuck Inside of Mobile With the Memphis Blues Again," but they moved into spooky/powerful, Nick Cave territory with some of the newer material. The highlight for me, though, was a guitar-heavy version of "Ballad of a Thin Man" that managed to be faithful to the original while violently defiling it at the same time. I guess I like it rough.

You can't trust this review, obviously, given what I've already told you about the impossibility of my not liking the show. But I highly recommend seeing Bob Dylan live if you have any interest and get the chance. You won't see an oldies concert. You won't see a washed-up legend who doesn't know when to quit. Instead, you will see a truly original artist who continues to evolve in ways other musicians can't even imagine.

See you next week.

The Reviews are In: The Witmark Demos and The Original Mono Recordings

Fans and critics alike have risen in praise of Bob Dylan's new releases, The Witmark Demos and The Original Mono Recordings.

Read what the critics are saying</>

Stick With Mono

Columbia Records has commissioned a public service announcement of crucial importance to Bob Dylan's listeners and their parents.

You may view this film at this link:

http://www.bobdylan.com/media/videos/stick-with-mono

Please share it with your neighbors and loved ones.