Bob Dylan's Nobel Lecture is worth your time...

...so I'll add nothing else here.

Happy Birthday Bob!

Bob Dylan turns 76 today.



And you still don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows.

Happy 75th Bob!

The distraction engine known as Twitter too easily lures me in to comment on the latest idiocies coming from the small mouth of the man who lives on top of the big brassy Fifth Avenue tower bearing his name. Today I won't type that name. Today the @trueblueliberal Twitter page is all about offering 75th birthday greetings to an artist who will be remembered long after all the Presidents and would-be Presidents he has lived under.

Here's Bob Dylan at the Concert for Bangladesh in August 1971:

'Blonde on Blonde' turns 50 today

Released on May 16, 1966, this 50-year-old double album from Bob Dylan still sounds fresh and full of mystery.

Recorded at Columbia Studios on January 14, 1965

Bob Dylan's "Subterranean Homesick Blues":

I always find myself watching the conversation between Allen Ginsberg and Bob Neuwirth off to the left when I watch D.A. Pennebaker’s film of the song.

I don't think that plant is going to survive.

If you liked Bill Murray singing Roxy Music at a Tokyo karaoke bar in Lost In Translation, you will love this video of him singing 'Shelter from the Storm' along with Bob Dylan in this video pulled from the upcoming St. Vincent:

Rubin "Hurricane" Carter, May 6, 1937 -- April 20, 2014

The first trial was a pig circus and so was the re-trial in 1976 that took place after Bob Dylan's hit song. I attended a couple of sessions of the second trial in Paterson and it's the young railroaded John Artis I remember most clearly. The fact that John Artis was still his "longtime friend and caregiver" when Rubin Carter passed away in Toronto today is a piece of information that I find simultaneously heartwarming and heartbreaking. R.I.P. Hurricane.

Happy 71st to Jerry Garcia

There's more to be learned about "America" and "Freedom" from the missing middle finger of this man in the Mexican poncho than from all the speeches using those words that you'll ever hear from men wearing suits.

“There’s no way to measure his greatness or magnitude as a person or a player. I don’t think any eulogizing will do him justice. He was that great, much more than a superb musician, with an uncanny ear and dexterity. He’s the very spirit personified of whatever is Muddy River country at its core and screams up into the spheres. He really had no equal. To me, he wasn’t only a musician and friend, he was more like a big brother who taught and showed me more than he’ll ever know. There’s a lot of spaces and advances between The Carter Family, Buddy Holly and say Ornette Coleman, a lot of universes, but he filled them all without being a member of any school. His playing was moody, awesome, sophisticated, hypnotic and subtle. There’s no way to convey the loss. It just digs down really deep” -- Bob Dylan

"... nobody can sing the blues like Blind Willie McTell..."

And nobody can sing and play Dylan's "Blind Willie McTell" like Mick Taylor (with even a touch of "Layla" thrown in at 5'36").


Blind Willie McTell was born on May 5, 1898 (and passed away on August 19, 1959).

September 11, 2012: Closing A Circle?

New albums are generally released on Tuesdays, so maybe it's not that significant or coincidental that Bob Dylan's "Love and Theft" was released on Tuesday, September 11, 2001 and his "Tempest" was released today, Tuesday, September 11, 2012.  

World Trade Center from Jersey City, September 11, 2012

It seems significant to me though, because on the morning of September 11, 2001, I was looking forward to walking around the corner to the Sam Goody store on the corner of 42nd Street and 2nd Avenue at lunchtime to buy "Love and Theft".  At noon we were still being told to stay in our building and by late afternoon when I left the office, the album was not on my mind, and all the stores were closed. I can't remember when I finally picked it up. It couldn't have been more than a week or two later, but the excitement about a great recording will be forever overshadowed by events.

Today I hit my local record store as soon as it opened at 11 and picked up "Tempest" (this isn't a review, but I'm loving what I've listened to so far) and for the first time since 2001, there is a visible highlight to the lower Manhattan skyline. I don't believe that "closure" is even a proper word, and that's not what I'm talking about here, but it feels to me, personally, as if we're beginning to close a circle.

"... nothing left to do but smile, smile, smile ..."

Jerry Garcia's smile at the 4'30" mark of this video is the way I'll always remember this man and this band. Here are the Grateful Dead in 1972 playing "He's Gone" and I realized again while watching this that three of these six men are no longer with us, with Jerry Garcia having left us on August 9, 1995.

He's already been gone for 17 years.



Everyone should read what Bob Dylan and Jerry's writing partner Robert Hunter had to say about their friend immediately after his death.

“There’s no way to measure his greatness or magnitude as a person or a player. I don’t think any eulogizing will do him justice. He was that great, much more than a superb musician, with an uncanny ear and dexterity. He’s the very spirit personified of whatever is Muddy River country at its core and screams up into the spheres. He really had no equal. To me, he wasn’t only a musician and friend, he was more like a big brother who taught and showed me more than he’ll ever know. There’s a lot of spaces and advances between The Carter Family, Buddy Holly and say Ornette Coleman, a lot of universes, but he filled them all without being a member of any school. His playing was moody, awesome, sophisticated, hypnotic and subtle. There’s no way to convey the loss. It just digs down really deep” -- Bob Dylan

An Elegy for Jerry 
by Robert Hunter

Jerry, my friend,
you've done it again,
even in your silence
the familiar pressure
comes to bear, demanding
I pull words from the air
with only this morning
and part of the afternoon
to compose an ode worthy
of one so particular
about every turn of phrase,
demanding it hit home
in a thousand ways
before making it his own,
and this I can't do alone.
Now that the singer is gone,
where shall I go for the song? 

Without your melody and taste
to lend an attitude of grace
a lyric is an orphan thing,
a hive with neither honey's taste
nor power to truly sting. 

What choice have I but to dare and
call your muse who thought to rest
out of the thin blue air
that out of the field of shared time,
a line or two might chance to shine -- 

As ever when we called,
in hope if not in words,
the muse descends.

How should she desert us now?
Scars of battle on her brow,
bedraggled feathers on her wings,
and yet she sings, she sings! 

May she bear thee to thy rest,
the ancient bower of flowers
beyond the solitude of days,
the tyranny of hours--
the wreath of shining laurel lie
upon your shaggy head
bestowing power to play the lyre
to legions of the dead

If some part of that music
is heard in deepest dream,
or on some breeze of Summer
a snatch of golden theme,
we'll know you live inside us
with love that never parts
our good old Jack O'Diamonds
become the King of Hearts. 

I feel your silent laughter
at sentiments so bold
that dare to step across the line
to tell what must be told,
so I'll just say I love you,
which I never said before
and let it go at that old friend
the rest you may ignore. 

The services were held, of course,

at St. Stephan's Church, in

Belvedere, California on

August 12, 1995

Tom Morello on Bob Dylan, Amnesty International, Clear Channel, and more

And a great Wobbly hat.

"...the forces of reaction... you have to always be on guard for. They're always trying to steer history in the direction of the ruling elites and our freedom of expression is one of our best ways to fight back ..."
--Tom Morello at the end of this video from Spin

"... and you never ask questions when god's on your side ..."

No, the title of this blog post isn't taken from the literature of the god-chosen Bachmann, Santorum, or Perry campaigns (I wasn't the one to make this up, but if a god did tell them to run, it proves s/he wants Obama to win re-election). No, the title of this blog post comes from the Bob Dylan song that's stuck in my head this afternoon, here in an interpretation of Joan Baez's from 1965:

On Thanksgiving I watched a younger relative play a disgusting millitary recruitment vehicle called "Call of Duty, Modern Warfare 3" on a widescreen television. Have any of you seen this bloody spectacle? This thing is a bestseller, so I assume I'm a little out of the gamer loop. Is there any doubt that the Pentagon, if not specifically supporting such crap, loves that young Americans are being desensitized to killing by these products -- many of which will be under America's Christmas trees next month?

"...you better start swimmin' or you'll sink like a stone . . ."

My favorite quotations about the Occupy Wall Street movement are the ones that go something like this: "Of course I agree with the ideas of the Occupy movement, but I don't agree with the tactics." You hear it all the time, and the #OWS movement has succeeded every time that sentiment is voiced.

When the first few occupiers started in their occupation in the first city, New York, exactly two months ago on 9/17/2011, nobody in the media or government was primarily concerned with the growing American economic inequality. The only economic issue being discussed by "serious" commentators was the debt, and how much more pain was going to have to be doled out to those already suffering from the vagaries of a "free" market skewed to help those at the top (and by those at the top). The range of debate two months ago went all the way from the center right to the far right (and then farther right once the Tea Party got involved).

You won't see Andre Cuomo wearing
one of these anytime soon.

The Governor of my state, a man with national political ambitions, New York's Andrew Cuomo, has firmly planted himself in the center of that limited frame of reference. But he needs to be careful, because the Occupy movement has reopened the curtain on the left-hand side of the political stage, and a large portion of the electorate has finally seen a set of views and arguments that they can relate to and agree with. Cuomo is all for letting the Millionaire's Tax in New York expire at the end of the year and he's taking the corporate side in the contentious debate over hydrofracking for natural gas, but the center has moved. This is the wrong side of both issues within this state and within his party. In a raucous fall meeting of the Democratic State Committee, the party leaders wouldn't let either issue come up for a vote, knowing that our Governor had staked out the Republican positions for himself on both issues. “Go to hell!” yelled committeewoman Lori Gardner after the fracking resolution was tabled. “The party leaders pretty much protect the governor, they were appointed by the governor, and here, they pretended they won.”
To get back to my original point, you can't separate the ideas of the Occupy movement from the tactics. Without the tactics, the overreactions of law enforcement, and the constant presence in the streets of all fifty states over the past two months, those ideas never would have found their rightful place in the national dialogue. Andrew Cuomo is not the only politician who needs to recalibrate (or flip flop) in order to keep his national political ambitions alive. He needs to be listening to the Occupiers in Albany rather than trying to arrest them every night (even though Albany County District Attorney David Soares refuses to prosecute them).
Here's the song about clueless politicians I can't get out of my head tonight:

Come senators, congressmen
Please heed the call
Don't stand in the doorway
Don't block up the hall
For he that gets hurt
Will be he who has stalled
There's a battle outside
And it is ragin'.
It'll soon shake your windows
And rattle your walls
For the times they are a-changin'.

2009 Is Going to Be a Great Year (Part Three)

Thomas Pynchon and Bob Dylan seem to be working in concert lately, and picking up speed, as they continue their creative careers. I couldn't help thinking that it seems like just yesterday that Pynchon's Against the Day and Dylan's "Modern Times" were released, and now here we are (or at least here I am) anxiously awaiting their new creations.

But their parallel paths go back much further than 2006, or even 1997. In every year that Thomas Pynchon published a novel, Bob Dylan has given us a new studio album!

2009 -- TP's Inherent Vice // BD's "Together Through Life"
2006 -- TP's Against the Day // BD's "Modern Times"
1997 -- TP's Mason & Dixon // BD's "Time Out of Mind"
1990 -- TP's Vineland // BD's "Under the Red Sky"
1973 -- TP's Gravity's Rainbow // BD's "Dylan" and "Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid"
1966 -- TP's The Crying of Lot 49 // BD's "Blonde on Blonde"
1963 -- TP's V. // BD's "The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan"

The only year that seems a little off is 1973, where even two Dylan albums weren't enough to balance the scales. The cover versions on "Dylan" and the extended single of "Knockin' on Heaven's Door" that is "P.G. & B.t.K." are no match for the weight of Gravity's Rainbow (GR would have been balanced by "Blood on the Tracks" in a more perfect world), but all the other years seem to reach a sort of equilibrium. I'm surprised that I never noticed this coincidence between two of my favorite artists before, but I'm sure that someone else has.

(I had hoped that these magical creative years might give us some financial guidance as well in these turbulent economic times, but there's no such luck: 1963, 1997, and 2006 were up years for the Dow, but 1966, 1973, and 1990 saw declines.)

2009 Is Going to Be a Great Year (Part 2)

I'll be doing my bit for the economy in 2009, giving money to Penguin for a new book in August and to Columbia for a new record on April 28th. You can check BobDylan.com for details, read about it on RollingStone.com here, and read an interview by Bill Flanagan with Bob Dylan talking about "Together Through Life" by clicking here.

Here's a sample:

[...]Some people preferred my first period songs. Some, the second. Some, the Christian period. Some, the post Colombian. Some, the Pre-Raphaelite. Some people prefer my songs from the nineties. I see that my audience now doesn’t particular care what period the songs are from. They feel style and substance in a more visceral way and let it go at that. Images don’t hang anybody up. Like if there’s an astrologer with a criminal record in one of my songs it’s not going to make anybody wonder if the human race is doomed. Images are taken at face value and it kind of freed me up.

And if that's not clear, Bob explains his imagism better with the follow-up question:

In what way?
Well for instance, if there are shadows and flowers and swampy ledges in a composition, that’s what they are in their essence. There’s no mystification. That’s one way I can explain it.
Like a locomotive, a pair of boots, a kiss or the rain?
Right. All those things are what they are. Or pieces of what they are. It’s the way you move them around that makes it work.

Keep those images moving Bob!

2009 has already given us President Obama, and promises to give us a new studio album from Bob Dylan and a new novel from Thomas Pynchon. Quit your fucking whining America! These are the best years of our lives!

Bob Dylan shall be free (#10)

Here's the stanza I can't get out of my head this afternoon.
...

Now, I'm liberal, but to a degree
I want ev'rybody to be free
But if you think that I'll let Barry Goldwater
Move in next door and marry my daughter
You must think I'm crazy!
I wouldn't let him do it for all the farms in Cuba.
...
--Bob Dylan: I Shall Be Free No.10 (click here for the rest of the lyrics)

Remember when Goldwater was a right-wing nut? Before Reagan and then Dobeliou (the frenchified version of Double-U, just to piss Dobeliou off) pushed Barry's memory to the center?

It's great to see Bob getting his due recently with Chronicles & 60 Minutes.
It was great to go see him play in Bethlehem PA exactly a month ago with my son (here's the playlist). It was the only time I had seen him since 1974. He's not the same. He played keyboards rather than guitar. But he's still Bob. And when he played the last verse of a scorching Masters of War the place (or at least I) went nuts. I couldn't help picturing Dick Cheney having "the big one" a la Fred Sanford, and the joy that that would bring to the world.

-- True Blue Liberal