Blind Wille in a hotel room in Georgia Library of Congress site ↗ Like many Dylan fans, I became aware of Blind Wille McTell after the release of The Bootleg Series Vol. 1-3, released in 1991. That collection includes his nearly lost masterpiece, Blind Willie McTell, which was inexplicably left off Infidels. I immediately sought […]
Blind Willie McTell and Bob Dylan Read More »
The people that played that music were still around…[in the early sixties], so there were a bunch of us, me included, who got to see all these people close up – people like Son House, Reverend Gary Davis or Sleepy John Estes. Just to sit there and be up close and watch them play, you
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I’ve been listening to a lot of old, acoustic blues recordings lately. Scrolling through Amazon Unlimited (note –> not Spotify), one song stood out to me. Not because of the music, but the name, Special Rider Blues. After a few seconds, it came to me that Special Rider Music was the name of one of
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by Clinton Heylin It’s been a long time since I read a Dylan biography. However, a few days ago I happened across Clinton Heylin’s The Double Life of Bob Dylan on the “New Books” shelf at the public library. I picked it up. I suppose many of you know of Heylin. He’s written much about
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Most reading this are probably familiar with the work of Dorothy Parker, the short story writer, poet, theatre critic, New Yorker staffer, and member of the Algonquin Round Table. One of my favorite of her many famous witticisms: “This wasn’t just plain terrible, this was fancy terrible. This was terrible with raisins in it.” I
Most of us want things to be neat and tidy, to follow a set pattern, perhaps because our teachers beat that idea into our heads from an early age. Or maybe because most of the childhood storybooks and Hollywood movies we grew up with follow a typical pattern. However we got indoctrinated, we have a
Bob Dylan and Hafez Read More »
We all hate criminals. The criminal is a low life who takes things that don’t belong to him. He does things that should not be done. The criminal should be locked up and the key thrown away. Outlaws are another story. We love the outlaw, even though he often does the same things the criminal does.
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I recently bought the Criterion release of Rolling Thunder Revue: A Bob Dylan Story by Martin Scorsese. Yes, I could have watched it for free on one of the many streaming subscriptions I pay for but infrequently watch. But I wanted the supplementary materials, especially the Scorsese interview. His Mean Streets and The Last Waltz
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A few days ago I was listening to the version of Neighborhood Bully on Vol. 16. I wondered why they felt it was necessary to release it. There’s not a big difference with the Infidels version. The Infidels version contains a new verse: Now his holiest books have been trampled upon No contract he signed
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It seems to me that the later Bootleg Series releases – I’d say since Live 66 – are mostly inessential. Yes, it’s nice to have them available. But I can’t see anybody really listening to say, the Dylan and Harrison duet of If Not For You, more than once or twice. This release is no
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