VIDEOS: The First Episode of The Johnny Cash Show, Featuring Bob Dylan and Joni Mitchell (1969)

by Josh Jones, Open Culture: http://www.openculture.com/2014/03/the-johnny-cash-show-with-dylan-and-mitchell.html

Whether you hate-watched, love-watched, or ignored last night's Academy Awards, you may be tired today of Oscar talk. Take a break, unplug yourself from Facebook and Twitter, and travel with me back in TV time. It’s June 7th, 1969, and The Johnny Cash Show makes its debut on ABC, recorded—where else?—at the Grand Ole Opry (“I wouldn’t do it anywhere but here”). Featuring Cash ensemble regulars June Carter, the Carter family, Carl Perkins, the Statler Brothers, and the Tennessee Three, the musical variety show has a definite showbiz feel. Even the opening credits give this impression, with a decidedly kitschy big band rendition of “Folsom Prison Blues.” This seems a far cry from the defiant Johnny Cash who gave the world the finger in a photo taken that same year during his San Quentin gig (where inmate Merle Haggard sat in attendance).

But showbiz Johnny Cash is still every inch the man in black, with his rough edges and refined musical tastes (in fact, Cash debuted the song “Man in Black” on a later episode). As daughter Rosanne showed us, Cash was a musicologist of essential Americana. His choice of musical guests for his debut program—Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell, and Cajun fiddler Doug Kershaw—makes plain Cash’s love for folk songcraft. The appearance on the Cash show was Kershaw’s big break (two months later his “Louisiana Man” became the first song broadcast from the moon by the Apollo 12 astronauts). Mitchell, who plays “Both Sides Now” from her celebrated second album Clouds, was already a rising star. And Dylan was, well, Dylan. Even if all you know of Johnny Cash comes from the 2005 film Walk the Line, you’ll know he was a huge Dylan admirer. In the year The Johnny Cash Show debuted, the pair recorded over a dozen songs together, one of which, “Girl from the North Country,” appeared on Dylan’s country album Nashville Skyline. They play the song together, and Dylan plays that album’s “I Threw it All Away,” one of my all-time favorites.

Initially billed as “a lively new way to enjoy the summer!” The Johnny Cash Show had a somewhat rocky two-year run, occasionally running afoul of nervous network executives when, for example, Cash refused to censor the word “stoned” from Kris Kristofferson’s “Sunday Morning Coming Down” and brought on Pete Seeger, despite the furor his anti-war views caused elsewhere. Ever the iconoclast, Cash was also ever the consummate entertainer. After watching the first episode of his show, you might agree that Cash and friends could have carried the hour even without his famous guests. Cash opens with a spirited “Ring of Fire” and also plays “Folsom Prison Blues,” “The Wall,” and “Greystone Chapel.” And above, watch Johnny and June sing a sweet duet of Dylan’s “It Ain’t Me Babe.”

ALBUM REVIEW: "Freewheelin' by Bob Dylan

by Stan Denski, Culture Sonar: http://www.culturesonar.com/bob-dylan-freewheelin/

Getty Images

If there is one principle true for all great art, it is that repeat visits reward with new insights. This is as true for great pop records as it is for great paintings, great books and great films. Case in point: Bob Dylan’s sophomore album Freewheelin’. I just re-listened to this LP for the umpteenth time (which means that I’ve heard this recording I don’t know how many times over the past four decades) and it never fails to offer something new. In Dylan’s expansive catalog, I’m hard-pressed to name another record better than this one. And I’ve tried them all.

Freewheelin’ was the follow-up to Dylan’s eponymous 1962 debut — an album that sold so poorly that Dylan was nicknamed “Hammond’s Folly” by execs at Columbia Records. But whereas his debut showcased Dylan in full Woody Guthrie mode (and still making wild claims about a mythical childhood in the Southwest or raised by wolves in the Black Hills of the Dakotas), Freewheelin’ is where Bob Dylan actually finds his voice. It’s here that he puts the finishing touches on his persona by adding touches of James Dean and Marlon Brando to Guthrie 2.0 and Ramblin’ Jack.

And regarding the LP’s most famous song… Just as some “true” Beatles fans identify themselves by denigrating Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, Dylan elitists tend to dismiss “Blowin’ in the Wind.” In truth, “Blowin’ in the Wind” rates among the greatest American songs of the 20th Century. I imagine it gets the short shrift now because it’s joined the ranks of anthems like “Amazing Grace” and “We Shall Overcome,” yet on an album of major and minor masterpieces, “Blowin’ in the Wind” really does remain the jewel in the crown.

But the rest of the album has many high points: “Girl of the North Country” has near-perfect lyrics; “Down the Highway” is classic country blues; and “Bob Dylan’s Blues” plays the essential role of releasing some air from the profundity balloon. As for “A Hard Rain…,” yes, it’s based on an old Scottish ballad, but it stands there, with one foot in the 17th Century and the other in the 20th. It encompasses Kerouac, Ginsberg, and the Beats and who knows how many other references and when it first was released people were absolutely dumbfounded by it, just like they must have reacted to hearing Charlie Parker for the first time, or Bill Monroe.

“A Hard Rain” is actually the big bang of the singer-songwriter movement; a tune that set the standard for folk authenticity and made writing and singing original material a requirement for artistic legitimacy. Not that Freewheelin’ ends there but you’ll have to sort out for yourself the rankings of unforgettable “Don’t Think Twice,” the satiric “Talkin’ WWIII,” and the revelatory “Corrina, Corrina.”

And then there’s the album’s amazing cover: a simple photo of Bob and his girlfriend walking down a winter street in the Village, which somehow manages to encompass the vague and uncertain concept of “freewheelin'” that gave the LP its name. To be freewheelin’ seems to have something to do with your relationship to the future. If the defining characteristic of what is now called “THE SIXTIES” was an ability to imagine a future as something other than the simple extension of the present then the sixties start here, in those boots, those jeans, that jacket and this amazing album.

– Stan Denski

PS. While we’re talking Dylan, check out our posts Bob Dylan’s Rebirth: An Ode to His Days with The Traveling Wilburys, “Triplicate” Is Dylan’s Take on The Great American Songbook, and Can We Talk About Dylan’s Voice?

Photo credit:  Keystone Features (courtesy Getty Images)

VIDEOS: Andy Warhol Shoots “Screen Tests” of Nico, Bob Dylan & Salvador Dalí

Andy Warhol (Photo credit: vpickering)

by Colin Marshall, Open Culture: http://www.openculture.com/2013/08/andy-warhol-shoots-screen-tests-of-bob-dylan-nico-salvador-dali.html

Colin Marshall hosts and produces Notebook on Cities and Culture and writes essays on literature, film, cities, Asia, and aesthetics. 

He’s at work on a book about Los Angeles, A Los Angeles Primer. Follow him on Twitter at @colinmarshall.



Just the other day, I had a chat with a well-known poet who laid out for me his theory that Andy Warhol invented our conception of modern America.

When we think about this country, the poet explained, we think about this country broadly in the way that Warhol (and thus his disciples) envisioned it.

We here at Open Culture have covered several of the forms in which the artist promulgated his distinctive brand of Americana, and today, for the 85th anniversary of his birth, we’ve rounded up a few of his famous “screen tests,” the short films he made between 1963 and 1968 that offer portraits of hundreds of figures, famous and otherwise, who happened to pass through his studio/ social club/ subcultural hot zone, The Factory.

Just above, you can watch Warhol’s screen test with Nico, the German singer who would become an integral part of the Factory-formed band the Velvet Underground.



Little-heard at the time but ultimately highly influential, the Velvet Underground’s sound shaped much American popular music - and given popular music’s centrality back then, much of American culture to come.

You may not necessarily buy that argument, but surely you can’t argue against the influence of a certain singer-songwriter by the name of Bob Dylan, Warhol’s screen test with whom appears just above.

Coming from a Polish immigrant family, and seemingly dedicated to the cultivation of his own outsider status his entire life, Warhol understood the importance of foreigners to the vitality of American culture.

Naturally, he didn’t miss his chance to shoot a screen test with Salvador Dalí, below, when the Spanish surrealist came to the Factory.



See also our previous post on Warhol’s screen tests with Lou Reed, Dennis Hopper, Edie Sedgwick, and others.

When you’ve watched them all, consider continuing your celebration of life in Andy Warhol’s 85th birthday with the EarthCam and The Warhol Museum’s collaboration Figment.

It offers live camera feeds of not only his grave but the church where he was baptized. Comparisons to the viewing experience of Empire are encouraged.

The film Andy Warhol: A Mirror of the Sixties has been added to our list of 550 Free Movies Online.

VIDEOS: 50 Years On, Dylan's "Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll" Still Speaks Truth to Power

by Erika Lundahl, Yes! magazine: http://www.yesmagazine.org/happiness/fifty-years-on-bob-dylan-s-lonesome-death-of-hattie-carroll-still-speaks-truth-to-power

Erika Lundahl wrote this article for YES! Magazine, a national, nonprofit media organization that fuses powerful ideas and practical actions. Erika is an editorial intern at YES!


Fifty years ago today, a 22-year-old Bob Dylan sat down to record "The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll" at Studio A in New York City.

The song is a mostly factual account of the then-recent murder of African American barmaid Hattie Carroll by wealthy tobacco farmer William Zantzinger.

The song appeared on "The Times They Are A-Changing," an album full of remarkable works. But what makes "Hattie Carroll" special, from today's vantage point, is its topical nature and continuing relevance.

The song comments directly on the social problems of its time, and younger songwriters have adopted its melody and structure to talk about today's injustices.

The verses of the song - each of which consists of a single, detail-heavy sentence - lay out a slightly simplified version of the facts of the case, while the final chorus provides Dylan’s commentary on the immorality of the event:

But you who philosophize disgrace
And criticize all fears,
Bury the rag deep in your face,
For now is the time for your tears.

"The story I took out of a newspaper," Dylan told talk-show host Steve Allen. "I used it for something I wanted to say."

Songwriters have tended to leave that chorus intact while adjusting the verses to fit modern-day issues.

In 2006, British musician and activist Billy Bragg gave the Hattie Carroll treatment to Rachel Corrie, an American peace activist, who was killed by an Israeli bulldozer in Gaza in 2003.

Like Dylan before him, Bragg uses the verses to weave together sharply reported details of Corrie's case with commentary on the political context:

Rachel Corrie had 23 years
She was born in the town of Olympia, Washington
A skinny, messy, list-making chain-smoker
Who volunteered to protect the Palestinian people
Who had become non-persons in the eyes of the media
So that people were suffering and no one was seeing
Or hearing or talking or caring or acting ...

(You can download a free copy of the song at the Guardian, and listen to it in the video below).


Then, just last year, Massachusetts songwriter Jonah Mantranga became the latest singer to borrow Dylan's melody and chorus, this time applying it to the case of Trayvon Martin.

His song puts George Zimmerman in the role of William Zantzinger, showing an eerie set of parallels between the two cases.

George Zimmerman, who had 28 years
Has a dad who's a judge who keeps speaking for him
And over the years he's tried to protect him
With his high-court relations in the politics of Florida

Matranga says he was inspired to write the song by his "radically inclusive" Methodist church where he sings in the choir. In an email, Mantranga wrote that "the whole community addressed [the Trayvon case] head-on, speaking out against profiling."


Taken together, the three stories - of Hattie Carroll, Rachel Corrie, and Trayvon Martin - build a story that transcends lines of race, gender, and identity, illuminating structural injustice and appealing to a higher conscience.

The legacy of "The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll" points to the lasting power of music to bring meaning to senseless tragedies.

VIDEO: "Man of Constant Sorrow" by Bob Dylan

by 1965dylan

VIDEOS: Bob Dylan and Van Morrison Sing Together in Athens, on Historic Hill Overlooking the Acropolis

by Mike Springer, Open Culture: http://www.openculture.com/2013/03/bob_dylan_and_van_morrison_sing_together_in_athens_on_historic_hill_overlooking_the_acropolis.html

“Foreign Window” and “One Irish Rover”:

On a summer day in 1989, Van Morrison and Bob Dylan met up in Greece and brought their acoustic guitars to the place in Athens where the ancients believed the muses lived.

Philopappos Hill, traditionally known as the Hill of the Muses, rises high above the Athens Basin and has a commanding view of the Acropolis.

It was June 29. Dylan had just wrapped up a European tour the night before at Panathinaiko Stadium, and Morrison was traveling with a BBC crew for an Arena documentary that would be broadcast in 1991 as One Irish Rover: Van Morrison in Performances.

The two legendary singer-songwriters played several of Morrison’s songs: “Foreign Window” and “One Irish Rover,” above, and “Crazy Love,” below.

A fourth song, “And It Stoned Me,” was apparently cut from the film.

“Crazy Love”:

Who Is Bobby Z?

by Kathy Unruh

I like to refer to my favorite folk singer as Bobby Z (A.K.A. Bob Dylan) whose real name is Robert Zimmerman. He changed his last name to Dylan (after the Welsh poet Dylan Thomas) very early in his career.

One of his most popular songs, Knockin On Heaven's Door, was written for a movie score about Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid...

One of the reasons I like Bob Dylan, is because he isn't afraid to speak his mind. His lyrics can be painfully honest and very convicting too. They make an impact on the listener, often providing them with a different perspective to consider.

Bob often stuck his neck out on controversial issues during the Civil Rights movement and the Viet-Nam War era which caused a great divide among people. They either loved him, or hated him, but no one could ever ignore him.

He, himself doesn't really seem to care what anyone thinks. He just does his own thing and remains who he is. There is no hype.

Like all musician/songwriter's, Dylan's songwriting drew from people he admired, the most important influence in his early years being the American folk singer Woody Guthrie.

Woody was a man who cared about and spoke for the people of his generation through songs like This Land Is Your Land.

Woody's son, Arlo Guthrie, was a contemporary of Dylan's who also became famous during the sixties. Arlo wrote the song "Alice's Restaraunt" among others, and was one of the many well known rock icons who performed at the Woodstock festival.

In 1979 Dylan declared that he had become a "born-again Christian" and was heard playing harmonica on the album "No Compromise" with the popular contemporary-Christian recording artist Keith Green.

Dylan later went on to win his first Grammy Award that same year with a Contemporary Chirstian album of his own called "Slow Train Coming."

Bob Dylan's influence on the direction of popular music is legendary. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1989.

During the ceremony Bruce Springstein said Bob Dylan ... "broke through the limitations of what a recording artist could achieve, and changed the face of rock and roll forever."

Other notable artists such as Jimi Hendrix, The Byrds, Eric Clapton, Gun's and Roses, have covered Dylan's songs and re-created their own hit versions of ...

- All Along the Watchtower - Jim Hendrix
- Hey Mr. Tambourine Man - The Byrds
- Knockin On Heavens Door - Eric Clapton / Guns and Roses

Undoubtedly, the songs that Bob Dylan gave us will continue to inspire musicians and songwriters for years to come.

Free Guitar Lesson Video:
Knockin On Heaven's Door

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Bob Dylan's Greatest Hits By The Numbers

Bob Dylan holds a cue card in the music video for "Subterranean Homesick Blues" (Wikipedia)

by Garrett Sawyer

You'd think that with a legendary career like Bob Dylan's that he would have an extremely long "greatest hits" list.

Ironically he hit Billboard's American Top 40 a grand total of only twelve times.

For anybody new to Dylan here's a rundown of the few songs that actually charted, in reverse order from lowest to highest:

Subterranean Homesick Blues, #39 in 1965

His first hit, it contained the classic line, "You don't need a weather man to know which way the wind blows."

George Jackson, #33 in 1971

This was a tribute to the Black Panther leader, George Jackson. Jackson had been shot and killed by guards at San Quentin Prison on August 21, 1971. The famous Attica Prison riot was partially attributed to the shooting.

Hurricane, Part 1, #33 in 1976

This was the first portion of Dylan's eight minute leadoff song from "Desire" about how Rubin "Hurricane" Carter was allegedly framed for a 1966 triple murder in Patterson, New Jersey.

Just Like A Woman, #33 in 1966

Rumored to be about Edie Sedgwick this was a song whose lyrics Dylan, according to historian Sean Wilentz, improvised in the studio by singing "disconnected lines and semi-gibberish". Don't you wish you could improvise like this?

Tangled Up In Blue, #31 in 1975

With his marriage to Sara Lowndes falling to pieces Dylan penned this epic allegory of their relationship, how they came together, fell apart, came back together and fell apart again.

Gotta Serve Somebody, #24 in 1979

Dylan became a born-again Christian in the late 1970s, recorded two albums of gospel music, and lost a few fans (again). This was Dylan's way of reminding everybody (perhaps himself included) that no one is ever totally their own master.

I Want You, #20 in 1966

Rolling Stone declared "Blonde on Blonde" to be the ninth greatest album of all time. It yielded this hit.

Knockin' On Heaven's Door, #11 in 1973

Isn't it nice when you can star in a movie and get a hit song out of it? That's exactly what happened when Dylan starred in Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid.

Positively 4th Street, #7, charted for 7 weeks in 1965

Laden with imagery of retribution this was supposedly Dylan's response to so-called "friends" from the folk community who, from the sound of it, stabbed Dylan in the back (figuratively, of course).

Lay Lady Lay, #7, charted for 11 weeks in 1969

Suddenly Dylan lurched country, recording with Nashville musicians and doing a duet with Johnny Cash.

Rainy Day Women #12 and 35: #2 for one week in 1966

He practically laughed all the way through this gleeful litany of a double entendre. Everybody's got to get stoned, like the adulterous woman in the Gospels nearly was, only to find that he's probably talking about getting high the whole time.

Like A Rolling Stone, #2 for two weeks in 1965

There's not much you have to say about this song. Rolling Stone proclaimed it the single greatest song of all time. In an era when hit songs weren't supposed to run for more than about three minutes or so Dylan's accusatory anthem ran on for over six unprecedented minutes.

And these are just the ones that charted! All this goes to show is that innumerable terrific songs don't necessarily sell, make it to the Top 40 charts or get the radio airplay they genuinely deserve.

The rest of Bob Dylan's "Greatest Hits", if you judge by the quality of the songs themselves, would doubtless make a list that would run several pages.

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Bob Dylan's "Blood On The Tracks", Part 5: The Fatal Extension Course

Cover of Blood on the Tracks

by Garrett Sawyer

Part of the appeal of Bob Dylan's "Blood on the Tracks" is that the songs are undoubtedly part-autobiographical.

Although Dylan himself has vigorously denied that it is so Jakob, the youngest of Bob and Sara Dylan's four children, has stated: "The songs are my parents talking".

Tragically, some of what Dylan was portraying was the breakup of his marriage.

Ironically, what helped drive them apart wasn't infidelity on either of their part. It was art lessons. Around April 1974 Dylan began taking classes in art from a 73-year-old Russian immigrant named Norman Raeben.

What Raeben taught Dylan permanently altered the latter's way of thinking. Or as Dylan would recall later," I went home after that first day and my wife never did understand me ever since that day.

That's when our marriage started breaking up. She never knew what I was talking about, what I was thinking about, and I couldn't possibly explain it". To finish the album's songs:

If You See Her Say Hello: Now he's getting mournful and melancholy on us. She evidently has already left him long ago. Among the revelations he makes is that he seems to have made one last attempt to stop her from leaving one night but the scene that resulted left a bad taste in his mouth. Yet through it all he doesn't seem to harbor any resentment toward her.

Shelter From the Storm: Dylan was not the first to use this phrase. Creedence Clearwater Revival used it previously in 1970's "Who'll Stop the Rain" ("I went down Virginia, seeking shelter from the storm"). Here the theme is totally different. In a quiet acoustic song full of natural and religious imagery Dylan again recounts his loss of Sara. Following each verse is the simple rejoinder "'Come in' she said 'I'll give you shelter from the storm.'" More than once he seems to be comparing himself to Jesus when he refers to the woman in the song taking his crown of thorns or people gambling for his clothes in a village the way soldiers supposedly did after the Crucifixion

Buckets of Rain: The coda to the album. It's a quiet, almost playful finale to Sara (Sample lyric: "Little red wagon, Little red bike. I ain't no monkey but I know what I like"). It almost sounds like he's laughing through his tears. A fitting finale to an album full of sound and fury, signifying lots of things.

"Blood on the Tracks was recorded soon after Bob Dylan's and Sara Lownd's initial separation. The divorce was finalized in June of 1977. Theirs was a strained relationship for several years afterwards but eventually they made peace with one another well enough that they even considered remarrying.

Dylan's true feelings came out on his subsequent album, "Desire", on the song "Sara", where he called her his "Radiant jewel, mystical wife".

Wouldn't it be pleasant if great works of art like "Blood on the Tracks" didn't have to be the result of personal tragedy, heartbreak and loss? Perhaps the only good thing that can be said for hardships like the kind Bob Dylan and Sara Lownds underwent is that Dylan channeled his suffering into his art.

If you like Bob Dylan's "Blood on the Tracks" then you'll like a song inspired by the story of a soldier who died after returning from Iraq. For a limited time only you can download this song for FREE by clicking HERE.

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ALBUM REVIEW: Bob Dylan's "Blood On The Tracks", Part 2: Blowing In The "Idiot Wind"

Joan Baez and Bob Dylan, 1963 (Wikipedia)

by Garrett Sawyer

Like a modern-day Dante, Dylan chronicled the inferno of his disintegrating marriage with Sara Lownds.

Even the title itself carried the poetic device of a double meaning. There isn't a train in sight on this album.

So when he titles it "Blood on the Tracks" is he referring to railroad tracks?

Or does he mean musical tracks, in which case he's implying that the songs have lyrical "blood" all over them? You be the judge.

On with the songs:

Simple Twist of Fate

Here the narrator sounds like he's describing a chance encounter (the twist of fate of the title) that happened to someone else. The pairing falls apart after a night of passion although the man hopes that perhaps he'll get lucky twice.

Yet he eventually ends up revealing his own feelings about it when he sings, "People tell me it's a sin to know and feel too much within" as if to admit that he's been talking about himself the whole time but found it too painful to acknowledge.

You're a Big Girl Now

If this isn't a painfully candid assessment of his failing marriage with Sara then there's never been one. Think of an update version of "Just like a Woman" and you've got the essentials.

The song is replete with sad observations as to the state of their relationship ("I'm back in the rain and you're on dry land"), pleas to be understood ("I hope that you can hear, hear me singing through these tears"), promises to change, confessions of ignorance and inferiority and, finally, a wistful request not to "change horses in midstream" even as they've apparently already broken up.

Idiot Wind

This is the song he should have written right after "Like a Rolling Stone" (I don't know about all of you but I can practically hear him singing, "How does it feel ... to be as clueless as you are?"). The sarcasm, anger and outright hostility quite literally drip from the speakers. The only question left is, who's really the target of this poisonous musical dart?

The first verse sounds like it was written for the paparazzi, the second verse for all of their oblivious friends. But most of what follows sounds like he's telling Sara off (sample lyric: "You're an idiot babe. It's a wonder that you still know how to breathe").

One of Dylan's performances would seem to confirm this. Dylan sang "Idiot Wind" during a performance in Fort Collins, Colorado at Hughes Stadium. You can hear this performance yourself because it was included on "Hard Rain", Dylan's live album.

Does he sound even angrier than the recording? If he does, there's a possible explanation: it seems Sara was supposedly sitting in the front row.

What a canon of songs! Just in these three songs alone Dylan careens from hope to sorrow to dripping sarcasm and back again. And if the lyrics don't capture you the inventive, ingenious melodies will.

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ALBUM REVIEW: Bob Dylan's "Blood On The Tracks", Part 1: Tangled Up In Blue

Blood on the Tracks

by Garrett Sawyer

Some critics have hailed Bob Dylan's "Blood on the Tracks" as his best album. And with good reason.

The album is a raw mix of personal anguish, fantasy and poetry gushing out in an abundance of terrific melodies.

The album was not his best-selling one; "Greatest Hits", "Greatest Hits - Vol. II", and "Desire" all sold more but as an artistic achievement only "Highway 61 Revisited" was undeniably better.

Let's go through the songs in order:

Tangled Up In Blue

This rambling seven-verse epic is a road song/love song that has as many twists and turns as a slalom.

Written in the summer of 1974 at a farm he had just bought in Minnesota it examines a fictional relationship that comes together, breaks apart, comes together again much later and then finally breaks apart a second time, still with eventual hope of reconciliation.

When he sings, "She was married when we first met, soon to be divorced" this is an accurate description of his first encounter with his future wife, Sara Lownds. When they met she was already married and the mother of a daughter.

On stage Dylan has occasionally introduced this song about the ups and downs of his subsequent marriage to Sara by telling the audience it took "10 years to live and 2 years to write."

As part of their 1977 divorce settlement, Sara got half the royalties from the songs Dylan wrote while they were married ... "tangled up in blue" included.

While most of the references in the song are pure fantasy, some of them are quite real. There really is a "Montague Street" in an upscale section of Brooklyn which had a music venue named "Capulet's" (recall Shakespeare's Romeo Montague and Juliet Capulet) that Dylan sometimes frequented.

The allusion to "an Italian poet from the fifteenth century" may sound ambiguous at first but the explanation is there were two versions of this song recorded: the first in New York then subsequently in Minnesota.

The Minnesota version was the one used on the album. But in the previous New York version the lyric was originally "thirteenth century" a clear reference to the Italian poet Dante.

From the lines, "All the people we used to know they're an illusion to me now" we get the impression that the breakup of their relationship felt surreal to him. The song ends with a frank confession "We always did feel the same, we just saw it from a different point of view, tangled up in blue."

Despite his legendary career Dylan never hit the charts as frequently as artists/bands with comparable influence such as the Beatles, Elvis and the Rolling Stones. "Tangled up in blue" was a happy exception, poking its way into Billboard's Top 40 in March of 1975.

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BOOK REVIEW: Bob Dylan Chronicles: The Confession Of An Artist

Cover of Chronicles: Volume One

by Johnny Clark

Bob Dylan: Chronicles - Volume 1, is supposed to be the first part of a 3 volume memoir.

Published in 2004, there have been countless rumors about the release of a second volume. The author has just confirmed in a recent interview to Rolling Stone dated September 2012 that he was indeed working on it.

This is the second book written by the songwriter since his experiment with Tarantula (1971), and apart from the following three collections of his drawings Drawn Blank (1994), The Brazil Series (2009) and Man Gave Names To All The Animals (2009).

This first volume of Bob Dylan's Chronicles covers the year he arrived in New York, back in 1961, and the events surrounding two of his albums: New Morning and Oh, Mercy. Therefore, it avoids the times and recordings that turned the man into a legend.

This may be an attempt to reestablish his relationship with journalists on another level, as he explains: "Most people who write about music, they have no idea what it feels like to play it. But with the book I wrote, I thought, 'The people who are writing reviews of this book, man, they know what the hell they're talking about.'

This musician's autobiography is one of the few written by an artist himself, without the help of a journalist, and it's also well written. Up to the point where attacks have been made against the book using the same charges that have targeted his songs recently. Indeed, a lot of sentences from Chronicles seem to be reassembled phrases taken from other books.

But maybe that's why his memoir is so good: it was written like a song, so that the book itself reflects its own subject, and that the form underlines the content.

Furthermore, the book acknowledges the way Bob Dylan built his entire body of work. Charges of plagiarism fall flat the minute you realize what Chronicles is: not the list of events that made B. Dylan famous, but a collection of situations that have inspired the artist. The book actually lays down the foundation of his art, within the form of the work itself.

Because the book is not a biography, but a true chronicle. It's not the account of a person's life but "an extended account [...] of historical events, sometimes including legendary material, presented in chronological order and without authorial interpretation or comment", as defined by the free online dictionary.

Long after Bob Dylan was labeled the "voice of a generation", people keep scrutinizing his lyrics and building up theories, when the guy keeps repeating that he only wants to write songs and play them live. And this book says nothing more ...

Bob Dylan uses the same template for memoir and for his songs, giving the book the coherence and genuine quality that lacks so many other musical autobiographies. This is just another way to say that what matters is the music, and the music only.

If you like real music like Bob Dylan's music, than you might also check out Frans Schuman. He has recorded his first two albums with just a guitar and a harmonica. Some are folk songs and some have a different feel. But I think you might like it. Click here to download a copy of his latest single for free.

Cheers, Johnny Clark.

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The Best Bob Dylan Lyrics - And Why

Cover of Highway 61 Revisited

by Johnny Clark

Bob Dylan has always been considered as a great writer, some have "raised" him to the status of a poet, and his lyrics are literally scrutinized.

Even though I think we shouldn't separate his words from his music and take his songs as a whole, nobody can deny that some of his lines stand on their own.

Let's get a look at the best Bob Dylan Lyrics and select those that are truly outstanding:

• "Oh God said to Abraham, "Kill me a son" / Abe says, "Man, you must be puttin' me on" / God say, "No." Abe say, "What?" / God say, "You can do what you want Abe, but / the next time you see me comin' you better run"", from "Highway 61 Revisited". This is a classic form of lyric used by B. Dylan during the first period of his work of art. It's highly influenced by the talking blues form that he takes here a step further with this very rhythmic dialogue.


• "He not busy being born is busy dying" from "It's Alright Ma (I'm Only Bleeding)". One of the greatest Dylan one liners, the reality of its content acts like ice water in your veins as this verse is sharp as a double edged knife, with no handle: there is no doubt that the singer-songwriter who is constantly reinventing himself follows this guideline.


• "I wish that for just one time / You could stand inside my shoes / You'd know what a drag it is / To see you" from "Positively 4th Street". A perfect example of Mr. Dylan's sarcastic side. The construction of the sentence makes the reader start to feel empathy for the narrator and the burden of being in his shoes before the punch line comes stripping the latter of his victim's clothes.


• "If you ever go to Austin / Fort Worth or San Antone / Find the Barrooms I got lost in / And send my memories home." From "If You Ever Go To Houston". You can see with this one how important the form of a verse can be. This line could make it to the top only for having "lost in" to rhyme with "Austin". Just add to this the content's power that clearly depicts the desperation and nostalgia of a world that no longer exists.


• "I'm going to raise me an army / Some tough sons of bitches / I'll recruit my army / From the orphanages" from "Thunder On the Mountain". Another great rhyme: "bitches" /" orphanages" even though it is a false one. This proves that Bob Dylan doesn't use random rhymes and that the sense can be underlined with style so that the reader doesn't miss the thunder pounding on the Mountain.

While it is true that a lot of great songs have very simple lyrics, Bob Dylan is an artist that makes it obvious that good lyrics clearly add value to a song.

If you like Bob Dylan and want to expand your horizon than you might also check out Frans Schuman. His first two albums are made of guitar and harmonica only tracks with interesting lyrics that I think you might like. Click here to download a copy of his latest single for free.

Cheers, Johnny Clark.

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http://EzineArticles.com/?The-Best-Bob-Dylan-Lyrics---And-Why&id=7352149

OPINION: This Is The Best Bob Dylan Album, Period

Cover of World Gone Wrong

by Johnny Clark

So, Bob Dylan is the greatest singer songwriter of all time.

He is a poet, a protest singer, the voice of a generation, a painter, a legend. He has sold millions of records, received several awards and continues to release great albums very frequently while touring constantly since 1988.

But which record can be considered as the best bob Dylan album?

This is a difficult question considering the fact that he has released 35 studio albums to date, most of which are considered to be great and that even his weirdest records have sold relatively well.

The singer-songwriter's work can be classified into 3 categories:

• The great albums (the first and last ones): Bob Dylan (1962), The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan (1963), The Times They Are a-Changin' (1964), Another Side of Bob Dylan (1964), Bringing It All Back Home (1965), Highway 61 Revisited (1965), Blonde on Blonde (1966), John Wesley Harding (1967), Nashville Skyline (1969), Good as I Been to You (1992), World Gone Wrong (1993), Time Out of Mind (1997) Love and Theft (2001), Modern Times (2006), Together Through Life (2009), Christmas in the Heart (2009), Tempest (2012).


• The seventies: Self Portrait (1970), New Morning (1970), Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid (1973), Dylan (1973), Planet Waves (1974), Blood on the Tracks ( 1975), The Basement Tapes (1975), Desire (1976), Street Legal (1978), Slow Train Coming (1979).


• The eighties: Saved (1980), Shot of Love (1981), Infidels (1983), Empire Burlesque (1985), Knocked Out Loaded (1986), Down in the Groove (1988), Oh Mercy (1989), Under the Red Sky ( 1990).

We could select nominees: his first nine albums, obviously, his most personal album: Blood on the Tracks, his first Christian album: Slow Train Coming, Desire, his most sincere effort: World Gone Wrong, his resurrection album Time Out of Mind, Together Through Life and his latest album: Tempest.

Or sidestep the question and select a greatest hits album.

But the answer is blowing elsewhere. As the singer songwriter said himself, his albums are just recordings of songs at a given time and his real work of art comes to life onstage, where he reshapes his songs constantly. But a live album would only be another recording of songs at another given time.

The correct answer is to be found in the reason why B. Dylan has such a devoted following and why people keep continuing to buy tickets and records. He is a great artist because he keeps reinventing himself restlessly. And his best album is his next.

Bob Dylan is an artist that is always on the move and never repeats himself. This is the key to his longevity and the reason of his success to this day.

If you like Bob Dylan than you might also check out Frans Schuman. His first two albums are guitar and harmonica only tracks. Some are folk songs and some have a different feel. But I think you might like it.

Click here to download a copy of his latest single for free.

Cheers, Johnny Clark.

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Bob Dylan Poetry: True Lies Or Real Fraud?

Bob Dylan at Massey Hall, Toronto, April 18, 1980 - Photo by Jean-Luc Ourlin (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

by Johnny Clark

Is Bob Dylan a poet or a songwriter?

While the artist born Robert Allen Zimmerman changed his name to Bob Dylan in reference to Dylan Thomas, many argue that whereas a poem stands up by itself, a song can only come to life when the lyrics are sung.

Moreover, one way or the other, is he a true artist? From the very beginning, the human being has always been under the influence. Of his surrounding, of various kinds of products, of his own story and/or of History. And this is mostly true for artists. Let's see if there is such an object as the Bob Dylan poetry and outline some major facts.

1. "Yippee! I'm a poet, and I know it. Hope I don't blow it". While it is obvious that B. Dylan was influenced by Woody Guthrie on the songwriting side, it is also evident, since they have become friends, that he knew the works of beat poet Allen Ginsberg. But if you dig further, you will find such names as French poets Arthur Rimbaud, Paul Verlaine, Charles Baudelaire (whose Fleurs du Mal offers lots of oxymoron, a figure of speech often used by Dylan) but also William Shakespeare, John Milton, William Butler Yeats or T.S. Eliot.

2. An extended study of his poetry has led some to suspect more than just influences but cases of plagiarism. In Working Man Blues #2, Bob Dylan writes "In the dark I hear the night birds call, I can hear a lover's breath. I'll sleep in the kitchen with my feet in the hall, Sleep is like a temporary death". These lines may seem very familiar to anyone who came across Henry Timrod's Two Portraits which contains the following verse: "Which, ere they feel a lover's breath, Lie in a temporary death".

Mr. Dylan has indeed confessed reading civil war material prior to releasing the album Modern Times, some of which might have been from contemporary poet H. Timrod. As to whether this is plagiarism, he has answered the question in a recent interview ...

3. What nobody can deny is that Bob Dylan, who started covering/rewriting talking blues, masters the poetic form and has made a trademark of his by underlining the meters of his lyrics through his notorious phrasing. All of which emphasize the rhythm of his songs which we have described below for It's All Over Now, Baby Blue.

HIGH-way is for GAM-blers, better USE your sense
TAKE what you have GA-thered from co-IN-cidence
[Rhythm: DAH-dah-dah-dah DAH-dah-dah-dah DAH-dah-dah]
The EM-pty-handed PAIN-ter from your STREETS
Is DRAW-ing crazy PAT-terns on your SHEETS
[Rhythm: Dah -DAH-dah-dah-dah DAH-dah-dah-dah DAH]

The point is that Bob Dylan is a master at playing with his art form and whatever you might think about his inspiration, the question is would you ever have heard about Henry Timrod without Modern Times?

And how would you ever hear about Frans Schuman without B. Dylan? His first two albums are made of guitar and harmonica only tracks. Some are folk songs and some have a different feel. But I think you might like it.

Click here to download a copy of his latest single for free.

Cheers, Johnny Clark.

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Bob Dylan Hits - The Facts Behind The Legend

Bob Dylan performing in Rotterdam (Wikipedia)

by Johnny Clark

Everyone will agree that Bob Dylan has become more than just one of the greatest American musicians of all time but succeeded to reach the status of a true legend during his lifetime.

He has changed the course of popular music to the point where there is now a time before and a time after Bob Dylan in contemporary music history.

While I am one of his millions of followers that will defend the fact that he is the best singer-songwriter of all time, when the question of "what songs are actual Bob Dylan hits" was raised at a friend's party late last Saturday night, everyone was pretty confident they had the answers.

His #1 hits would have to be: Mr. Tambourine Man, Knocking On Heaven's Door and Like A Rolling Stone.
Well I did some research a little while after and came up with these more or less surprising facts ... and let's get this straight right away: I will only be talking here about songs written and interpreted by Bob Dylan, and my research is limited to the US top 100 chart.

1) The first fact I discovered is that the greatest singer-songwriter of all time never actually reached the number one spot, ever. But our assumptions as to which songs are Bob Dylan's ultimate hits were part right.

His top song, peaking at #2, is indeed Like A Rolling Stone (which stayed 12 weeks in the charts while the other song he has that ranked similarly but lasted only 10 weeks is Rainy Day Women #12 and 35). Knockin' On Heaven's Door is his 5th greatest hit peaking at only #12 while Mr. Tambourine Man never made the top 100 chart.

2) Besides the above mentioned Like A Rolling Stone and Rainy Day Women #12 and 35 that both ranked at #2, Bob Dylan has only two other songs that made the top 10 which are: Lay Lady Lay (peaked at #7 and stayed 14 weeks in the chart) and Positively 4th Street (also reached #7 but only lasted 9 weeks).

3) Bob Dylan's most hit-loaded album is unsurprisingly Blonde on Blonde, considered by many as his masterpiece, with the following tracks besides Rainy Day Women #12 and 35: I Want You, Just Like A Woman, and Leopard-Skin Pill-Box Hat (respectively reaching #20, 33 and 81).

Second comes Nashville Skyline with 3 songs making the top 100 which are, apart from Lay Lady Lay: Tonight I'll Be Staying Here With You reaching number 50 and I Threw It All Away taking the last spot on Bob Dylan's greatest hits list at #85. His third album with the most hits is Desire with singles Hurricane (Part I) (#33) and Mozambique (#54).

While it is clear that there are not so many actual Bob Dylan hits and that the man is not one of the best selling artist of all time he remains the greatest proof that a real artist can have a huge success and still stand above such figures.

If you like Bob Dylan than you might also check out Frans Schuman. His first two albums are made of harmonica and guitar only tracks. Some are folk songs and some have a different feel. But I think you might like it. Click here to download a copy of his latest single for free.

Cheers, Johnny Clark.

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http://EzineArticles.com/?Bob-Dylan-Hits---The-Facts-Behind-The-Legend&id=7323857

INTERVIEW: Bob Dylan Strikes Back at Critics: Addresses Plagiarism Charges For the First Time in New Rolling Stone Interview

by Rolling Stone, http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/bob-dylan-strikes-back-at-critics-20120912

Bob Dylan on the Cover of Rolling Stone (Sam Jones)

Bob Dylan opens up like never before in the new issue of Rolling Stone, on newsstands Friday, September 14th.

In the interview with Mikal Gilmore, Dylan covers an incredible range of topics: John Lennon and Bruce Springsteen; what he really thought about the movies I'm Not There and Masked and Anonymous; being picked up by the police in New Jersey in 2009; and - in a remarkable stretch - his belief that he was "transfigured" around the time of his 1966 motorcycle accident.

Dylan also, for the first time, strikes back at critics who have accused him of drawing too much from the work of others. Here's an excerpt:

I want to ask about the controversy over your quotations in your songs from the works of other writers, such as Japanese author Junichi Saga's Confessions of a Yakuza, and the Civil War poetry of Henry Timrod. In folk and jazz, quotation is a rich and enriching tradition, but some critics say that you didn't cite your sources clearly. What's your response to those kinds of charges?

Oh, yeah, in folk and jazz, quotation is a rich and enriching tradition. That certainly is true. It's true for everybody, but me. There are different rules for me. And as far as Henry Timrod is concerned, have you even heard of him? Who's been reading him lately? And who's pushed him to the forefront? Who's been making you read him? And ask his descendants what they think of the hoopla. And if you think it's so easy to quote him and it can help your work, do it yourself and see how far you can get.

Wussies and pussies complain about that stuff. It's an old thing - it's part of the tradition. It goes way back. These are the same people that tried to pin the name Judas on me. Judas, the most hated name in human history!

If you think you've been called a bad name, try to work your way out from under that. Yeah, and for what? For playing an electric guitar? As if that is in some kind of way equitable to betraying our Lord and delivering him up to be crucified. All those evil motherfuckers can rot in hell. 

Seriously?  

I'm working within my art form. It's that simple. I work within the rules and limitations of it. There are authoritarian figures that can explain that kind of art form better to you than I can. It's called songwriting. It has to do with melody and rhythm, and then after that, anything goes. You make everything yours. We all do it.

For the full interview, pick up the new issue of Rolling Stone.