Matt,
You will be proud of me. I am going to my first concert this month and it is someone good: I am seeing Bob Dylan, Elvis Costello and Amos Lee in about 3 weeks in Bloomington. I am pretty pumped....
CS
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CS,
All I can say is "WOW"...that sounds like an amazing concert...I saw Bob Dylan at UW-La Crosse in I think 2000 and he played a lot of his newer stuff and not too many classics...but I guess he has sort of changed that in his recent concerts...
Elvis Costello has always been one of my favorites...but I have never gotten the chance to see him. I am not too familiar with Amos Lee but I have heard good things about him.
Talk to you later,
Matt
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Matt,
I will admit that Elvis Costello is 90% of the reason I bought tix to this concert. I really like his music; he has a pretty diverse catalog and a very distinctive voice -- I turned on the radio the other day and within 2 seconds, I knew it was a Elvis C song, even if I couldn't identify the song right away. Sometimes I think "I can't stand up for falling down" is the story of my life.
I will also admit that I have never "gotten" Bob Dylan. I respect him and he is obviously influential, but I have never connected with his music. I would compare it to the feeling when someone tells a story that they think is funny and then says, "I guess you had to be there."I feel like I am missing something with Dylan. Any thoughts on this?
CS
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CS,
That's very interesting...I guess my interest in Dylan is two fold:
a. Everyone considers him awesome so I need to check out what the hub-bub is about. Because I am a music freak, if anyone ever says "best album ever" or "best song ever" I have a contractual obligation to investigate. So a number of the albums I own are based on good marketing you could say.
b. When I see good song writing I appreciate it. I particularly like "Positively 4th Street" in that it is so negative and it is like a slap in the face. But I guess looking back at it, I don't have a personal connection to the music as I do other bands. Dylan is always sort of like a history lesson to me [even though he has a bunch of recent work].
When I saw Dylan it made me think of how things are different now, versus when he was playing in the 60's. The Bootleg Series Volume 4 documents Dylan's concert at the Royal Albert Hall [which continually gets mentioned as the best/most important concert ever]. He was right at the crossroads of playing folk and his increasing interest in rock & electric guitars. The first half is acoustic and the crowd cheers loudly. The second half is electric and Bob is met with constant boos. At one point, someone yells out "Judas" and the crowd erupts in applause...Bob says "I don't believe you...you're a liar" and then turns to his band and says "play it fucking loud" and they burst into "Like a Rolling Stone"....
Imagine that happening at Bloomington...Just catching a little bit of that sort of magic might make a concert worth it...
CS
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Matt,
I guess that one reason I am going is that I want to see if Dylan has an in-concert charisma that doesn't carry over to his albums.
I tried listening to Dylan for the first reason that you mentioned. I figured that he was so beloved -- to the point of mysticism and hero worship -- that there had to be something there. And I was consistently underwhelmed (the song that I really liked is Forever Young. My favorite "Dylan" song is how Stealers Wheel sounds like a Dylan impersonator in "Stuck in the Middle with You.") One of the reasons I compared Dylan to the "I guess you had to be there" kind of stories is that I feel like he is more recognized as an icon of his time than as a musician. I am sure that I would feel differently about him if I had been a Baby Boomer who had gone through the 60s, especially as Vietnam was heating up. And he deserves credit for being the first artist to use his talents to address social issues and still be a mega-star. And I admire him, much like Van Morrison, for marching to the beat of his own drum and making music that interests him,critics be damned.
But I am only a casual music fan -- as opposed to being an amateur music historian, like yourself -- so in the end, it comes down to the music. I keep broadening my horizons -- I try everything from country to rap -- but I still need music that I connect with. I generally use the iPod test for music. If I am driving back to Eau Claire, got the iPod plugged in and X comes on (whether it be an artist or a specific song), how likely I am to skip X and go to the next track? Bob Dylan generally fails that test.
CS
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CS,
So were you secretly listening to Dr. Dre and The Wu-Tang Clan when you told us your favorite artist was James Taylor?
I would say that Elvis Costello and Van Morrison are the two best artists in doing whatever the hell they want too...be it classical, Irish folk music, whatever they find interesting at the moment...
Have you had a chance to hear the new Bruce Springsteen yet? If you aren't a big fan of his work at least give "Radio Nowhere" a listen too...best song from him in a while in my opinion...
Matt
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Matt,
Thankfully, I have advanced far beyond my college days in terms of music. My iPod has everything from Run DMC to the Flying Burrito Brothers.
I go hot and cold on Springsteen. At his best (i.e. Born to Run),there is no one better. But he has put out some pretty shitty music too.
CS
