OT- Happy Birthday Bob Dylan

[mikershoein]

I'm gonna post cause Mikershoein did.
Saw Dylan in Pittsburgh in 1979...great live performance

Some of my favorite musicians love him, I'm just not a fan. With that being said "hurricane " is a solid tune

 

[FanuSanu52]

But that is why he is overrated. He sang what he wrote, and his singing is awful.

His myth is much bigger than his talent, which is why as time goes on, future generations will forget him. Other acts from his generation, this won't happen.

Yep, the world is sure to forget about Bob Dylan, along with "The Beatles" and "Elvis" and "Mozart". All highly forgettable.

The fact that he has an awful voice is a testament to what a musical force he is - who else could have ridden that voice to the career Dylan's had? No one said you have to like him, but the overrated talk is ridiculous. Even if his actual singing disappears over the next century, his influence and songwriting will live on.

 

[SkilletHead2]

Not sure what you mean by "doesn't take himself too seriously." Phil Ochs was a radical, not a liberal, And "Love me, I'm a Liberal" was not a humorous jibe, but a scathing indictment of liberals....at least a certain type of liberal. He was way more serious about these issues than Dylan. And he didn't just write songs about these things like Dylan. Ochs was an activist.

Kbee, "didn't take himself too seriously" was a dumb way to put it. What I was trying to get at was the notion that I always felt that Dylan and Lennon conveyed they were superior to everybody else, and to me, Ochs communicated more of a sense of an old union Joe Hill type of guy. There But for Fortune has a real sense of "we could all be there." And Draft Dodger Rag is anti-war but really humorous. I disagree with you on Love Me I'm a Liberal. I think he's pushing people to think, not making a scathing indictment.

His intro to that song is funny and reminds me of something Professor Marvin Bressler used to say in his into to sociology lectures (back in the late 60's when Ochs was writing):

(This is how I remember it) Young scholars, let me tell you about the incredible Jackie Robinson. I loved watching him play in Ebbets Field. Jackie would get on first base either through a hit or a walk, and then he would take his lead off first. He would crouch down, spread his arms out in either direction and start doing this (and then Bressler, who was a little bald guy, would start sort of dancing up and down while doing 'jazz hands' -- it was hilarious). Now, if you were the opposing pitcher, you would go into your stretch and then you would look over your shoulder at Robinson (he imitates the pitcher); it would appear to you that Robinson was going to his left and to his right at the same time, when in fact, HE WAS GOING NOWHERE AT ALL, AND THAT, YOUNG SCHOLARS, IS A LIBERAL.

Marvin Bressler was a great, great professor. Miss him. Still address my classes today down in New Zealand as "young scholars" in honour of him.