Since 2008 Untld Dylan has published over 4000 articles about Bob Dylan, his music and his writing, and we continue adding to this number at a rate of around one a day.
Over these almost 20 years, we have not only considered every one of his 500+ compositions, we have also considered them from both a literary and a musical point of view, looking at everything from the background of the composition to its impact on others, from its musical structure to its instrumentation, to its use of language to the influence it has had on others.
Untold Dylan thus considers Dylan’s place in the musical and literary culture of western civilisation as well as tracing Dylan’s own evolution as a creative artist, noting who and what has influenced his work, and the influence he has had on others both in terms of the language used within his songs, and the way in which he constructs the musical accompaniment he gives to those lyrics.
Further, we have also given much consideration to the way in which Dylan himself has then reconstructed and developed his compositions – a unique feature within his work in a world in which the stars of popular music have generally sought to reproduce the way songs are treated on record, when they are performed on stage.
Because of this on-going review of Dylan’s work in terms of both lyrics and music, we feel this site represents one of the most comprehensive analyses of Dylan’s work – and of course with over 300 new articles being added each year, we are pleased to see it being used as a source of information for anyone interested in both Dylan’s use of language and his use of music.
Our view that we have to some degree broken new ground by considering both the music and the lyrics of Dylan’s work in our commentaries will, of course, bring in counter-commentaries, and we would welcome this, as it is naturally the way in which we will ourselves learn more about Dylan’s work.
We remain convinced that Bob Dylan has revolutionised what popular culture, in terms of songs, actually means, and in this way has left his mark forever on the entire concept of popular culture and through that on an entire generation.
Tony Attwood C.Ed., B.A. M.Phil (Lond), F.Inst.A.M.
Publisher, Untold Dylan.