Bob’s Transformations: Things have changed – or is he just having a laugh?

Details of a few articles that explore a similar theme are listed at the end

By Tony Attwood

“Things Have Changed” was performed just over 1000 times by Bob and his band between March 2000 and September 2024.  And what is interesting here is that although Bob made some changes to the song itself over that time, he retained the essence of the piece throughout all those performances.

The central theme that, “I used to care but things have changed” is always there, and there is no attempt to turn it into a new concept.  Indeed such a change may not even be possible although Bob has done this before with a number of songs (and I am not resisting the temptation yet again to put in my favourite example of this ability, at the end of this piece).

Now of course I have not gone back and listened to all 1000+ performances of “Things”, and even if I had recordings of them all (which I don’t and I am not sure anyone does) I am certain that after 83 hours of “Things have changed” spread over however many days it would take me to focus on them all, I would be left even more bemused than when I started.

So I’ve chosen a few examples to suggest that perhaps perversely in a song which carries the word “changed” in the title, the number of changes made by Bob over the years is not nearly as great as that which we find in many other songs.  And then, of course, I added my example of what is to me the greatest song change of the entire Never Ending Tour and all that came before and since.

But this issue raises questions, such as “Why has he not changed the song even more?” and leading on from that, is this a deliberate artistic policy on Bob’s part, or is there something inherent in some songs that stops them being changed?

Here is the original “Things have changed” from 2000, which of course you’ll know, but having started this journey, I found I wanted to hear where everything started from….

Today, I’m taken by certain lines, and struck by odd issues; many I am sure being totally irrelevant to everything, but still they strike me.  Such as the rhyme of “champagne” with “train”.  Did anyone ever do that before?   And the oddity of “sapphire tinted skies”?

Here I am indebted to Larry Ffye who wrote the article “Shattering the glass of mirrors” on this site for pointing out therein that the phrase comes from “Lines Written among the Euganean Hills” by Percy Bysshe Shelley.  His rhyme incidentally is “skies” and “rise”.  Dylan went with “skies” and “eyes”.  (That’s not important, but I just noticed it).

Pointing with inconstant motion
From the altar of dark ocean
To the sapphire-tinted skies;
As the flames of sacrifice
From the marble shrines did rise,
Dylan, as you will recall, gave us
Got white skin, got assassin's eyesI'm looking up into the sapphire tinted skiesI'm well dressed, waiting on the last train

Now, I have to say I find a trip back a quarter of a century to 2000 is quite a shock.   Not because the song is not immediately recognisable, but because the feel of that slight lilt to the music, is so different from the way I think of the song now.

But then even within the same year, Dylan himself could change the melody and hence the entire feel of the song.  And what I find so fascinating in the video below (from a gig I was actually at, so it has a special meaning for me) is the way Dylan himself looks and stands.  He is singing about the fact that at any minute everything is going to break loose, but he is just standing there.

 

Now let us move on to 2012 – (and you’ll probably have to adjust the volume on your computer as these recordings all come from different sources of course).  And by 2012, as we might expect, the key is different – but then so is everything else.  The accompaniment, the singing, the emphasis on individual words, the instrumental break – just listen to that short passage at the opening, and between the verses.

Plus that strange (or at least to me strange) emphasis on the last word of each line, for no apparent reason.

Yet somehow it works.  To me this sounds like fun, a twisting, tangling re-thinking of the lyrics.  Even the little three chord interlude between the verses is unexpected and fun…

And beyond everything, I’m drawn to the line, “I’ve been trying to get as far away from myself as I can.”  Somehow with this version; this seems to me to be the absolute key to the song.   I am totally drawn to the thought that Dylan is indeed walking away from himself far more at this point than he even contemplated when he wrote and first recorded the song.  Although, maybe I am reading far too much into one performance.

But certainly this crazy character in the song tells us he can

"Feel like falling in love with the first woman I meetPutting her in a wheelbarrow and wheeling her down the street"

And then if you are listening to the recording of this version you cannot but be amazed by the harmonica solo before, “I hurt easy, I just don’t show it” and the use of the instrument thereafter.  Especially the harmonica playing that proceeds, “I’m not that eager to make a mistake”  And then of course, that fabulous coda.

To me that harmonica, especially in that extended coda is portraying that “hurt easy” line.  And indeed at this point in my life, having read so much about Bob, having been lucky enough to see quite a few concerts, I am drawn back to that.   For Bob has indeed experimented so much with his music, and has repeatedly been shot down seemingly for the great crime of being a brilliant artist who experiments, rather than be satisfied with what he has already done.

I move on to 2009, and again I am taken by the fact that these changes made to this song (and I suspect every other song) are not changes for the sake of it.  For as often as he moves a song somewhere else Bob can also take us back to its origins.   This is 2009…

There is a sense of marching along, emphasising the beats, rather than the usual approach of coming in half a beat before the bar, and letting the vocals and the instruments sway against each other.

Just listen to the instrumental that starts at 2’22”.  There is almost a feel of marching along; there is no swing in that lead guitar either; it just knocks out the beats.   And he keeps doing it.  Listen to the vocals around 3’10” with “hot to touch” and the lines that follow.

Yes Bob diverts slightly with the falling in love and wheelbarrow lines.   But around 3’40” he’s back to the marching approach.  And I am thinking, “Bob Dylan” and “marching”   Of all the contrasting concepts there could be those two are surely among the most extreme.

But this is not happening by chance.  Listen to the accompaniment throughout that performance and you’ll find those solid beats are there.  Indeed by 5’15” Bob is still there emphasising the one-word-per-beat approach that gives the feel of the march.

So what is this?   Is it, “Hey guys we’ve never played this song as a march before,” or is there a message within?  A message that says, “No matter what I say or do, people will stick with their same old-fashioned interpretations”?   Or in fact, is he just having a laugh?

For me, no he is not.  Because this is the man who by this stage we know could transform one of his own songs that really didn’t say too much to anyone, into one of the greatest moments of all from the tour.  And yes I keep on saying this about this performance, and you are probably bored out of your mind with me repeating this (assuming of course that you have been reading my ramblings all the way through – and if that is the case, let me know when you are next in my part of the world and I’ll buy you a drink).  But then again, if I don’t point this else, who else will?

Since I first heard this when Mike provided it in July 2023, it has been right up at the top of my selection for the best moment ever of the Never Ending Tour.  Best not only because it was so unexpected, but best because of its lyrical and musical quality.  I’m sorry if you are fed up with me promoting this moment from the Tour, but well, it’s one of the few privileges one gets from being not only the writer but also the publisher.

Elsewhere in Bob’s Transformations…

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