Author Archives: TonyAttwood

  by Jochen Markhorst When John Kiernan returns home from shopping, he sees two strangers standing in front of his house. He is not particularily alarmed. “Neil Young fan alert,” he says to his wife Patti Regan. Kiernan and Patti … Continue reading →

By Tony Attwood This is a song by Jackie Leven and Bob Dylan set to a melody that combines (at least to my ears) elements of “One too many mornings” and “Times they are a changing”.  However the story presented … Continue reading →

  By Larry Fyffe Jean-Jacques Rousseau utters his famous cry that man is born free but is everywhere in chains, and though he idealizes the ‘noble savage’, he remains a man of Reason. Oliver Goldsmith loosens the chains that bind … Continue reading →

by Jochen Markhorst They’ll stone ya when you’re tryin’ to keep your seat … When Dylan sings these words, it is only ten years after December 1, 1955, the day that Rosa Parks in a bus in Montgomery refuses to … Continue reading →

by Larry Fyffe Usually containing the word ‘like’ or ‘as’, a simile is a trope that creates a vivid comparison between an object (or action), and a different thing that has some similar aspect. Bob Dylan constructs lots of similes … Continue reading →

By Mike Johnson (Kiwipoet) ‘Rosemary combed her hair and took a cabbage into town’ No. She didn’t. She took a carriage into town, but it’s easy enough to mishear Dylan. He has a way of bending words, and while he … Continue reading →

 A kind of quest… By Aaron Galbraith I was having a read through Tony’s 2015 review for If You Gotta Go (Go Now) and it spurred me to write a quick look at several of the more interesting versions of the … Continue reading →

By Tony Attwood First off, let me reiterate – I’m an English guy who has visited the USA many times, but don’t consider myself to be immersed in its history and traditions.   I do my best, but the basic … Continue reading →

by Jochen Markhorst “One of my deficiencies is my voice sounds sincere,” Paul Simon says in the interview with Rolling Stone (April 2011). “I’ve tried to sound ironic. I don’t. I can’t. Dylan, everything he sings has two meanings. He’s … Continue reading →

by Larry Fyffe Which side of the big Titanic metaphor is singer/songwriter Bob Dylan on? Do his song lyrics reflect a Hermetic view of the cosmos, or a Gnostic one? It’s a question many an examiner of Dylan’s music ask, … Continue reading →

Tell Me That It Isn’t True    by Jochen Markhorst “I Heard It Through The Grapevine” is the first song of the legendary Motown duo Barrett Strong and Norman Whitfield and an indestructible classic right away. No chance hit either; … Continue reading →

  by Mike Johnson (Kiwipoet) ‘I heard the roar of a wave that could drown the whole world’ I’m writing this at dawn on January 3. There’s a new moon, bright and hard, with the shadow of the old clearly … Continue reading →

by Tony Attwood Recently, with the help of Jochen I started musing on songs that Dylan has commented on – songs that he didn’t write but which he particularly likes.   So far I’ve looked at two of them in … Continue reading →

by Larry Fyffe Previously in this series: Dylan and Rudyard Kipling appears here (Part 1) I Don’t Believe You: Bob Dylan And Rudyard Kipling (Part II) The Victorian perspective of poet and writer Rudyard Kipling has a lasting influence on Western … Continue reading →

  by Jochen Markhorst The world is a play scene Each plays his role and gets his share In the Dutch speaking world well-known poetry verses from Joost van den Vondel from 1637, but even at that time they were … Continue reading →

By Tony Attwood https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1em7qHwYyI4 “Baby coming back from the dead” is a song that doesn’t get a listing in Heylin at all, but is reported as being recorded in 1985.  It turned up on the bootleg album “After the Empire” … Continue reading →

. Part one of Dylan and Rudyard Kipling appears here. by Larry Fyffe When singer/songwriter Bob Dylan sources a poem to augment his song lyrics, he often pays a tribute to the author of that poem. Whether consciously or subconsciously, … Continue reading →

by Jochen Markhorst Herodotus tells in Book III of his Histories about the power-lusting empire-builder Cambyses, the king who wanted to expand his Persian empire. In the south of Egypt he recruits Ethiopian-speaking Ichthyophagi, ‘fish eaters’ from the Elephantine Island … Continue reading →

By Tony Attwood “Nowhere to go” also known as “When everybody comes to town” is listed in many places as a Bob Dylan – George Harrison co-composition which was in the long list of songs to go onto All Things … Continue reading →

by Jochen Markhorst “Once the record was released, I heard all the Dylan comparisons, so I steered away from it. But the lyrics and spirit of Greetings came from an unself-conscious place.” (Springsteen on his first LP Greetings From Ashbury … Continue reading →