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Recent articles
- The Philosphy of Modern Song from “Jesse James” to Po Boy
- No Nobel Prize for Music: creativity dries up…the descent towards the basement
- Desolation Row – the 5th stanza
- Bob Dylan and US History 9
- Bob Dylan: the concert series: Macron, Georgia, 27 October 2018: top quality throughout
- Bob Dylan: why would you do this?
- The Philosophy of Modern Song: Money Honey and the material world
- No Nobel Prize for Music: I Want You
- Dylan’s “Night Watch”
Author Archives: Tony Attwood
Mr Tambourine Man: early thoughts and the wonderful 1964 festival version
By Tony Attwood This is the first review of Tambourine Man on this site. For reasons that I now cannot properly recall I decided to do a second review a few years later, which you can find here. This article … Continue reading
Posted in Bringing it all Back Home
6 Comments
On the road again: Bob Dylan’s forgotten post-modernist 12 bar. Its origins, its re-invention
By Tony Attwood This review re-written July 2018 with links to the original “On the road again” and the Nas and Jack White revival of that, plus videos from other artists who have re-worked Dylan’s song. Having delivered a straight … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
4 Comments
Bob Dylan’s “It’s alright, ma (I’m only bleeding)”. The masterpiece of the era
by Tony Attwood You cannot be a Dylan fan without knowing this song inside out, and all the way round again. But perhaps what many of us have not done is listened to the version on “Before the Flood” and … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
12 Comments
Bob Dylan: The perfect “Like a Rolling Stone” recording. Energy and aggression.
By Tony Attwood We have all heard Like a Rolling Stone so many times on recordings, and of course at the end of the Never Ending Tour gigs, that it is hard to go back and get a new perspective … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
17 Comments
What was it you wanted? Bob Dylan’s song and a version by Willie Nelson
What was it you wanted Reviewed and analysed by Tony Attwood A slow introduction, and from line one we go; a song in a minor key packed with minor chords, revealing once more the lost and bemused individual. If you … Continue reading
Posted in Oh Mercy
19 Comments
Dylan’s “Everything is Broken.” How a short track transmuted into post-modernist chill.
By Tony Attwood This review updated July 2018 with the addition of live videos and further thoughts on the song itself. I’ve also added links at the end to various articles from Untold Dylan which explore the theme of the … Continue reading
Posted in Oh Mercy, Uncategorized
7 Comments
“The Man in the Long Black Coat.” Bob Dylan reaches the depths, and then descends some more.
By Tony Attwood This review updated 28 May 2018 with addition of examples of Dylan’s song and of the folk song that was said to have inspired it, plus additional commentary on the timing and meaning. This song in 12/8 … Continue reading
Posted in Oh Mercy
22 Comments
Bob Dylan’s “Political World”: How to get hit by reality (& the 6 missing verses)
Review by Tony Attwood This review updated July 2018, with some commentary on the missing verses, and three videos: the official release vid, the full song with the 6 missing verses from the outtakes of the album session, and a … Continue reading
Posted in Oh Mercy, Uncategorized
12 Comments
Tell Ol’ Bill: Dylan digs deep into the song’s origins to create a brilliant film song
By Tony Attwood This review has been revised multiple times since it was first published. This update 6 July 2019. Copies of outtakes from the Tell Ol Bill sessions appear and vanish – if the ones listed are not … Continue reading
Posted in Tell Tales Signs
26 Comments
Dylan’s “John Brown”: not just the song it is the staggering performance
by Tony Attwood It is not the song “John Brown” that works so perfectly within its own context – the story of the mother proudly telling everyone her son is fighting in the war and then coming back shot to … Continue reading
Posted in MTV Unplugged (Live), The Songs
6 Comments
Dylan’s “Series of Dreams” complete with the missing verse & a brilliant alternate version.
by Tony Attwood Note: This article was Updated July 2018 with 3 recordings added including the version with the “extra” verse. But since then all the versions with the extra verse have been removed from the internet as far as … Continue reading
Posted in Bootleg Series volume 3
34 Comments
Neighborhood Bully: how not to write a song in praise of something
By Tony Attwood There is something I really don’t like about Neighbourhood Bully, despite Dylan’s assertions that it is not about Zionism. Maybe it is not. Maybe it is just about the state of Israel. I would always appreciate that … Continue reading
Posted in Infidels
45 Comments
Foot of Pride: Bob Dylan’s rambling masterpiece which tears us limb from limb
By Tony Attwood Writing the second version of this review it struck me what a curious mixture of songs Bob wrote in 1983. Here is the sequence of composing, as far as it can be put together, around the time … Continue reading
Posted in Bootleg Series volume 3, The Songs
44 Comments
Standing in the doorway: a work of solemn genius from Bob Dylan
Review by Tony Attwood. Updated May 2018 with addition of this extraordinary live version of the song, and the opening verse at the end. “Time out of mind” starts just about as low as you can imagine – “Love Sick” … Continue reading
Posted in The Songs, Time out of mind
7 Comments
“When the ship comes in.” Bob Dylan as a prophet of vengeance and a better life to come.
By Tony Attwood This review updated July 2018, with the addition of one of Dylan’s rare outings for the song, and two totally different renditions linked at the end. Amidst all the moral relativism of Dylan, all the references to … Continue reading
Spanish Harlem Incident: The meanings behind Bob Dylan’s extraordinary song
By Tony Attwood This is one of Dylan’s unsung masterpieces – an extraordinary piece of music to the accompaniment of lyrics about a visit to a fortune teller / possible lover. (She’s one or the other, or both, possibly at … Continue reading
Posted in Another Side
6 Comments
Bob Dylan’s “Highlands”; its origins in Burns poetry, and a beautiful rare reworking in concert
By Tony Attwood This review updated 26 June 2018, with addition of this live version – I really would recommend a listen to these, particularly this one below Also now included are references back to the origins of the song … Continue reading
Posted in The Songs, Time out of mind
9 Comments
Lay Lady Lay: Three Bob Dylan transformations of his song & a look at the meanings.
By Tony Attwood In returning to this song I didn’t really feel I wanted to change any of the original commentary, but I did want to add a couple of live recordings as they show the power of Dylan’s reinvention. … Continue reading
See that my grave is kept clean
It is strange to think that all those years ago, my feeling about the very first Dylan album (“Bob Dylan”) was that the producer of the album had made a very odd choice as to the order of the songs. … Continue reading
Posted in Bob Dylan
2 Comments
Bob Dylan’s Maggie’s Farm. 3 very different versions; but why play it so often?
By Tony Attwood (revised March 2013 and again June 2018) Between 1965 and 2009 Bob Dylan performed Maggie’s Farm 1051 times on stage – often as an opening song; an interesting outcome for a song that was a last minute … Continue reading