I know I was meant to blog about a crazy story during my time in Holland - but I haven't finished (or started!) it, so, I'm going to blog about someone worthy of blogging about, Bob Dylan.
I took my Mum to see Bob Dylan back in April - and we had a hoot! Mum and Dad grew up listening to Bobby in the 60s and 70s and I bummed their cds and got hooked when I was a teen. In May, Rolling Stone celebrated Bobby's 70th birthday by listing their favourite Dylan songs - it's pretty (really) decent. Here is the link for it, http://www1.rollingstone.com/dylan/
Fast forward to June - I was flying back to Sydney from the US and was discussing the highs and lows of life with the fella who was sitting next to me, Caleb. Caleb was a 4 year old boy who was flying to Sydney to see his Daddy! After a while Caleb grew tired of talking to me so he watched the movie Tangled, for the fourth time (he would watch it no less than 5 times!) So I was left to my little own self, and so I pulled out my pad of paper and started writing - and this is what I wrote,
Cam's Top 10 Dylan Songs
10. Tangled Up in Blue
For those of you out there who can't afford all of Bobby's albums, I feel you. So maybe you were like me and bought his Essential album? There's no shame in that - it's taken me a couple years to buy 7 of his many, many albums. On the second disc of this Essential album is a song called, Tangled Up in Blue. This was one of the first songs I listened to when I bought the album, and I think two months went by before I dared to venture off and listen to another song on the cd!
It's the opening scene of the song which draws me in, and shuts the door so that I can't listen to another song.
""Early one mornin’ the sun was shinin’
I was layin’ in bed
Wond’rin’ if she’d changed at all
If her hair was still red
Her folks they said our lives together
Sure was gonna be rough
They never did like Mama’s homemade dress
Papa’s bankbook wasn’t big enough
And I was standin’ on the side of the road
Rain fallin’ on my shoes
Heading out for the East Coast
Lord knows I’ve paid some dues gettin’ through
Tangled up in blue"
And, well, I just had to know what happened next!
9. The Ballad of Frankie Lee and Judas Priest
I haven't found many people who are familiar with this song, even less who are interested in it. But ya know, even though it sounds like just another sing-along la-la-la song, there is a lot more to it. There is a lesson to learn from the lives of Frankie Lee and Judas Priest, but unlike Aesop's Fables, you have to decide what that lesson is.
So I reckon sit down and listen to it, and if you truly do listen - you wont be able to walk away before you listen to it again! That's why it makes the 10.
8. Desolation Row
Wait, wait, wait! How can I have this song from the Highway 61 Revisited album and not Like A Rolling Stone?! Well - I get tired of seeing Dylan lists and Rolling Stone being a sure thing at #1. So this song will represent Highway 61 Revisited. But don't read my words wrong, this song can stand on it's own! Let me show you,
It's in the 11 minutes of masterful writing and meaning,
Cinderella, she seems so easy
“It takes one to know one,” she smiles
And puts her hands in her back pockets
Bette Davis style
And in comes Romeo, he’s moaning
“You Belong to Me I Believe”
And someone says, “You’re in the wrong place my friend
You better leave”
And the only sound that’s left
After the ambulances go
Is Cinderella sweeping up
On Desolation Row
Yeah, this song stands on its own!
7. Don't Think Twice, It's Alright
There's an ever growing part of me that wants to personally thank the ladies who have broken Bobby's heart over the years. I know that sounds awful, but it's only because of his heartbreak that we get a companion for the lonesome hours of our lives.
I remember sitting on a plane, I was moving to Sydney. And I was playing this song while I thought about the girl I'd never see again. And it ain't fun, but that connection we form between music and emotion is priceless.
And even just last year (5 years after I sat on that plane) I sat on a park bench and sang those words,
I’m walkin’ down that long, lonesome road, babe
Where I’m bound, I can’t tell
But goodbye’s too good a word, gal
So I’ll just say fare thee well
I ain’t sayin’ you treated me unkind
You could have done better but I don’t mind
You just kinda wasted my precious time
But don’t think twice, it’s all right
They always are worth the time though!
6. A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall
If I ever have children then one day (when the time is right) I'm going to sit them down and play them this song. There ought to be another verse added to the book of Proverbs,
Wise is the man who knows A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall.
5. When He Returns
A Dylan mate (who is also a Christian) calls Every Grain of Sand his favourite Dylan worship song. He said he wants it played at his funeral. Well don't tell him I said this, but I think he's got the wrong Dylan worship song. This is my Every Grain of Sand - and I want it played at my funeral.
Surrender your crown on this blood-stained ground, take off your mask
He sees your deeds, He knows your needs even before you ask
How long can you falsify and deny what is real?
How long can you hate yourself for the weakness you conceal?
Of every earthly plan that be known to man, He is unconcerned
He’s got plans of His own to set up His throne
When He returns
I still get goosebumps listening.
4. Visions of Johanna
I'm not sure who Johanna is (I'm not even sure Dylan reveals in song who she is) but I know two things -
1. I know who my Johanna is
and
2. I sure have got those visions that conquer my mind... and kept me up past the dawn.
This song is a bit of a enigma to me. It starts out so serene, the kind of sound you'd listen to as you lay in a park somewhere and gaze up at the fluffy clouds. But then you listen and think to yourself, doesn't sound like Bobby is enjoying himself.
Is this the meaning of the gift and the curse?
I dunno, you listen and tell me.
3. Subterranean Homesick Blues
This was the first Dylan song I fell for - and it always gets me going!
You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows!
I'd yell that line from the song constantly. And then I'd break off into an impromptu dance! It was love at first listening. Bobby got me, and I got everything Bobby was saying. A lot of people ask me, "how can you understand what he's saying?" and I reply,
"well, what's he saying to you??"
2. The Times They Are A-Changing
There was a young man of 17 who once sat in the waiting room of the Juvenile Justice centre near Central Station in the city. He sat waiting to check in with his probation officer. He sat listening to a song which was playing from a radio sitting on the table next to him.
The line it is drawn
The curse it is cast
The slow one now
Will later be fast
As the present now
Will later be past
The order is rapidly fadin’
And the first one now will later be last
For the times they are a-changin’
And then the song ended, leaving the 17 year old to nod his head in agreement and think, one day all this here will also be the past.
You have got to tip your hat to Mr. Dylan for this one - with only an acoustic guitar, a harmonica and a groany voice, he spoke the words of an entire generation.
*DRUM ROLL...
1. Blind Willie McTell
People say With God On Our Side is Dylan writing the history of his nation. That may be so - but if you are going to say that then I reckon you should slide Blind Willie along side it. From the first men and women who were chained and thrown onto the ships off the coast of Africa, to that man who dared to dream on the steps of D.C., Blind Willie McTell is singing your story.
Listen to the words, let them soak in with the piano, and then picture Willie in your mind - whips cracking on him, plantation owners mocking him, constantly witnessing power and greed and corruptible sin. And then it ends, no resolution, no happy ending. It's only in Hollywood that a man who has endured such pain must have a happy ending.
Dylan knows this ain't Hollywood.
See them big plantations burning
Hear the cracking of the whips
Smell that sweet magnolia blooming
See the ghosts of slavery ships
I can hear them tribes a-moaning
Hear that undertaker’s bell
Nobody can sing the blues
Like Blind Willie McTell
