DylanOnTube-PBS/ScorseseDocumentary

Subject: RE: DylanOnTube-PBS/ScorseseDocumentary
From: GUEST,Rich
Date: 04 Oct 05 - 11:45 PM

I don't think I'd ever paid much attention to Odetta, but hearing her clip in part one of the documentary just blew my mind. Does anyone know what song that was she was singing? The one where she was making these wonderful percussive sounds while she sang? I must find this.

Subject: RE: DylanOnTube-PBS/ScorseseDocumentary
From: Little Hawk
Date: 05 Oct 05 - 12:45 AM

Odetta was marvelous.

Peter, why would you not like Dylan's voice in '75, with the Rolling Thunder Revue? He was in great form. Or on "Blood On The Tracks"? Or on "Street Legal"? Or on "Infidels"?

I know his voice is different after '66, but it certainly wasn't lacking in either strength or range until about the early to mid-90's. It was almost gone in the last concert I saw.

Subject: RE: DylanOnTube-PBS/ScorseseDocumentary
From: GUEST
Date: 05 Oct 05 - 08:47 AM

Yes, many faces are missing from "The Sixties Generation" snapshots, to be sure. Minorities and women especially. I can't think of that many women who, over the years, felt that Dylan spoke to them about much of anything. I think the so-called "Dylan phenomenon" is the construct of a white middle class male mind, and nothing more. And before you all come storming in to tell me you know just TONS of women who absolutely LOVE Dylan: there are always plenty of female appeasers to go along with the boys. Those sorts of women tend to always "love" whatever their significant male of the moment (be it a respected and beloved friend, boyfriend, father, brother, husband, etc) loves.

Not that Dylan doesn't have female fans. He does, and I've even known a few. But Dylan devotees these days seem to be mostly middle age and older men. Or at least that's what a friend of mine told me after attending a recent Dylan concert. Said he thought maybe he'd stumbled into a heavy metal gig for elders by mistake. ;-)

Subject: RE: DylanOnTube-PBS/ScorseseDocumentary
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 05 Oct 05 - 09:17 AM

I would not generalize about women so much guest.

I don't think it is unusual that people gravitate toward music from someone of their own gender. I would say I know more women who were Joni Mitchell fans then my male friends. I think we tend to follow music that speaks to us personally, and often it is hard to relate to the feelings being expressed by an artist of the opposite sex.   That doesn't mean we don't learn and experience their music, it just isn't something that we cling to.

Back in the 60's I was in middle school. We had an art teacher that would allow the students to bring in albums while we worked on our projects.   There was one girl in our class who would always bring in Bob Dylan albums. It was not a case of teen idols like those that were bringing in Beatle and Rolling Stones albums.   At that age, I was just a sponge - usually listening to whatever was on the radio or being offered by Ed Sullivan.   I do remember being struck by the words and Dylan's delivery.    Sure his voice was rough, but I don't think the power would have been there if a vocalist like Perry Como or the like tried to sing the song.   

No one is being forced to like Dylan.   I do find it interesting that MOST of the Dylan detractors in this thread tend to show up as an anonymous guest. That speaks volumes.

Subject: RE: DylanOnTube-PBS/ScorseseDocumentary
From: number 6
Date: 05 Oct 05 - 10:25 AM

I'm a very big fan of Dylan. I admire his artistry (and his singing voice) to the up most. My peers, my outlook at that time in the 60's, and somewhat still to this day reflect that liberal image. That very image that is displayed by the media these days, giving a perception of that was what the 60's were completely about. But I have to agree with Guest. I remember vividly that we were definitely in the minority (my peers and I) in our outlook on liberalism, philosophy, art and 'rejection of the then rules and mores of society'. We were the outlaws of society. We were the outlaws that Dylan was reaching to.

Dylan certainly did speak to us, but he was not speaking for a large portion of the western world population. Don't forget, a majority of women did not work and those who did were generally relegated to the 2nd class jobs. They accepted it at that time. Let's face it, Dylan's voice couldn't match the smoothness and romance of Jonny Mathis. It wasn't until the 70's that they began to see the light, and the source of this light was certainly not the songs of Dylan.

He was not heard by the Afro Americans. Don't think all segregation was specific to the American south (another false perception of the media), there was (and still is) a large population 'caged' (thank you Randy Newman for that expression) in the ghettos of every major city in the U.S. These people in the 60's were venting their anger and frustration in violent riots in Detroit, Newark, and L.A. Let's face it, they were not and could not relate to some white middleclass kid with a hillbilly voice.

Dylan's songs did not reach the majority of the male population from the Midwest, and the industrial centres who were putting their lives on the line for their country. For a war they thought was just. Dylan was a hippy, he represented everything that was not God, country and the values of hard blue collar work

It is these people I have mentioned above whose faces are missing form that old photo of the sixties.

sIx

Subject: RE: DylanOnTube-PBS/ScorseseDocumentary
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 05 Oct 05 - 10:33 AM

the faces aren't missing, it just depends on which photo album you are looking at.

Subject: RE: DylanOnTube-PBS/ScorseseDocumentary
From: number 6
Date: 05 Oct 05 - 10:58 AM

Yes there are other phot albums to be looked at, but there only is one sitting on the coffe table. ... the sixties will always be remebered for love-ins, happenings, Woodstock, anti-war protests ... and yes the civil rights movements will be in that photo, but always with a perception of the south.

Not everyone was a 'hippy', women did not have rights, segregation was not fully eliminated.

sIx

Subject: RE: DylanOnTube-PBS/ScorseseDocumentary
From: Chris in Wheaton
Date: 05 Oct 05 - 11:17 AM

the 60's didn't really hit the mainstream until the 70's - and then got lost in self-absorbtion - like Our Hero
my take -
more interesting songs than Irving Berlin's
less talented than Gershwin
worse actor than Edd Kookie Byrnes

Chris in Wheaton

Subject: RE: DylanOnTube-PBS/ScorseseDocumentary
From: Don Firth
Date: 05 Oct 05 - 12:18 PM

GUEST, Rich, I agree, Odetta is fantastic!

I taped a repeat of the Dylan special. I haven't had a chance to watch it yet, but I'm pretty sure the song Odetta was singing was a chain gang song called "Take This Hammer." The first verse goes like this:

Take this hammer (WHUP!), carry it to the captain (WHUP!)
Take this hammer (WHUP!), carry it to the captain (WHUP!)
Take this hammer (WHUP!), carry it to the captain (WHUP!)
Tell 'im I'm gone (WHUP!)! Tell 'im I'm gone (WHUP!)!

There are a whole bunch of verses to this (DT gives a few verses HERE), and a lot of the verses were improvised, much like those of a sea chantey. The percussive "WHUP" or "WHOP" in the song was the grunt as the prisoner swung the hammer or pick-axe. Best Loved American Folk Songs (also published under the title Folk Song U. S. A.) by John and Alan Lomax has a song called "Rainbow 'Round My Shoulder," with essentially the same tune and a lot of the same verses—and more than likely, it's merely a variation of the same song. The first verse goes

I've got a rainbow (WHUP!) 'round my shoulder (WHUP!) [3 times]
But it ain't gonna rain (WHUP!). No, it ain't gonna rain (WHUP!).

The "rainbow" is the flash of the sun on the hammer-head or pick-axe.

I hope this helps.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: DylanOnTube-PBS/ScorseseDocumentary
From: Peter T.
Date: 05 Oct 05 - 04:55 PM

I think it is possible to be the voice of a generation without people knowing it at the time, or without unanimity -- Beethoven is the voice of the beginning of the 19th century, though there were certainly lots of Austro-Hungarians who would have disagreed if asked.

I don't think Dylan was the voice of his generation, because there were lots of other "voices" at the time -- the fascinating thing is that there were so many at one time.   Perhaps the Zeitgeist just was so full it burbled up in many people.

I think if there was a voice it was the Beatles. And that was partly a kind of accident of timing, everyone fixated on few TV channels, the death of Kennedy so recent, etc. -- if you were in America in February 1964, there was no doubt that the earth shook, and kept on shaking!! Dylan himself says that the Beatles changed everything. Then he turned around and did it to them -- which is schematically true, but the truth is that the Beatles were everything, and Dylan was an interesting phenomenon to 90% of those who had ever heard of him which was not a lot of people, the recent hype notwithstanding. "Like A Rolling Stone" did not change everything: "She Loves You" did.

yours,

Peter T.

Subject: RE: DylanOnTube-PBS/ScorseseDocumentary
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 05 Oct 05 - 05:54 PM

a majority of women did not work

Meaning that unless it's waged employment it's not work? By which definition an enormous chunk of the world's population over the ages, men as well as wome, have never worked.

I know that's drifting the thread, but it annoys me when I come across people using that lazy and innacurate way of talking, and the last few days I've kept on coming across people in the media doing it.

Subject: RE: DylanOnTube-PBS/ScorseseDocumentary
From: GUEST,Bo in KY
Date: 03 Jan 06 - 01:28 AM

I got this DVD and the "scrapbook" as a Christmas present and, having missed the PBS airing a few months ago, just watched it the other night. As one who was busy being born in the timeframe of the documentary, and thus an ankle-biter in folk music, I was awed and amazed by Dylan's story. The one thing that jumped out at me, though, was sheer number of classic, brilliant songs he wrote, and styles he went through, in .... 5-6 years???!!!! He must have been a man posessed, or had a hyperactive muse, or something....

I also have to wonder how all of this poetry with allusions ("stealing"?) and musical references could have come from a man who a few years before was an isolated teen-ager in a tiny Minnesota town. It's almost like the Shakespeare thing - how could he have known so much, regardless of who he was hanging out with? How could he have anticipated musical directions years, even decades, in advance?

It was curious that beyond the first few minutes there is no mention of his family. While I don't subscribe to the "child abuse" conjecture of an earlier poster, I do think the child is father to the man. Was Dylan ever a child?? Apparently not, according to this film of his "early years". What happened to his parents - did he even contact them again after taking off for NY?? I assume that he was an only child, as there is never any mention of siblings, but does anyone know??

Just wondering ... this moving film got me thinking and got me inspired!!   

Shalom,   Bo

Subject: RE: DylanOnTube-PBS/ScorseseDocumentary
From: John O'L
Date: 03 Jan 06 - 01:46 AM

There is a little about his parents, aunts & uncles in his autobiogrphy 'Chronicles', but not much. I think he regards his life as being
(a) The part to which the public is entitled, and
(b) The part to which it is not entitled.

Regarding his amazing output at that time, it has been suggested that he went 'down to the crossroads'...
It wouldn't surprise me if he did.

Subject: RE: DylanOnTube-PBS/ScorseseDocumentary
From: Dave Sutherland
Date: 03 Jan 06 - 03:19 PM

Thr Robert Shelton book "No Direction Home" has quite a bit in about his parents Abe and Beatrice plus his brother David. A more recent publication, Howard Sounes "Down The Highway" also features plenty about his family