{"id":22430,"date":"2020-06-20T18:24:55","date_gmt":"2020-06-20T22:24:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/panm360.com\/records\/rough-and-rowdy-ways\/"},"modified":"2020-06-22T10:45:27","modified_gmt":"2020-06-22T14:45:27","slug":"rough-and-rowdy-ways-bob-dylan","status":"publish","type":"records","link":"https:\/\/panm360.com\/en\/records\/rough-and-rowdy-ways-bob-dylan\/","title":{"rendered":"Rough and Rowdy Ways"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

On \u201cDesolation Row\u201d, in 1965, Bob Dylan dragged us for 11 minutes through a Felliniesque menagerie, where Einstein was disguised as Robin Hood. Two years earlier in Dallas, John F. Kennedy had been \u201cshot like a dog in broad daylight\u201d, as Dylan claims in \u201cMurder Most Foul\u201d, a torrential 17-minute lament featured on Rough and Rowdy Ways<\/em> (a title derived from \u201cMy Rough and Rowdy Ways\u201d, a 1929 song by Jimmie Rodgers), the first collection of fresh songs by the Bard of Duluth since Tempest<\/em>, in 2012. It is now almost 57 years after the fateful parade, and Dylan looks back on this turning point in his country’s history, the beginning of a \u201clong putrefaction\u201d that remains ongoing. So, ten new songs from Dylan, including some very dense ones like \u201cMurder Most Foul\u201d, equals hundreds of hours of exegesis for dylanologists of all stripes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI Contain Multitudes\u201d is not a variation of the verse \u201cmy name is Legion, for we are many\u201d, but rather a laudatory ballad \u2013 like \u201cMy Own Version of You\u201d \u2013 in which Dylan spins reminiscences. \u201cFalse Prophet\u201d, \u201cGoodbye Jimmy Reed\u201d, and \u201cCrossing the Rubicon\u201d are carnal and cerebral blues. The tune of \u201cI’ve Made Up My Mind to Give Myself to You\u201d is modelled on \u201cBarcarolle\u201d from Jacques Offenbach\u2019s Tales of Hoffmann. \u201cBlack Rider\u201d is an indictment, in the form of a serenade, against a doppelg\u00e4nger. \u201cMother of Muses\u201d is a gospel from the old countries. \u201cKey West (Pirate Philosopher)\u201d is a sailor’s shanty in which Bob says he was born on the wrong side of the railroad tracks, \u201clike Ginsberg, Corso and Kerouac\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dylan, as he has often reminded his interviewers in the past, is neither a guru nor a messiah, nor a prophet, nor a philosopher, although he was, or still is, a bit of all of those things, in spite of himself. Dylan is first and foremost a writer. And a musician, certainly, perhaps incidentally. But his art, which he has pushed to heights that very few of his peers will ever manage to reach, is that of the chronicler. His autobiographical goodie bag Chronicles: Volume One<\/em> can be read as one listens to his songs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rough and Rowdy Ways<\/em> is a literary achievement. And musical, because the Bard’s accompanists \u2013 \u00fcber-veterans Tony Garnier and Charlie Sexton as well as the whole troupe \u2013 are devilishly familiar with their boss’s sometimes dishevelled modus operandi, and their nuances magnify the congruence of the words. Dylan’s voice, so moving in its bitterness, remains strong, like the movement of the ocean. Robert Zimmerman, better known as Bob Dylan, turned 79 years old on May 24.<\/p>\n\n\n\n