OMG! What an album, Dylan is on fire.
What do you think?
28th August 2006 08:44 PM
Nellcote
Just listened to it for the 1st time, gets the Wicked Pissa!
I need to have another spin thru it
Listening to his Theme Time Radio Hour now, on XM/AOL
28th August 2006 09:03 PM
Lazy Bones
quote:Madafaka wrote:
OMG! What an album, Dylan is on fire.
What do you think?
I think tomorrow can't come fast enough!
28th August 2006 09:05 PM
pdog
It's very good.
Alicia Keyes Appreciation from his Bobness!
28th August 2006 09:27 PM
time is on my side
Like a lot of folks, I'm really looking forward to tomorrow and finally hearing the new one from Bob. It's getting rave reviews (five stars from Rolling Stone, 4 1/2 from all music guide among others) and from those that have already downloaded it from various sources.
Since I'm going to buy the CD anyway (probably the one with the bonus CD), never really felt the need to download. I'm going to be listened to it for decades to come. I can wait a few weeks.
Not sure if this has been posted but here's the review from AMG (sorry for the length):
When Bob Dylan dropped the deeply moving yet mournful and brooding Time Out of Mind in 1997, it was a rollicking rockabilly and blues record full of songs about mortality, disappointment, and dissolution. 2001 brought Love and Theft, an album steeped in blues and other folk forms that was funny, celebratory, biting, and stomping. In the five years since that set, Dylan was busy: he did everything from a Victoria's Secret commercial, to endlessly touring, to being in a couple of films Larry Charles' Masked and Anonymous and as the subject of the Martin Scorsese documentary No Direction Home to publishing the first of the purported three volumes of his cagey and rambling autobiography Chronicles, to thinking about Alicia Keys. This last comment comes from the man himself in "Thunder on the Mountain," the opening track on Modern Times, a barn-burning, raucous, and unruly blues tune that finds the old man sounding mighty feisty and gleefully agitated: "I was thinkin' 'bout Alicia Keys/Couldn't keep from cryin'/She was born in Hell's Kitchen and I was livin' down the line/I've been lookin' for her even clear through Tennessee." The drums shuffle with brushes, the piano is pumping ΰ la Jerry Lee Lewis, the bass is popping, and a slide guitar that feels like it's calling the late Michael Bloomfield back from 1966 ΰ la Highway 61 Revisited slips in and out of the ether like a ghost wanting to emerge in the flesh. Dylan's own choppy leads snarl in the break and he's letting his blues fall down like rain: "Gonna raise me an army, some tough sons of bitches/I'll recruit my army from the oldest villages/I've been to St. Herman's church and said my religious vows/I sucked the milk out of a thousand cows/I got the pork chop, she got the pie/She ain't no angel and neither am I...I did all I could/I did it right there and then/I've already confessed I don't need to confess again."
Thus begins the third part of Dylan's renaissance trilogy (thus far, y'all). Modern Times is raw, shambolic in places. Rhythms slip, time stretches and turns back on itself, and lyrics are rushed to fit into verses that won't stop coming. Dylan produced the set himself under his Jack Frost moniker, and it feels live, immediate. Its songs are humorous and cryptic, tender and snarling. What's he saying? We don't need to concern ourselves with that any more than we had to Willie Dixon talking about backdoor men or his metaphors for love and trouble, or Elmore James dusting his broom. Dylan's blues are primitive and impure. Though played by a crackerjack band, they're played with a fury as the singer wrestles down musical history and tradition as he spits in the eye of the modern world. But blues isn't the only music here. There are parlor songs such as "Spirit on the Water," where love is as heavenly and earthly a thing as exists in this life. The band swings gently and carefree, with Denny Freeman and Stu Kimball playing slippery and sometimes sloppy jazz chords as Tony Garnier's bass and George Receli's sputtering snare walk the beat. Another, "When the Deal Goes Down," makes it tempting to think of Dylan aping Bing Crosby in his gravelly snake rattle of a voice (but find someone who can phrase better). He's an unabashed fan of the old arch meanie crooner. But it just ain't Bing, because it's got that swing.
Dylan comes from the great blues and jazzman Lonnie Johnson (whose version of the Grosz and Coslow standard "Tomorrow Night" he's been playing for years in his live set). If you need further proof, look to Johnson's last recordings done in the late '50s and early '60s ("I Found a Dream" and "I'll Get Along Somehow"), or go all the way back to the early years for "Secret Emotions," and "In Love Again," cut in 1940. It is in these songs where you will find the heart of Dylan's sweet song ambition. Dylan evokes Muddy Waters in "Rollin' and Tumblin." He swipes the riff, the tune itself, and uses some of the words and adds a whole bunch of his own. Same with his use of Slim Harpo in "Someday Baby" who may have copped his riff from Muddy anyway. Those who think Dylan merely plagiarizes miss the point. Dylan is a folk musician; he uses folk forms such as blues, rock, gospel, and R&B as well as lyrics and licks and/or whatever else he can to get a song across. This tradition of borrowing and retelling goes back to the beginning of song and story. Even the title of Modern Times is a wink-eye reference to a film by Charlie Chaplin. It doesn't make him less; it makes him more because he contains all of these songs, their secret histories, and subtle nuances and labyrinthine legends; and besides, he's been around long enough to do anything he damn well pleases.
Modern Times expresses emotions and comments upon everything from love ("When the Deal Goers Down," "Beyond the Horizon") to mortality ("The Levee's Gonna Break," "Ain't Talkin") to the state of the union and world check "Workingman's Blues #2," where Dylan sings gently about the "buyin' power of the proletariat's gone down/Money's getting shallow and weak...they say low wages are reality if we want to compete at all." But in the next breath he's put his "cruel weapons on the shelf" and invites his beloved to sit on his knee, telling her she means more to him than himself. It's a poignant midtempo ballad that walks the line between the political stories of Cisco Houston and Woody Guthrie to the love songs of Stephen Foster and Leadbelly and early doo wop records. One can feel both darkness and light struggling inside the singer for dominance. But in his carnal and spiritual imagery and rakish honesty, he's not giving in to either side. This is a storyteller, a pilgrim, who's seen it all, has lived it all, and found it all wanting; he's found some infinitesimal take on the truth that he's holding on to with a vengeance. In the midst of changes that are foreboding, Modern Times is the sound of an ambivalent Psalter coming in from the storm, dirty, bloodied, but laughing at himself because he knows nobody will believe him anyway.
Dylan digs deep into the pocket of American song past in "Nettie Moore," a 19th century tune from which he borrowed the title and first line of its chorus. He also uses words by W.C. Handy and Robert Johnson as he extends the meaning of the tome by adding his own metaphorical images and wry observations. However, even as the song is from antiquity; it's full of the rest of Modern Times bemusement. "The Levee's Gonna Break" shakes and shimmies as it warns about the coming catastrophe. Coming as it does on the anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, it's a particularly poignant number that reveals apocalypse and redemption and rails on the greedy and powerful as it parties in the gutter. There are no sacred cows when Dylan evokes Carl Perkins' exhortation to put "your cat clothes on," it's hard not to stomp around maniacally even as you feel his righteousness come through. The great irony is in the final track, "I Ain't Talkin'," where a lonesome fiddle, piano, and hand percussion spill out a gypsy ballad that states a yearning, an unsatisfied spiritual hunger. The pilgrim wanders, walks, and aspires to do good unto others, though he falters often he sometimes wants to commit homicide. It's all part of the stroll. The guitar interplay with the fiddle (a second gypsy melody as one of gypsy swing comes through loud and clear and sweet in "Beyond the Horizon") and the one-note bassline are hypnotic. Dylan's simmering growl adds a sense of apprehension, of whistling through the graveyard, of determination to get to he knows not where, but supposedly it's the other side of the world. It sends the album off with a wry sense of foreboding. This pilgrim is sticking to what he knows is solid the motion of his feet.
Modern Times offers a new weird America, one stranger than any that's come before, because it's merely part of a new weird world. In these ten songs, bawdy joy, restless heartache, comical scenes, and bottomless sadness all coexist and inform one another as a warning and celebration of this precious human life and wondering about whatever comes after. This world view is expressed through forms threatened with extinction: old rackety blues that pack an electrically charged wallop, parlor tunes and crooned pop-style ballads that could have come from the 1930s or even the 1890s. Modern Times is the work of a professional mythmaker, a back-alley magician and prophetic creator of mischief. It offers a view of the pilgrim as pickpocket, the thief as holy man, the lover as the fighter. And all bets are on to see who finishes dead last. What could be more confusing or so ultimately timeless as contradiction as entertainment, provided with a knowing, barely detectable grin.
[Edited by time is on my side]
28th August 2006 09:29 PM
Nasty Habits
It seems to me that the first three songs are so good that the rest of the album never quite catches up to them, even though it hits new wonderous heights with Workingman's Blues #2 & Nettie Moore. I'm still on the fence about the true epic nature of the closer. Tomorrow, provided there's vinyl, will tell the tale - this is music that has to be heard on wax.
The t-shirt is the shit.
[Edited by Nasty Habits]
28th August 2006 09:40 PM
Soldatti
Another excelent record by the great Bob.
28th August 2006 09:42 PM
PartyDoll MEG
Love it.. and I have lost track of how many times I've listened.
Workingman Blues #2, Thunder on the Mountain, and Spirit on the Water are my favorite songs. But each time I listen, something else grabs me, or I catch a different Dylan phrasing that makes me smile. Fucking Brilliant!!!
28th August 2006 09:52 PM
Saint Sway
I wish the Stones would drop an album like this on us
28th August 2006 10:08 PM
Soldatti
quote:Saint Sway wrote:
I wish the Stones would drop an album like this on us
Modern Times is miles ahead of ABB, better songs, better music, better production, better artwork, etc.
I think that Mick heard Modern Times the last week and that's the reason for the lack of ABB songs in the setlists.
28th August 2006 10:22 PM
Saint Sway
Mick no longer has a clue how to make a real rock record. BTB/GITD/ABB are all buried in shite. Too many of the songs sound like desperate stabs at the pop market..... ASMB?, RFD, SOL, LWTCDI
Dylan still clearly has his feet on the ground and a grip on the pulse of what his fans want/expect from him. Its a mature record that holds up to the integrity of his back catalog.
thing is, I honestly believe the Stones could blow this record away and blow all our minds if they just sat down and tried to make something that was raw and honest and devoid of Mick's silly pop stylings.
28th August 2006 11:20 PM
Phog
Bob has dropped another winner on us. It gets better with each listen so far. Damn fine stuff.
29th August 2006 12:33 AM
erikjjf
Another great album!
Makes a great trilogy with Time Out Of Mind and Love & Theft.
29th August 2006 01:02 AM
aladdinstory
so how is it? on par with time out of mind and love & theft? i think the cover is great! i thought at one time the stones could pull of late career renaissance on par w/ ole Bob, but that prospect seems dim at best. which is too bad because i believe the potential is still there, but is the desire???
29th August 2006 05:18 AM
Ten Thousand Motels
.... that's all I can say....for now.
29th August 2006 05:22 AM
Ten Thousand Motels
quote:aladdinstory wrote:
... which is too bad because i believe the potential is still there, but is the desire???
Or good hats. Bob's creative resurgence in the last decade has coincided with an upturn in sartorial elegance. Especially in the headgear department. Its no coincidence that his last period of really sustained brilliance prior to now was in the mid 70's - the era of Desire, Rolling Thunder Revue, etc. He wore cool hats around then too.
29th August 2006 08:21 AM
Nasty Habits
Mick Jagger predicted and was partially responsible for this aspect of Bob's creative resurgence. In 1991, Rolling Stone ran an article for Bob's birthday, asking other rock and rollers what they would get him.
Mick said, "Based on his performance at the Grammys I'd get him a new hat and a decent song."
Thanks, Mick!
29th August 2006 08:23 AM
glencar
quote:Soldatti wrote:
Modern Times is miles ahead of ABB, better songs, better music, better production, better artwork, etc.
I think that Mick heard Modern Times the last week and that's the reason for the lack of ABB songs in the setlists.
I haven't heard all of Modern Times & I've liked what I've heard but I love ABB. Much better over all.
29th August 2006 08:33 AM
Gazza
quote:Nasty Habits wrote:
Mick Jagger predicted and was partially responsible for this aspect of Bob's creative resurgence. In 1991, Rolling Stone ran an article for Bob's birthday, asking other rock and rollers what they would get him.
Mick said, "Based on his performance at the Grammys I'd get him a new hat and a decent song."
Thanks, Mick!
Really? LOL...good call by Mick, indeed. 1991 saw Bob's headgear at its nadir, likewise his live performances. After that chaotic and unintelligible performance of 'Masters of War' at the Grammys that year, one baffled critic asked, in all seriousness, if he had performed the song in Hebrew.
29th August 2006 08:55 AM
Nasty Habits
I still remember seeing this go down live. Greatest acceptance speech ever!
29th August 2006 09:04 AM
Nellcote
I listened to Bob's show last night, I think it was from a couple of weeks ago. He intro's Neighbors, notes all the members in the band, Keith, Charlie, Mick, Woody, and "some" bass player. He goes on to say words to the effect of, "Imagine this guy screaming this song as your neighbor..."
29th August 2006 09:10 AM
Nasty Habits
That was last week's show, Friends and Neighbors.
I think it's the first time the Stones were on Theme Time.
29th August 2006 09:49 AM
paddy
Have You Seen Your Mother Baby ? was played on the MOTHERS show...............
29th August 2006 12:45 PM
Lethargy
quote:Nasty Habits wrote:
I still remember seeing this go down live. Greatest acceptance speech ever!
What an utterly terrible performance from one of his worst eras. Absolutely intolerable to listen to his voice. This is the era where he clearly didn't give a crap. Nowadays he seems much better. Even the voice seems more listenable now.
29th August 2006 12:51 PM
Gazza
quote:Nasty Habits wrote:
I still remember seeing this go down live. Greatest acceptance speech ever!
The acceptance speech was priceless, and considering the state he was in at the time, quite self-revealing by his own standards. The choice of song for the performance (it was in the middle of the Gulf War) was excellent. The performance, however, was abominable.
29th August 2006 12:57 PM
Martha
quote:Nasty Habits wrote:
That was last week's show, Friends and Neighbors.
I think it's the first time the Stones were on Theme Time.
No it wasn't the first time he's mentioned or played them....they've been on at least 3 times now.
29th August 2006 01:15 PM
Gazza
then dont bother posting about him.
[Edited by Gazza]
29th August 2006 01:16 PM
jb
quote:Gazza wrote:
then dont bother posting about him.
[Edited by Gazza]
I know you enjoy him, but I am not interested in the least about where he is performing or his new album...I want him removed from this site asap.
P.S.-can you please remove him from avatar as it is very disturbing.
[Edited by jb]
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