| September 30th, 2005 11:11 AM |
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| Ten Thousand Motels |
Bob Dylan continues his religious odyssey
By Andrew Muchin
9/30/05
The Jewish Ledger
The re-animator of folk music. The poet of rock ‘n' roll. The nasally voice of a generation. The private Jew turned public Christian turned public Jew turned who knows what? Bob Dylan remains an enigma, particularly when it comes to faith.
Readers of his autobiography "Chronicles: Volume One" (2004, Simon & Schuster) -- or any of the dozens of Dylan biographies or the hundreds of interviews Dylan has given in a 43-year musical career n will find a tale of two deities.
Dylan owes the public no explanation of his religious beliefs. Yet inquiring souls want to know what motivated Dylan to introduce religious imagery into popular songwriting in the early 1960s, to visit Israel in 1971 and, 25 years after his bar mitzvah, to begin performing with Jesus on his side and record three Christian albums.
Then his 1983 album "Infidels" contained an ode to Israel, the anguished "Neighborhood Bully." Next, Dylan was reported to be praying with Lubavitcher Chasidim. With son-in-law Peter Himmelman, an Orthodox popular singer/songwriter, Dylan performed "Hava Nagila" on a Lubavitch telethon in 1989.
On the other hand, as Tevye might say, Dylan's recent concerts have included songs from his Christian period.
Growing up Jewish in middle America
Bob Dylan found his muse in New York City, but he grew up as a small-town Jew in the north country. Robert Alan Zimmerman was born May 24, 1941, to Abe and Beatty Zimmerman in Duluth, MN. Soon the young family moved 75 miles northwest to Beatty's hometown, Hibbing, population approximately 18,000. Abe's brothers, Maurice and Paul, made room for Abe at their electrical supply and appliance store.
Hibbing's Jewish population was strong and steady -- 285 in 1937 and 268 in 1948, according to "The American Jewish Year Book." The Zimmermans participated in Jewish life: Abe as president of the B'nai B'rith lodge, Beatty as president of the Hadassah group.
Bobby attended religious school at Agudas Achim Synagogue. He spent summers at Herzl Camp, a Zionist facility in northwestern Wisconsin. He became bar mitzvah.
Growing up in Hibbing "gave me a sense of simplicity," Dylan told the Hibbing High Times in 1978. Dylan-watchers believe that his Hibbing Jewish experiences -- and lack thereof -- are reflected in his Jewish outlook and spiritual sense.
Larry Yudelson, owner of the radiohazak.com and yudel.com Web sites, which contain megabytes of Dylan data, says Dylan found in old-time American music what growing up in Hibbing couldn't provide.
"My sense is the religious language of salvation and faith in Jesus he picked up very early," Yudelson said. "I think about what it meant to grow up in Hibbing as a third-generation American Jew, My guess is Dylan connects to this Jewish absence, this yearning, which he finds in the old folk music. I think he has found a real American connection."
The message in the music
In Dylan's own songs, the characters often are sinners, yet outside of three preachy Christian albums, the religious impact comes more from his use of biblical allusions and metaphors. The language of "A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall" is apocalyptic. "Forever Young" is written as a blessing. "Highway 61 Revisited" revolves around the binding of Isaac. "Jokerman" is steeped in biblical references.
Many of Dylan's songs take a strong moral stand, calling for justice ("Ballad of Hurricane"), peace ("Masters of War") and faith ("Father of Night").
But using the songs to identify Dylan's beliefs probably is reading too much into the work of a well-read songwriter.
His personal statements are no more helpful. He writes in "Chronicles" that his 1971 visit to Jerusalem was a publicity stunt.
"I ... got myself photographed at the Western Wall wearing a skullcap. The image was transmitted worldwide instantly and quickly and the great rags changed me overnight to a Zionist. This helped a little" in removing Dylan from the pop music spotlight. Yet on the same trip, he announced: "I'm a Jew. It touches my poetry, my life in ways I can't describe."
An American and a Jew
So is he Jewish? Now he is, said Neil Schwartz, a Hibbing native who serves as cantor of B'nai Zion Congregation in Chattanooga, TN. Small-town Jews tend to adapt their practices to fit the general community, he said.
"Given a milieu like that, it didn't surprise me that Dylan strayed but that he came back."
However, maybe he didn't come all the way back. Scott Marshall, author of "Restless Pilgrim: The Spiritual Journey of Bob Dylan" (2002, Relevant Media Group, Inc.), notes that Dylan said in 1984 that "he was a literal believer in the Bible."
"He said the Old and New Testaments were equally valid," Marshall remarks ... "All I can add is he continues to sings these songs from [his Christian albums] ‘Slow Train Coming' and ‘Saved.' My thought is if he truly no longer believes that, why in the world would he sing these songs?"
Yudelson cautions that Christian lyrics do not a disciple make.
"He ends up with Evangelicals. He ends up with Chabad. Then he ends up with a much more normal sense that the language of the old American songs speaks to him, the Yom Kippur davening speaks to him, he loves his frum grandchildren," Yudelson said.
"I don't think Dylan is one for drawing a strong distinction between ‘you're inside the camp or outside the camp.' My sense is he has a much fuzzier feeling about finding God through the music, finding God through gospel music."
Yudelson calls Dylan "a pre-denominational Jew with a vague sense of Yom Kippur, a vague sense of bar mitzvah, but you're an American."
That description fits the model of Judaism described by social scientists Steven M. Cohen and Arnold M. Eisen in "The Jew Within: Self Family and Community in America" (2000, Indiana University Press): that all Jewish belief and practice are individual and personal. In other words, Judaism is what each person thinks it is.
If only Dylan would tell us his thoughts on Judaism.
As part of its ongoing American Masters series, PBS will air "No Direction Home: Bob Dylan," a two-part chronicle of the life and music of Bob Dylan, directed by Martin Scorsese.
Part 1 will air on Sunday, Oct. 2 at 1 pm and 8 pm; and Monday, Oct. 3 at 1 am.
Part 2 will air on Sunday, Oct. 2 at 3 pm and 10 pm. Check local listings for other times
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| September 30th, 2005 11:33 AM |
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| Honky Tonk Man |
Which albums of Dylan's are from his Christian phase? Are they any good? |
| September 30th, 2005 11:37 AM |
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| Ten Thousand Motels |
quote:
Honky Tonk Man wrote:
Which albums of Dylan's are from his Christian phase? Are they any good?
Slow Train Coming
Saved
Shot of Love
so..so. Slow Train Coming is the better of the three.
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| September 30th, 2005 11:50 AM |
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| Ten Thousand Motels |
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| September 30th, 2005 12:10 PM |
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| Honky Tonk Man |
Thanks for posting the albums artwork Ten Thousand Motels!
I presume your a Dylan fan, so I was wondering if you could help. Below are the records I already own, I know Desire is highly rated, but what other Dylan studio albums would you cite as essential?
The Best Of Bob Dylan (Volume 2)
Bob Dylan (Thats the 1962 debut)
Freewheelin' Bob Dylan
Bringing It All Back Home
Highway 61 Revisited
Blonde On Blonde
John Wesley Harding
Blood On The Tracks (Stuning album!)
My dad has a few on vinyl, including albums like Another Side Of Bob Dylan, but I find that one boring. |
| September 30th, 2005 12:21 PM |
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| Factory Girl |
I highly recommend:
1. Time out of Mind
2. Love & Theft
Both cds are rather brilliant. L&T is the more boisterous of the two. |
| September 30th, 2005 03:18 PM |
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| justinkurian |
Pick up Bootleg Series Vol. 4: 1966 "Royal Albert Hall." It's a two disc set.
If you have some money to stashed away, get Vol. 1-3 (it's one set, three discs)...I bought it years ago and keep finding new stuff all the time.
Then again, I like all his albums - I find something I like on every one of 'em.
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| September 30th, 2005 03:27 PM |
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| blackandblue |
quote:
Factory Girl wrote:
I highly recommend:
1. Time out of Mind
2. Love & Theft
Both cds are rather brilliant. L&T is the more boisterous of the two.
Quite right. Also: Oh Mercy. |
| September 30th, 2005 03:51 PM |
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| The_Worst |
quote:
Honky Tonk Man wrote:
Thanks for posting the albums artwork Ten Thousand Motels!
I presume your a Dylan fan, so I was wondering if you could help. Below are the records I already own, I know Desire is highly rated, but what other Dylan studio albums would you cite as essential?
The Best Of Bob Dylan (Volume 2)
Bob Dylan (Thats the 1962 debut)
Freewheelin' Bob Dylan
Bringing It All Back Home
Highway 61 Revisited
Blonde On Blonde
John Wesley Harding
Blood On The Tracks (Stuning album!)
My dad has a few on vinyl, including albums like Another Side Of Bob Dylan, but I find that one boring.
I also agree Live 1966 Bootleg Series Volume 4 is a must have. Actually, I think all of the bootleg series are great! I also love "Before The Flood" & even "at Budokan". |
| September 30th, 2005 03:56 PM |
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| monkey_man |
Don't forget "Nashville Skyline" |
| September 30th, 2005 05:45 PM |
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| Prodigal Son |
I think Desire, New Morning and Planet Waves are also overlooked and underrated. I think you'd enjoy them. Dylan's made some clunkers over the years but for a guy with 31 studio albums, there are surprisingly few. Let me give my masterful overview of his works:
A+ (10/10, *****, masterpiece, eg. Exile on Main Street, Who's Next):
-Highway 61 Revisted (1965)
-Blonde on Blonde (1966)
-Blood on the Tracks (1975)
A (9/10,****1/2, brilliant,eg. Some Girls, Sticky Fingers):
-The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan (1963)
-Bringing it All Back Home (1965)
-Greatest Hits, Vol. 1 (1967)
-The Basement Tapes (rec. 1967, released 1975)
-John Wesley Harding (1968)
-Greatest Hits, Vol. 2 (1971)
-Before the Flood (Double-disc Live, 1974)
-Biograph (3-disc compilation-1985)
-The Bootleg Series, Vol. 1-3 (1991)
A-(8/10, ****, very good, eg. Black and Blue, Tattoo You):
-Another Side of Bob Dylan (1964)
-World Gone Wrong (acoustic folk/blues covers-1993)
-Time Out of Mind (1997)
-The Bootleg Series, Vol. 4 (Royal Albert Hall-worth it for the electric side alone cause the acoustic side is pretty tame)(1999?)
-The Bootleg Series, Vol. 6: Live 1964 (don't remember where this one was but it was a nice acoustic set) (2002?)
B+ (7/10, ***1/2, good, eg. Goat's Head Soup, Voodoo Lounge):
-Bob Dylan (1962)
-The Times They Are-a Changin' (1963)
-Nashville Skyline (1969)
-New Morning (1970)
-Planet Waves (1974)
-Desire (1975)
-Slow Train Coming (1979)
-Infidels (1983)
-Oh Mercy (1989)
-Good as I Been to You (the first of two straight solo acoustic folk/blues covers albums-1992)
-MTV Unplugged (1995)
-Greatest Hits, Vol. 3 (2000?)
-The Bootleg Series, Vol. 6: Live 1975 w/Rolling Thunder Revue (2004)
B (decent, 6/10, ***, eg. Steel Wheels, Bridges to Babylon):
-Shot of Love (1981)
-Real Live (1985)
-Empire Burlesque (1985)
B- (average, 5/10, **1/2, eg. TSMR, Undercover):
-Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid Soundtrack (mostly instrumentals-1973)
-Hard Rain (Live-1976)
-Street Legal (1978)
-Live at Budokhan (1979)
C+ (mediocre, 4/10, **, eg. Goddess in the Doorway, Dirty Work):
-Saved (1980)
-Down in the Groove (1988)
-Dylan and the Dead (Live-1989)
-Under the Red Sky (1990)
C (Weak, 3/10, *1/2, eg. Wings' Back to the Egg, She's the Boss)
-Knocked Out Loaded (1986-would be C- if not for "Brownsville Girl" and "Precious Memories")
C- (bad, 2.5/10, *, eg. Bon Jovi's latest, side one of Metamorphisis)
-Self Portrait (1970)
D+ (really bad, 2/10, 1/2*, eg. Barry Manilow in general, Wings Wild Life): none
D (awful, 1.5/10, 0 stars, eg. Styx's Kilroy Was Here, Celine Dion's Falling into You): none
D- (painfully bad, 1/10, bullet, eg. anything by Air Supply or Mac "I Believe in Music" Davis):
E+ (absolutely terrible, 0.5/10, bullet, eg. 75% of the Osmond family's music-that includes the Osmonds, Jimmy Osmond, Donny Osmond, Marie Osmond and Donny & Marie, William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy's debut albums)
-Dylan (a collection of haphazard, ridiculous covers and outtakes from the already crappy Self-Portrait. He jumped from Columbia to Asylum for Planet Waves and this was their revenge! It's so bad Columbia hasn't, and will never, release it on CD. So it's now a rare collector's item. Somehow people wanted to hear this junk and it got to #8 on the charts-1973)
E (incomprehensibly bad, 0/10, bullet eg. Tiny Tim, any album where wrestler's sing)
E- (unlistenable, -0.5/10, minus 1/2*, eg. Metal Machine Music, John and Yoko's sound collages)
F (a joke, -1/10, minus *, this is a virtually impossible grade to get. You'd have to record dull piano noodlings through a tape recorder while farting into it through a Leslie organ speaker).
[Edited by Prodigal Son] |
| September 30th, 2005 05:45 PM |
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| Gazza |
quote:
Honky Tonk Man wrote:
Which albums of Dylan's are from his Christian phase? Are they any good?
Slow Train Coming (1979) - yes
Saved (1980)- no
Shot of Love (1981) - yes
Saved turned out to be a disappointing record (the songs were better in concert), but the shows that followed it in late 1980 are superb |
| September 30th, 2005 05:55 PM |
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| Gazza |
quote:
Honky Tonk Man wrote:
Thanks for posting the albums artwork Ten Thousand Motels!
I presume your a Dylan fan, so I was wondering if you could help. Below are the records I already own, I know Desire is highly rated, but what other Dylan studio albums would you cite as essential?
The Best Of Bob Dylan (Volume 2)
Bob Dylan (Thats the 1962 debut)
Freewheelin' Bob Dylan
Bringing It All Back Home
Highway 61 Revisited
Blonde On Blonde
John Wesley Harding
Blood On The Tracks (Stuning album!)
My dad has a few on vinyl, including albums like Another Side Of Bob Dylan, but I find that one boring.
Blood On The Tracks is the best album ever made by anyone.
The Top Ten of the Rest (studio)
1. Blood on the Tracks
2. Desire
3. The Basement Tapes
4. Street Legal
5. Love & Theft
6. Time Out of Mind
7. The Times They Are A-Changin
8. Nashville Skyline
9. Oh Mercy
10. Planet Waves
HOWEVER
You must buy the two 3-Cd boxed sets (you can get them relatively cheap)-
"Bootleg Series Vol 1-3". An incredible collection of 58 outtakes. The fact that this is Dylan's 'leftovers' gives you an idea of the sheer depth of his talent (not to mention his flawed artistic judgement). Any other artist would build a career around these songs.
"Biograph" - a 1985 compilation. Has about 53 songs, but includes no less than 18 previously unreleased songs and performances. Stunning.
Then there are the live albums
The three Bootleg Series albums are essential. Vol. 4 is the infamous Manchester '66 ("Judas!") concert, Vol. 5 is from the 1975 Rolling Thunder Revue tour and Vol. 6 is a superb all acoustic show in New York at Hallowe'en 1964.
Of the rest, the most essential are "Hard Rain" (1976) and "Before The Flood" (1974). "At Budokan" (1978)shows interesting rearrangements of his old stuff from what was a fantastic tour, but the European tour from that year is better than the Japanese tour which is the source of this album. |
| September 30th, 2005 06:02 PM |
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| Prodigal Son |
The thing about his Christian period is that those three albums included some of his most moving and touching songs: "Every Grain of Sand" (the version on the Bootleg Series I find superior), "What Can I do for You?" "When He Returns," "Precious Angel," "I Believe in You" and the pre-1991 unreleased "You Changed My Life," "Lord Protect My Child" and "Ye Shall Be Changed."
Then again he could rock out like old on tunes like "Solid Rock," "Gonna Change My Way of Thinking," and "The Groom's Still Waiting at the Altar" or be a raging old zealot on one-dimensional rockers such "Slow Train," "Gotta Serve Somebody," "Trouble," "Shot of Love" and "Dead Man, Dead Man." Then he returned to secular recordings in 1983 with Infidels but still sounded angry on "Neighbourhood Bully," "Man of Peace," "Union Sundown," "License to Kill" and the unreleased (and kick ass) "Foot of Pride." But he saved the real heartfelt greatness for arguably his best 80s song, the pre-1991 unreleased "Blind Willie McTell."
Though some songs, and most of Saved, were meant to show his newfound religious beliefs and love of God, the man was about as pissed and preachy as ever. You don't need no lyric sheet, either. He spouts it out pretty clearly for the human ear to decipher. He has had his usual angry-at-the-world stuff since in small doses but the religious overtones have been absent except for maybe "Ring Them Bells," and "Trying to Get to Heaven." |
| September 30th, 2005 06:17 PM |
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| Prodigal Son |
<"Bootleg Series Vol 1-3". An incredible collection of 58 outtakes. The fact that this is Dylan's 'leftovers' gives you an idea of the sheer depth of his talent (not to mention his flawed artistic judgement). Any other artist would build a career around these songs.>
Yeah, gazza. It's amazing. It cannot be understated that this man is among the top 10 most important artists of this century (grouped in with people like the Beatles, Hank Williams, Louis Armstrong, Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, Duke Ellington, Elvis, Cole Porter, George and Ira Gershwin, etc.) and it's likely he's closer to 1 than 10. Whether he's the greatest, or most influential, I don't know. But he's my favourite in that list. I know no matter what, he will be revered 100 years from now in a way the Stones and Beatles won't be able to touch. The documentary only reinforces the magic behind the man.
But it also showed how complicated and complex he is. With various interviews, recordings and such over the years, he has not given much insight into himself and sometimes ends up contradicting himself. It's tough to know who the real Dylan is. He's a chameleon in ever sense of the word.
<"Biograph" - a 1985 compilation. Has about 53 songs, but includes no less than 18 previously unreleased songs and performances. Stunning.>
Damn, I have most of it but there are some things, "Mixed up Confusion" and "Can You Please Crawl Out Your Back Window?" that I'd love to have.
I agree partially about Blood on the Tracks. It's truly spectacular and always fits in my ranking of the top 10 greatest rock albums (#1 has always been Exile because it provides the best pre-1970s artifact for the future historians of rock; only new wave, hip hop, punk and metal and all their offsprings are absent. This above all other albums will preserve the Stones legacy for a time of reflection when people like me are 95! Yeah, and I wasn't even alive in 1972 when this stuff came out). As a guitarist and songwriter on my own (hey, I'm working at it on the side) it stuns me how Dylan can make such great songs and lyrics go together so well with the simple chord arrangements of Blood. He recorded those tracks from the New York sessions with his guitar tuned in open E, hence the similar, full and open acoustic sound on the songs.
[Edited by Prodigal Son] |
| September 30th, 2005 07:47 PM |
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| Gazza |
Funny that you list Self Portrait so lowly
Call me nuts, but I absolutely love that album. Its unbelievable that he made an album like that basically to get people off his back..it was like deconstructing his own myth
I think its sheer contrariness is part of its charm. At times, its so bad its brilliant...
and there are some majestic songs on it..."Copper Kettle" is absolutely beautiful. And the guitar playing on "Little Sadie". And I even fucking love 'Wigwam', which, to those who havent heard it, is basically Bob Dylan humming out loud over a horn arrangement...some of it is indeed vile though. The live version of "Like A Rolling Stone" from the Isle of Wight is horrendous.
You can imagine the reaction when that album came out after all Dylan had done to that point (Greil Marcus famously opened his review in "Rolling Stone" with "What IS this shit?"). There used to be a programme on BBC TV years ago called "Disco 2" (it was a kind of forerunner to the "Old Grey Whistle Test"). A mate of mine who was a huge Dylan fan and had followed him religiously up to that point watched it because they said they would be playing a song from the new Dylan album. You can picture his face when the song they chose to play was "All The Tired Horses" and the poor bastard sits for about 3 minutes waiting for Bob to come in only to get a few women singing "All the tired horses in the sun/how am I supposed to get any writin' done" over and over for three minutes until it faded out!
"Dylan" is basically a collection of warm ups that Bob didnt sanction for release (actually, when you listen to it closer, its mostly from the same session as "New Morning" and not (contrary to myth) full of "Self Portrait" leftovers. His voice is the same as it is on "New Morning" (an album recorded when he had a head cold)...its mostly weak and whoever mixed it should have been publicly disembowelled, but I love the version of "Mr Bojangles" on it |
| September 30th, 2005 08:58 PM |
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| Prodigal Son |
Well, I do believe Self-Portrait has some good stuff but nothing to redeem crap like "All the Tired Horses" and all. It all sounds too pedestrian for a guy like Dylan. And I've always wondered why he sounded so hoarse on New Morning. Although it was also the case, I thought it was because he'd started smoking again. And he also sings in that rasp on Greatest Hits, Vol. 2 for "Watching the River Flow" and "When I Paint My Masterpiece." I also suppose filming Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid took up much of his time in 1972 as he took most of 1971 out of the limelight.
Then after that movie, I guess he broke away from Columbia over some dispute (?) and recorded Planet Waves with The Band. The early 70s were very inconsistent for Dylan, I've always thought. But New Morning has some great stuff. For an album with electric instruments, it's quite quiet but the CD remastering from the 80s by Columbia that I have is pretty weak. And I think "Winterlude" and "If Dogs Run Free" come off as more hilarious than crappy, because Dylan is doing a couple of tongue-in-cheek genre excericises as I see it.
It's harder to tell if he's doing that on Self-Portrait. I guess I could be nicer but C+ is the best I could possibly give that thing. Dylan regained some sense of humour on Love and Theft that had been missing ever since New Morning and Self-Portrait, On his website's merchandise store you can buy a T-shirt with a dog on it, and it says "If dogs run free/Why not we?" Great stuff.
I reviewed all that Dylan stuff for fun but I really do own almost all those albums. All of them except Greatest Hits, Vol. 3, Pat Garrett, MTV Unplugged, Real Live, Live at Budokan, Dylan and the Dead, Biograph, Under the Red Sky, Self Portrait and Live 1964 and 1975 bootleg series. But sound clips from some of these have convinced me of the grades I gave. And the only one I'll never listen to any time in the near future is Knocked Out Loaded. Even Saved has some really good tunes. Knocked Out Loaded is aimless and has pretty crappy 80s production too. I suppose Under the Red Sky would be coupled with that one if I bought it. Hey, it was only 7 bucks for KOL anyway.
[Edited by Prodigal Son] |
| September 30th, 2005 11:49 PM |
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| exile |
I have tried and I am sorry Bob Dylan is as interesting as Toast. JUST my personal opinion.
Wasnt he one of the Travelling Wilbury's?
Roy Orbison was WAY cool. What a voice. Now thats talent. |
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