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I could be here all night. There has been some good stuff on telly and radio 4 about this.
People who haven't heard of Creative shouldn't be allowed to post recordings of vinyl on Youtube.
I never did like Bob Dylan and no doubt never will. Some covers made the songs more paletable but the originals, ugh!
He may be 70, but he ain't .....
The early stuff for me.
anti vinyl and anti dylan
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Heard the interview with the journalist on the plane flight from the '60's on R4 yesterday - first admission of the $25 a day New York smack habit.
Posting from phone, can someone please stick Tangled Up In Blue on here? One of the very, very few perfect pieces of music I've ever heard.
Happy birthday Bob.
Serge Gainsbourg or Garry Glitter more your 'vibe' Edukator?
Nope, Gainsbourg sounded like a packet of cigarette too. Brassens if you want Dylan's generation, or Goldman and Cabrel from mine.
I never did like Bob Dylan and no doubt never will. Some covers made the songs more paletable but the originals, ugh!
Your loss mate
He's a funny character isn't he? Doesn't come across in interviews like his music cones across. A good example of a channel for whatever force he's connected to.
Saw him at the Apollo in Manchester about ten years ago now.
Was expecting a grumpy old sod a la live Van The Man - we actually got three hours of smiley primetime Bobness.
Great gig.
Good songwriter, but coon't flippin sing. Why did he ever think he could? Terrible voice. His stuff is only ever ok when sung by other people.
His voice is intentional, a bit marmite of course.
Top of the music-is-my-life tree, Neil Young and Frank Zappa there too.
Bob's got a hoose up near Nethy Bridge. I asked one of his aristocratic neighbours if she'd met him. She ruefully replied, 'Peter, I don't move in those circles'
His voice is intentional
What, you mean he meant to sound shit? 😯
Seriously, bloke could never sing. Should never have bothered. The worst renditions of Bob Dylan songs I've ever heard have bin sung by Bob Dylan. I've heard drunken tone deaf karaoke pub singers sound better.
With Edukator and Elfinsafety here. It can't be denied that he is a fantastic song writer, and he is! But he really can't sing for shit.
They played "I Want You" on the radio tonight. Catchy little tune but killed by it's own parent. As Clint said, "A man's gotta know his limits."
Lay Lady Lay
write songs though he can,
and thats a biggy.
could listen to pop idol twaddle,they can sing but cant write sh!t!
Though i don't suppose we'll meet.....
Wonderful song with great delivery
I agree that he doesn't have the greatest voice, but he sounds noticeably worse on these youtube clips than he does on an album.
I don't know if that's youtube making him sound worse, or sound techies making him sound better on a CD though?
Just a theory but if Bob Dylan could sing, surely less people would have felt the need to do cover versions? IMHO, most Dylan covers (not all tho!) are way more listenable than his originals. The music world is a far better place with so many of his finely crafted works sung by those with real singing talent. Most recent example is Adele's cover of Make you feel my love.
[i]Seriously, bloke could never sing[/i]
I'm surprised at you Elfin. A voice, like any art should be about originality first, not how technically correct it is.
It's like saying Picasso can't paint cos his paintings don't look like the thing he's painting.
So, you prefer
Michael Ball over Bob Dylan
Michael Buble over John Lydon
Leona Lewis over Bjork
etc etc and so on and so on
❓
Or do you prefer Keane?
ero
Just a theory but if Bob Dylan could sing, surely less people would have felt the need to do cover versions?
firstly it is a hypothessis not a theory
FIWIW The top 5 is Beatles, Dylan, Elvis, Duke Ellingon, Roling Stones
I assume you dont want to argue none of those could sing.
Top 20 also has stevie wonder, bowie, marvin gaye and Frank Sinatra
I think you have a point as well obviously. It is a micture of how gret his songs were and the fact many folk are better singers.
Junkyard - Top 5 of what? Songs covered by other people?
Many great singer / songwriters have their work covered by others but the cover is rarely as good as the original. I would suggest Dylan is unusual in that as a great writer but poor singer, covers often sound better than his originals.
I think if you've heard a significant amount of dylan you'll realise that he can sing, and that a his vocal delivery is pretty deliberate.
He's not Mariah Carey
It's like saying Picasso can't paint cos his paintings don't look like the thing he's painting.
Nothing like that.
More like, the rich people what commissioned great paintings like the Sistine Chapel or whatever, not bothering with yer Michaelangelo and doing it themselves instead.
So ner.
Having a voice with 'character' is not the same as having a terrible singing voice. Dylan has the latter.
If you were in a pub and someone was wailing over the Karaoke like that, you tell them to get off. Perhaps even glass them if they continued. And rightly so. It's bloody awful.
Dylan sounds like a constipated seal. What can't sing.
Bob's got a hoose up near Nethy Bridge. I asked one of his aristocratic neighbours if she'd met him. She ruefully replied, 'Peter, I don't move in those circles'
I thought he owned Inchrory Lodge?
Bob is at the top of the cultural tree as far as I'm concerned, an icon for icons.
Criticising his vocals is like criticising an impressionist painter for being unclear. His vocal style draws attention to the words. And he knows exactly where to put vocal emphasis, better than anyone I can think off.
*Edit - didn't realise the painter analogy had already been made. In any case, the people who misunderstand the vocals just don't understand full stop. I blame a poor education system, or the classic/romantic split. Anyhow, have another analogy. It's like saying Lanark was rubbish because it jumped all over the place. Or Tolkien was rubbish because he got caught up in geekish over-analysis of imagined cultures.
It's classic cop-out bullshit when someone criticises something you love to say 'oh well you just don't understand because you're not clever enough'.
His voice is awful, his harmonica playing is even worse. Great songwriter - terrible performer. There's also people who are technically poor but have something about them - he's not one of them either, sorry.
How can you claim that Masters of War/Tangled up in Blue don't involve good singing by Dylan? Masters of War is particularly a difficult song, requiring real range. I do not think Noel or Liam could pull it off, but Dylan storms it.
What Dylan is strong at is the attitude. Have you ever tried singing along to Lou Reed? The notes are easy to get across but what's very, very difficult is the attitude (Sweet Jane for example). The same goes with Dylan. It's not a strictly "technical" thing. Neil Young, too.
Some of his stuff grates, some of it is great. Generally the less he plays the harmonica the better.
And I agree his voice has aged very badly but that happens even to "great" singers, Stevie Nicks for example.
It's classic cop-out bullshit when someone criticises something you love to say 'oh well you just don't understand because you're not clever enough'.
i think its more a case of ignorance of some of his back catalogue and numerous excellent live recordings....
Its totally fine to dislike him/his work, its another thing to make sweeping generalisations about his technical ability, particluarly when its quite patently not true.
But it is. He has a terrible singing voice. Fact.
Just cos you're too blinded and deluded to see that, doesn't mean it's not true.
Its totally fine to like him/his work, its another thing to make sweeping generalisations about his technical ability, particluarly when its quite patently not true.
🙂
i know its really important for you to be right and i'm in a giving mood today, have this one on me
Some people post with 100% confidence their own unwavering and incontrovertible opinion on every thread and subject on internet forums. I don't understand how such folk have had the time to develop the knowledge on such a wide breadth of subjects.
Other folk only post comments on the threads where they understand the subject, or at least know enough to have a comment worthy of inclusion and consideration.
Crikey you're all very sensitive about ol' Bob aren't you?
Do I have to listen to every single one of his recordings in order to have an opinion then? I've already been subjected to more than I care for.
It seems that you're not allowed to dislike his performances, and that anyone who does is automatically a philistine. 🙄
There's probably a fair number of people out there who say the same thing about Katy Perry, but it doesn't make them right.
He's a genius.
Age is cruel.
Yep, he's a genius alright. Happy Birthday Bob and thanks for writing great songs.
A pity all those fools who waste their money seeing him live when they'd be better off saving their ears for a real singer.
grum you can say he is not your cup of tea but to call him crap is OTT IMHO
For example I dont like Queen or Jedwood but I can tell you which one is good if that helps. There is a distinction
I liked some of his stuff e.g. Positively 4th Street' but politically he always backed off and was sufficiently ambiguous to widen his audience and not offend. Joan Baez ridicules his 'protest'songs. That $25 habit stuff confirms to me that he was a fraud, it's never come out of other interviews or his book. Some nice covers done by the Byrds though.