As long as there's tape, old Dylan won't fade

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© St. Petersburg Times
published February 5, 2002

So now I guess I am, in the words of some of my other music idols, "old and in the way."

That's how I felt Saturday night at a concert presented by '60s folk icon Bob Dylan, once a major influence in my life.

Just about everyone in the Ice Palace, where, let's face it, turkeys are nothing new, seemed to be enjoying themselves which, to me, means that they either A) didn't know how bad he stank or, B) are inhabitants of some postmodern musical fantasy world in which what we were listening to is actually considered good.

It's okay. I am young enough to remember the old fogeys who told me that entertainers like Elvis and the Beatles and even early Dylan were, because they were different, not worth listening to. And I understand that in a world with background music provided by most of today's big-name entertainers, what sounded so awful to me Saturday night might sound good to a newer, hipper crowd, although for me it just confirms that the genetic damage we were told marijuana would cause has really occurred, and we are reaping the harvest of music played by the people who apparently lack the genes for key, rhythm and coherency.

But I am also old enough to remember risking losing my military security clearance by carrying a copy of The Freewheelin' around in my seabag, and to remember hearing Like a Rolling Stone as I crossed the Miami city limits on my way home from Vietnam in 1966.

Our pop music critic, to be fair, loved Dylan's presentation and saw his new deconstructed approach to his old music as invigorating and uplifting.

I found it difficult to believe that he had actually become harder to understand with the years and found no joy at all in having to listen to eight bars of an old song before recognizing the tune -- and then being sorry that I did.

I remember when Highway 61 Revisited came out and folk purists, who still sing Blowin' In The Wind as a sort of anthem, were appalled at his desertion of acoustic-only accompaniment for electronic amplification and, shudder, drums! But his use of an old high school friend of mine, Charlie McCoy, on lead harmonica induced me to listen, and I still liked what I heard in the lyrics.

Whether I liked anything I heard in the lyrics Saturday night is still up for grabs; I didn't recognize many and had to fill in most of them from memory.

What I saw and heard was a once-revered artist working hard at caricaturing himself but not, as most caricaturists do, enjoying the humor of the process.

We were attending with friends, (who, for the record, are in their mid 30s) who had bought the tickets, and so I struggled mightily to hide my discomfort, until I saw the male half of the couple grimacing and holding his hands over his ears -- for nearly an hour. His wife, admittedly the hipper of the two, couldn't argue about Saturday's performance but said she has heard him perform better within the past 10 years.

I saluted Dylan's willingness to move on to new things 36 years ago, and I regret that I can't salute that decision now.

From a consumer's standpoint, I wish Dylan would recognize that entertainers with his longevity, especially those who began in the folk arena, have large followings based on nostalgia. His songs, and those of Peter, Paul and Mary and Arlo Guthrie and Joan Baez and even Country Joe and the Fish are part of our heritage and our history.

We're willing to sit through PP&M's latest offering of music that is antiwhatever war is currently on, if we can hear Puff the Magic Dragon before the night is out.

We don't ask to be exclusively catered to, just taken note of.

If you saw me at the Dylan concert and are about to run to e-mail me that I was seen on my feet applauding at the end, you would be right.

It was because I was hoping he would cut the crap and sing something the old way for an old man.

I am glad there was a young, and apparently pleased, crowd there Saturday. It means that Bob will be able to get by without my old-fogey bucks, except for when I wear out and have to replace another Greatest Hits tape.

And, yes, I said tape.

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