0. Until last night I anticipated that the title of the present essay was to be: “At the Bob Dylan Concert, at the Indian Casino, in Wheatland, California, with Mom, in the Summer of 2024”, for that is how I had been thinking of the event in question for the several weeks leading up to it.
Life without music would just be a mistake, as some onetime Wagnerhead once put it I believe.
This is a pleasure to read, the little too-blunt jab at J"C"M aside. It's beautiful to see your informed stances and long practice of listening weave in and out with your revision of your own positions (bumping Dylan down in favor of Willie, and then explaining why, in real time as it were).
I grew up in Houston Texas. Willie used to put on a New Years Eve concert every year at the Summit. My mom took us for several years in a row when we were teenagers. Great songwriter. Willie is a legend!
Recurring loop in my head, maybe not daily, but more often than you might believe, is "Oh yeah/ life goes on/ long after the thrill/ of living is gone"-- As soon as you mentioned John Mellencamp, there it was again. I liked him more than Springsteen, growing up.
I fear I was much too hard on old Mellencamp in the original piece. So many people have written to tell me how much he has stuck with them over the years — that must count for something!
Dylan is my favorite artist, and late period Dylan is, most days, my favorite Dylan, although I grow to love Willie more and more with each passing year. I regret deeply that I missed their shows here in Washington State. I've seen Dylan a few times in the past 2 decades (he was great every time, but, again, I'm a die hard and love his late-period stuff), but I've never seen Willie, and I'm hoping this wasn't my last chance. JEH, if you haven't heard it yet, you've got to hear Willie's record "Spirit". I (think) I've listened to almost all of his voluminous studio output, and that may be his best. It's certainly the best showcase for his guitar playing, for which he is still bafflingly underrated. "A Beautiiful Time" from 2022 is well worth your time, too.
That drum break and turn in ‘Jack and Diane’ will never not make me think he tapped into something even more profound in a track that’s uniquely powerful for evoking nostalgia about one’s own past — not about the song itself, but how it describes a nearly universal moment
I mean I never had a Diane
But I still feel the whole ocean of it after beat and he intones that we should let the Bible Belt come and save our soul
I may have been too hard on the old Cougar in my essay. The more I think about it, in part after considering comments from readers, the more I have to admit I like him.
I was fortunate enough to have seen Willie Nelson at a small community festival when I was a teenager, and only because my parents happened to take me as I was not really interested. This was the 1990s, and even by then he seemed to have developed a sort of mythology around him. I really value having seen him.
Incidentally, these same two parents caught Dylan much later (~6 years ago?) and left sounding like everyone around you at the show: they were quite underwhelmed.
And while I’m at it, I’d be remiss to mention that Mellencamp’s “Human Wheel” remains a favorite record. I believe that was an album or two after he dropped the Cougar.
I remember in Bob Dylan's book Chronicles there's a section about recording his Oh Mercy album in New Orleans with Daniel Lanois. Lanios asked him something like "Hey why don't you write another 'Masters of War' or 'Tangled up in Blue'". Dylan rolls his eyes like, ok buddy, you think it's so easy, you think I know how I did that?
Lovely observation about singing behind the beat. It’s something off a connecting thread, I think. You can hear Schabel and Godowsky doing it on the piano (ie right hand slightly behind the left) in those crackly old Chopin recordings from pre-war Vienna. And Snoop does it too, come to think of it.
The Wheatland hop riot was a violent confrontation during a strike of agricultural workers demanding decent working conditions at the Durst Ranch in Wheatland, California, on August 3, 1913. The riot, which resulted in four deaths and numerous injuries, was subsequently blamed by local authorities, who were controlled by management, upon the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW). The Wheatland hop riot was among the first major farm labor confrontations in California and a harbinger of further such battles in the United States throughout the 20th century. - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wheatland_hop_riot
i’ll be catching the show at the gorge amphitheater this weekend. saw Bob in KC last summer for a couple of special Dylan sets. looking forward to this appearance and whatever that may bring.
i’m heartened to hear Willie is in good form and am also highly looking forward to the upstart phenom, Billy Strings, making a special appearance for this stop of the tour.
wish Mellencamp nothing but blessings, happiness and creative nirvana
Kate Manne is one of those fairly stupid but aggressively opinionated people who seem empowered in modern academia, or perhaps I should say modern academic social media
Let's keep the comments off of Kate Manne, since I only mentioned her in the earlier version of the essay as a result of a misattribution, which I've now corrected and for which I've now apologized. I have some substantial objections to the general project of ameliorative analysis, which I should make an effort to develop and to share, but I do not think she is stupid. My error here was to allow my substantial objections to shape my memory of what I had previously read in her piece: i.e., bias! So again, let's have no more comments on Kate Manne, or I'll have to close them.
But it isn't true that Kate Manne's 'precise claim was that country music is “pat and whiney”', she's entertaining a hypothetical where having "previously found" it "pat and whiney" she might listen more to find what is excellent in it.
Anyway, thanks for the preparation for my own encounter to come with Dylan (November) and here's a John Cougar referencing song from the (sadly now defunct) Bottle Rockets
Life without music would just be a mistake, as some onetime Wagnerhead once put it I believe.
This is a pleasure to read, the little too-blunt jab at J"C"M aside. It's beautiful to see your informed stances and long practice of listening weave in and out with your revision of your own positions (bumping Dylan down in favor of Willie, and then explaining why, in real time as it were).
One of your best, well worth reading out loud to friends!
I grew up in Houston Texas. Willie used to put on a New Years Eve concert every year at the Summit. My mom took us for several years in a row when we were teenagers. Great songwriter. Willie is a legend!
I keep watching his performance on Austin City Limits from 1981 — perfection!
Recurring loop in my head, maybe not daily, but more often than you might believe, is "Oh yeah/ life goes on/ long after the thrill/ of living is gone"-- As soon as you mentioned John Mellencamp, there it was again. I liked him more than Springsteen, growing up.
I fear I was much too hard on old Mellencamp in the original piece. So many people have written to tell me how much he has stuck with them over the years — that must count for something!
Dylan is my favorite artist, and late period Dylan is, most days, my favorite Dylan, although I grow to love Willie more and more with each passing year. I regret deeply that I missed their shows here in Washington State. I've seen Dylan a few times in the past 2 decades (he was great every time, but, again, I'm a die hard and love his late-period stuff), but I've never seen Willie, and I'm hoping this wasn't my last chance. JEH, if you haven't heard it yet, you've got to hear Willie's record "Spirit". I (think) I've listened to almost all of his voluminous studio output, and that may be his best. It's certainly the best showcase for his guitar playing, for which he is still bafflingly underrated. "A Beautiiful Time" from 2022 is well worth your time, too.
Lovely, thank you so much Isaac. I will take your recommendations to heart.
That drum break and turn in ‘Jack and Diane’ will never not make me think he tapped into something even more profound in a track that’s uniquely powerful for evoking nostalgia about one’s own past — not about the song itself, but how it describes a nearly universal moment
I mean I never had a Diane
But I still feel the whole ocean of it after beat and he intones that we should let the Bible Belt come and save our soul
I may have been too hard on the old Cougar in my essay. The more I think about it, in part after considering comments from readers, the more I have to admit I like him.
He’s no Dylan, but he’s pretty good sometimes :)
I was fortunate enough to have seen Willie Nelson at a small community festival when I was a teenager, and only because my parents happened to take me as I was not really interested. This was the 1990s, and even by then he seemed to have developed a sort of mythology around him. I really value having seen him.
Incidentally, these same two parents caught Dylan much later (~6 years ago?) and left sounding like everyone around you at the show: they were quite underwhelmed.
And while I’m at it, I’d be remiss to mention that Mellencamp’s “Human Wheel” remains a favorite record. I believe that was an album or two after he dropped the Cougar.
No one plays like Willie.
I remember in Bob Dylan's book Chronicles there's a section about recording his Oh Mercy album in New Orleans with Daniel Lanois. Lanios asked him something like "Hey why don't you write another 'Masters of War' or 'Tangled up in Blue'". Dylan rolls his eyes like, ok buddy, you think it's so easy, you think I know how I did that?
Absolutely beautiful
Lovely observation about singing behind the beat. It’s something off a connecting thread, I think. You can hear Schabel and Godowsky doing it on the piano (ie right hand slightly behind the left) in those crackly old Chopin recordings from pre-war Vienna. And Snoop does it too, come to think of it.
The Wheatland hop riot was a violent confrontation during a strike of agricultural workers demanding decent working conditions at the Durst Ranch in Wheatland, California, on August 3, 1913. The riot, which resulted in four deaths and numerous injuries, was subsequently blamed by local authorities, who were controlled by management, upon the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW). The Wheatland hop riot was among the first major farm labor confrontations in California and a harbinger of further such battles in the United States throughout the 20th century. - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wheatland_hop_riot
i’ll be catching the show at the gorge amphitheater this weekend. saw Bob in KC last summer for a couple of special Dylan sets. looking forward to this appearance and whatever that may bring.
i’m heartened to hear Willie is in good form and am also highly looking forward to the upstart phenom, Billy Strings, making a special appearance for this stop of the tour.
wish Mellencamp nothing but blessings, happiness and creative nirvana
Kate Manne is one of those fairly stupid but aggressively opinionated people who seem empowered in modern academia, or perhaps I should say modern academic social media
Let's keep the comments off of Kate Manne, since I only mentioned her in the earlier version of the essay as a result of a misattribution, which I've now corrected and for which I've now apologized. I have some substantial objections to the general project of ameliorative analysis, which I should make an effort to develop and to share, but I do not think she is stupid. My error here was to allow my substantial objections to shape my memory of what I had previously read in her piece: i.e., bias! So again, let's have no more comments on Kate Manne, or I'll have to close them.
But it isn't true that Kate Manne's 'precise claim was that country music is “pat and whiney”', she's entertaining a hypothetical where having "previously found" it "pat and whiney" she might listen more to find what is excellent in it.
Anyway, thanks for the preparation for my own encounter to come with Dylan (November) and here's a John Cougar referencing song from the (sadly now defunct) Bottle Rockets
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iJVqJdKhh1A
You're right! I'm going to correct that, with apologies.