'no direction home - bob dylan'

[crackedpaint]

Hello

I was fascinated by the following comments in the recent Matin Scorsese film ‘No Direction Home – Bob Dylan’ because they are fascinating and also that I like to think about people like Dyaln in these terms.

Liam Clancy – ‘in old Irish mythology they talk about the shape changers – he (BD) changed voices, he changed images – it wasn’t necessary for him to be a definitive person – he was a receiver – he was possessed’

BD – upon finding an old record on and old record player at ten years old (song ‘drifting to far from the shore) ‘the sound of that record made me feel like I was somebody else – that I was maybe not even born to the right parents or something’

Bob Johnson – ‘ he’s got the holy spirit about him – you can look at him and see that’

Allen Ginsberg – upon seeing him in concert ‘at one, or became identical with his breath, dylan had become a column of air so to speak, at certain moments, where his two physical and mental forces was this single breath coming out of his body, he had found a way in public to be almost like a shaman, with all the intelligence and consciousness focused on his breath’

BD – ‘I had gotten in the door when no one was looking – I was in there now and there was nothing anybody from then on could ever do about it’

regards

[sidecross]

I have considered Dylan to be an undocumented shaman for a long time.

I have watched ‘No Direction Home’ 4 times and still feel the same way.

[Rob P]

.......

I was up until 3:30 AM last night (this morning)
watching the whole thing on PBS, and I still feel
the need to buy the DVD....!!

It was really inspiring.....

seeya

r o b

.......

[ October 02, 2005, 05:33 AM: Message edited by: Rob P ]

[MidnightDreary]

I feel you Rob. After watching it twice on PBS I immediately went out and grabbed the DVD.

Bryan

[craazyman]

Like all great lyrical poets he found innate rhythms and melodies in language that were utterly unique and original to him and perfectly suited to his themes, a "discovery" so to speak. For me anyway, reading his stuff is much less effecting than hearing it. Although one could say the same about just about any songwriter--just like you can't read a screenplay and feel it as much as a novel. Of course not. I kinda got Dylaned-out several years ago. Too overloaded with him and it and all of it. As I grew older, it struck me hard as the music of youth. Some of the characters/scenes/situations he sings about are just too "cool" and monodimensional, I dunno, but the language is always intricate and pure. He's a genius, no question. Cryptic and remote. Although I'm still not sure, in the long run, if there's a there there, one that will last as more than the anthem of an age.

[sidecross]

One of my favorite Dylan pieces is not even a song. I heard it first from a friend, but it is now available on the ‘Bob Dylan: the bootleg series volume 1’.

It is 7 minute and 7 second free verse tribute to Woody Guthrie and is titled ‘Last Thoughts On Woody Guthrie’. There is no musical accompaniment and his recitation could have been delivered with less hurry, but even so it is a wonderful piece of writing that sadly not many have heard or read.

[gone]

http://www.buddyhead.com/mp3blog/BobDylan-LastThoughts.mp3

[sidecross]

Good post gelfer!

[willoweyes]

What did this special teach me about Bob Dylan, my God? (yes). That he ripped out his wide-open eyes when he betrayed perfect love and Joan. From that point on, it was all about going deeper inward.

[tana]

oh, what a great documentary!! dylan, above all else, remained true to the muse...and he served as a shaman, for sure. (as many musicians have.)

i liked what al kooper said... god didn't just touch dylan on the head...he kicked him in the ass!

[ October 03, 2005, 04:22 PM: Message edited by: tana ]

[sidecross]

A comparison of Dylan’s work to Samuel Beckett’s work can be made from the below quote from the book The Philosophy of Samuel Beckett by John Calder.

“Success and failure are neither significant nor different, as they lead inevitably to the same end. Success is only a trap, offering a temporary and false security which can crumble and fall away at any time…”

Dylan lived these very thoughts as well.

[craazyman]

Just listened to Dylan's tribute to Woody Guthrie. Good God. I took the subway once out to Brighton Beach Brooklyn to have a nice Russian lunch on that ocean boardwalk on a summer Sunday. Climbing down the metal stairs from the elevated tracks a block from the beach I kept thinking I wonder where he lived around there. I couldn't see Woody Guthrie living anywhere near Brooklyn, especially Brighton Beach. What the hell was he doing there? Playing Radio City? With all the concrete and tenaments edging up on the trash strewn beach. It seemed impossible to fit him inside a place like that. It seemed like the hideous prison of some big sky prarie saint. And to think of him later on lying in that Brooklyn hospital, can't move his arms and legs writing in that simple longhand Why, Oh God, Why, Oh God, Why. I saw a sketch on a CD cover of his songs. He had done it, it was of a crowd inside a Texas dance hall. It could have been from a Van Gogh or Goya sketchbook. I doubt he ever had an art lesson. To be able to see the wholeness of things the way he did and then to bring it back as simply as he did. Good Lord. Think of the difference between Blood on the Track's Simple Twist of Fate and Guthrie's So Long, Been Good to Know Ya. Same situation. But with Dylan it's pyschoanalyzed down to the neon of a hotel sign and locked up inside cryptic riddles of words. With Guthrie it's just the tragedy of two people who bounce off each other before dust returns to dust in sentences you could use when talking to your mother. "And in the 1950s, Guthrie was blacklisted, which prompted a typically glib response: "I ain't a Communist necessarily, but I been in the red all my life.""