@Willie McTell : Maybe some of us don’t want to be outside of the loop, if we can’t immediately relate to whatever song or project Bob is currently releasing. But sometimes you just find yourself over the line. When it comes to Triplicate, I’m outside of the loop. CITH doesn’t exist to me. TTL and MT are both very good. I’ve listened to Tempest all the way through less than a dozen times. I have enjoyed hearing many live versions of Tempest songs when Bob’s voice started to improve. If you like cigars you should like the Tempest album.
More fun with Kennedyesque codes in the lyrics: I convinced myself the "Acid Queen" is both the obvious Tommy/Who nod, and meant to make us think of Mary Pinchot Meyer (who, in the JFK CT world, likely turned JKF on to acid and was herself murdered in a suspcious manner) and wondered if there was any "Tommy" connected to her story that might have been suggested....and now offer Thomas Braden, who people of my age might remember as Pat Buchanan's co host on the old CROSSFIRE tv show, and who was as one source expresses it "linked" in his own way to "Mary's ex-husband. Cord Meyer succeeded Braden as the chief of International Organizations Division. IOD was a CIA sponsored front for manipulating international groups."
Socrates---would love more context on this, can you provide the link or where this interview appeared/who conducted it?
That’s why I said I don’t know if it’s real. I usually have a pretty good memory for the interviews. Ask some dude at expectingrain where I got that from.
I never really got into Shadows In The Night, Fallen Angels and Triplicate myself. Perhaps one day I’ll give them another go. I like Christmas In The Heart taken at face value. It’s a novelty record but It works for me. I love Modern Times and Tempest. Together Through Life didn’t grab me apart from the wonderful I Feel a Change Comin’ On.
SHADOWS vexes me. I think most of the songs are great and have loved them in other contexts. And I find that general weird spooky spectral almost Hawaiian late night reverie approach of Bob's voice and the band in theory very appealing. But mashing the two together makes something I have yet to actually enjoy, tho feel it lingers on the edge of appealing in some manner and I might grow to love. It became the last Bob I bought (except for box set archive stuff) after a lifetime buying Bob day of release. Checked out FALLEN from library. Just gave TRIPLICATE a half listen on Spotify.
I think if the Tempest album’s vocals would have been more like the improved touring vocals, I would have liked the album much more.
Pretty much my exact experience of Shadows through Triplicate! Thank gawd for The Bootleg Series and the Live boxes!
That’s an interesting point. How does MMF compare for you in comparison to the Tempest album? Given the choice, or Dylan’s got a gun to your head and says to you “you must choose one or else.....”
JFK et al are merely vehicles in the message so it’s relation to the timing of its release is not any more relevant than anything else he has ever released. Although the poignancy of the message and our current state of affairs is not lost on me, which his accompanying message seems to confirm... I’ll borrow a quote from the ER thread, I’m no expert in explaining art appreciation... “It's purely subjective if a song is a masterpiece or not.Every person will have their view,and one view is just as valid as another.” Motherwell Off the top of my head, I’d rank probably 25 tracks as masterpieces, this occupying one spot. That so many are mystified by it is remarkable proof of its success
Maybe I’d just tell Bob to pull the trigger if I had to choose either MMF or Tempest. Or, I could always quote Keith Richards: “I must be a masochist or something. I bring out the sadist in you.”
The people who don't like it are proof of it's success? This is even more rickety than that his winning the Nobel prize means this is a great song. But you are saying that this is beter than all but 24 Dylan songs. That's progress. I'd like to know how that could be. It really is about appealing to sentimentality more than anything else, and in that is not good Dylan, IMO.It feels stale and not fresh. The appeal of 65 Dylan was the wit, style and sharpness of his poetic lyrics. Not the subject matter, or the politics of the day, or the South or anything other than BD.
I noticed no sentimentality in my understanding of the message. I could see where one hung up on the vehicle would see that tho... Also, I didn’t mention anything about those who don’t like it But we’re also at a point where the same points are being revisited every few pages, there is a lot of great information here for those that are compelled to explore, afterall that’s where the fun is, no?
It's sentimental to pursue Dylans mind through all this CT nonssnse, and call it a poignant something or other. It's very sentimental to need some great message from the man now. It's sentimental to defend him from all criticism because he is "Bob Dylan after all"
I’m not defending him from any criticism, everyone is open to their own subjective interpretation of the track.
Are you mystified enough that, should you come to be more enlightened about it, it "could" stop being a masterpiece?
Literary and other criticism is all about exactly the things that old dog dylan heads like me are using to compare the great work to the new work. But all we get is that "he is BD. Shut up" It's to comapre style, theme, psychology, message, intent, context (a big one that no one here is addressing) and: Wit. The posts praising the song are too vague and to me, they avoid the true comparisons.
Well, I’m honest enough with myself to understand that my brain is fluid and that as I’ve matured my appreciations have as well. Some things have remained constant but others have grown as I’ve aged. I wouldn’t think that my appreciation for this message would diminish, but I haven’t heard the other side of the album yet
