taylor-mayed's Full Review: Bob Dylan's Greatest Hits [Remaster] by Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan is possibly unique amongst musicians in that he has become famous all over the world and earned the respect and admiration of his peers without ever really aspiring to achieve mainstream commercial success. He writes and performs songs about whatever subject he chooses and writes them in any way he sees fit, without thinking about what the record companies or the public or anybody else will think.
It is unlikely that such an individual will ever come to prominence again, and so Dylan is without doubt and artist who should be treasured. However, his style does not appeal to everyone, and there are criticisms that can be made of him. For one thing, much of his material does to a certain degree sound very similar; his variation of musical styles is very narrow. Another criticism is the somewhat downbeat and even depressing nature of many of the songs – a happy Bob Dylan will be released on the day the devil goes to work on a snow plough. He’s not a great singer and few of his songs could be accused of pushing any instrumental boundaries.
Despite all of this, a ‘best of’ collection of Dylan’s work is still a hugely impressive compilation of many of the true folk rock anthems of the latter half of the twentieth century. It begins with “Blowin’ in the Wind”, a very simple yet also effective song that gets its message across clearly without ever distracting from it with fancy musical flourishes or vocal gymnastics.
Possibly his best-known song follows quickly, “The Times They Are A-Changin’ ”. A genuine classic song that, despite the warning of its title, has indeed managed to stand the test of time and stand it well. It works, like many Dylan tracks, because it sums up feelings and ideas that are familiar to many of us and does so with a very simple but at the same time catchy tune.
An even catchier tune is “Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right”, a much fuller-sounding song in musical terms than the first few tracks, with some impressive acoustic guitar work complimented by Dylan’s trademark harmonica sound and deep, philosophical vocal performance. “Mr Tambourine Man” sounds much like the kind of psychedelic, nonsensical numbers John Lennon would come out with during the second half of The Beatles’ career and although his production and arrangement can’t even touch that of the fab four, that’s never really the point of his songs and this is another Dylan anthem that has been much covered and praised down the years.
“Like a Rolling Stone” is a sneering reproach to a woman who has fallen from grace after having lived a high-society life, having thought that she was better than others below her station and now finding herself amongst them. As with all Dylan songs the vocal is clear and powerful even if not particularly pleasing on the ear, and the lyric does sound almost unpleasantly bitter.
The trademark harmonica is wheeled out again for this song and for the one that follows it, “Just Like a Woman”, yet another song that is critical of the woman about whom it is being sung. There’s not a lot I can say about the musical arrangement of this song without sounding like I’m repeating myself yet again – nice acoustic guitar, the harmonica, but also a rattling drum beat present here that does differentiate it somewhat from the previous tracks.
“All Along the Watchtower” is another Dylan classic with a slightly faster pace to it that makes it much more pleasant to listen to than some of the other tracks. Certainly this original version is good enough for even the mighty U2 to have made arses of themselves when attempting to cover it on “Rattle and Hum” some twenty-odd years down the line.
Yet another in the impressive line-up of Dylan songs to have stood the test of time and stood it well is “Lay Lady Lay”, and it is quite impressive how different he makes his vocal sound on this track – deep and booming with an odd, otherworldly echoing quality that makes it sound quite unique amongst the other songs in this collection.
Songs of freedom are two a’ penny in any decade you care to mention, and especially so in the 1960s when they seemed to be cropping up all over the place. “I Shall Be Released” is one of Dylan’s own contributions to this genre, going back to the style of the earlier tracks on this collection with its simplicity, merely guitar and harmonica to compliment Dylan’s vocal. The overdubbing of an echo onto the chorus gives it an eerie quality however, although it is not ineffective.
“If Not For You” seems quite a step out of the norm for Dylan in that is could almost be described as being quite upbeat, almost happy even, although not quite so the devil can keep his snow plough in the garage for now. I personally prefer the cover version by Dylan’s good friend George Harrison, but the original is not without its merits, losing out to Harrison in my rankings simply because the ex-Beatle has a far better singing voice than Dylan.
“Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door” is a song that is nothing short of legendary. It has been covered hundreds of times by artists as far removed from Dylan as Guns N Roses, and most recently sampled on Gabrielle’s smash hit single “Rise”. A simple song about a dying sheriff, it has a kind of indefinable magic to it that makes it appeal to fans of good music whatever generation they belong to. The only slight criticism I would make of it is the ending – it just seems to fade to nothing in the middle of the song quite suddenly.
This classic is followed by one of my own personal favourite Dylan tracks, “Forever Young”, another simple but effective song of a man wishing well to a love from whom he has been parted – either by distance or death, it’s not entirely clear, but then again many of the best songs have ambiguous meanings behind them.
“Tangled Up in Blue” comes as something of a jolt on this album as it is quite different from the trademark Dylan style of the previous tracks, with the harmonica, although present, less overstated than in other tracks. It’s a ballad of a failed marriage between an eloping couple, and shows Dylan’s song writing ability at it’s very best, telling a complete narrative in song form like a modern day minstrel. There’s also some tremendous wit hidden in this song – for instance, where he tells of getting a job in the woods, but one day “the axe just fell”. It’s not a happy story by any stretch of the imagination, but it does get the listener involved and you can’t help but keep paying attention to see how it all ends up the first time that you hear it.
“Oh Sister” also serves up something a little difference with the appearance of Emmylou Harris on backing vocals, shadowing Dylan’s lead like an echo. However, this is something of a double-aged sword, for although it lends the song a unique quality, Harris’s voice shows up just what an average singer Dylan really is.
Something very different creeps up on the listener with “Gotta Serve Somebody” when suddenly and without warning electric guitars appear. This may have sent Dylan purists into a spin, but no artist survives his entire career writing and performing the same style of songs, no matter how good they are at that style and how successful they have been. The female backing vocals on the chorus, the slick-sounding production and the style of the song all help to make this a very modern-sounding Dylan, and I personally find the results quite pleasing.
This ‘neo-Dylan’ is also present on the equally slick and modern-sounding “Jokerman”. This song was a wonderfully melancholic quality to it; it brings up in the mind images of sunsets at the end of summer, a strange feeling of nostalgia and sadness all combining to create one of the truly classic Dylan numbers.
“Everything is Broken” begins with something of the feel to a TV theme tune to it – not to say that it is in any way lightweight, merely that it creates an immediate sense of atmosphere and it a catchy, pacey number. It does, however, seem closer to being pop music than just about anything else on this album, whether this is simply because of the pace or the slightly nonsensical lyric is difficult to tell. Dylan fans though will doubtless be cheered when the harmonica puts in an appearance in the middle of this song!
The album closes with “Shelter from the Storm”, a much more traditional Dylan number with a return to the simple guitar and harmonica formula. Dylan’s vocal is unusually strong and distinctive in this song, proving that he could sometimes muster a decent vocal performance, but I still feel that many of his songs sound a lot better when they are covered by other artists.
So to sum up a collection such as this, what can I say? If you don’t like Bob Dylan’s style of music then it is unlikely that you will find this album very appealing, as here is so little deviation from that established style that won him so many fans in the 1960s. If you do like Bob Dylan, the chances are you already have most of these songs on your albums anyway. If you are undecided about him or unfamiliar with his work and would like to give him a try, this is just about as good a place to start as any. Who knows? You might just be pleasantly surprised with what you hear.
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