albums of the year 2006 by richard haslop
2. Bob Dylan – Modern Times (Columbia)
- surely the album event of the year, sealed by its debut week US chart topping feat, and the third successive incontrovertible pearl in an apparently never ending late career revival – self-produced, with a direct, immediate and uncomplicated sound that suits its old fashioned pre-rock pop songs as snugly as the rock ‘n’ roll, country and especially blues infested portions of the record, it incorporates, without acknowledgement or apology, the thoughts, words, tunes and ideas of a string of influences, from Civil War poet Henry Timrod to bluesmen Sleepy John Estes and Muddy Waters, yet either to accuse Dylan of plagiarism or to glibly cite the folk process, as if he has steeped himself in American culture for so long that lines like “Blues this mornin’ fallin’ down like hail” or “Meet me at the bottom, don’t lag behind, bring me my boots and shoes” somehow sneak into his songs by accident is to fail to see the brilliance of his reworking of Rollin’ And Tumblin’, tried and trusted slide riff and all, so as to accommodate a verse like “The night’s filled with shadows, the years are filled with early doom / I’ve been conjuring up all these long dead souls from their crumblin’ tombs”
Leave a Reply