distributedlife

Dylan doesn’t speak to me. Not anymore. Now, he doesn’t even pick up the phone when I call. He probably doesn’t speak to my generation either. Not in the way he spoke to the previous generations. History tells me that Dylan was the voice of the American counterculture of the sixties. Something about the civil rights movement. At this point I’m just reading off the Wikipedia article.

That is where I find Dylan now, in the history books. I was never there; I wasn’t even born near there. Robin Williams once said that if you can remember the sixties you were not there.

I own some of Dylan’s music, I don’t have every album but I’ve got the important songs. The ones I need to recognise when a montage of the sixties is being shown on the Simpsons. Sixties montages is Dylan and California Dreamin’ from the Mamma’s and Pappas, Seventies is Credence Clearwater Revival and Fortunate Son.

To some extent, I think it is hard to be a Dylan fan when you weren’t born in his era. There is an expectation that one knows his music and to like his music. When we talk about Dylan’s music the songs on the first half of the compilation spring to mind; Blowin’ in the Wind, Like a Rolling Stone, Subterranean Homesick Blues, etc.

I like the aforementioned songs and others. I just don’t feel the same about them as someone who experienced the sixties. There is a difference between lyrics and lyrics with a deeper contextual meaning. Anyone can appreciate great lyrics. Not everyone gets the contextual meaning. You have to experience it first hand and only first hand.

One day I bought The Essential Bob Dylan collection for surprisingly little. I love finding an album or compilation for less than $10. The price is right and I get to expand my music collection. It had the usual Dylan on the first disc while the second contained, to me, some new Dylan.

One of the songs was Not Dark Yet.

This song made a difference to how I see Dylan. I bought the compilation because I know I needed to have Dylan in my collection. I liked Dylan and I didn’t really own much. In the end I don’t play Dylan much, except for this one song.

I can’t quite articulate what I like about this song. What I can say is that I like this song because of the little lyrical effort that was needed to conjure up the atmosphere. As a writer this is a skill I want to learn. I would spend several hundred words just to say what Dylan said in the first two lines.

In the end Not Dark Yet, out of all the songs that Dylan has written, I like the best. It is a both a song that I appreciate and understand and one that I did on my own terms. I wasn’t told to like it.

This is my Bob Dylan. It’s not tied to history; not to be interpreted as a protest song. It’s just a great song by a great singer-songwriter.