Joan Baez "Don't Think Twice, It's All Right" BBC In Concert, June 5, 1965.

music review #2 - blowin' in the wind

rating: 10/10 song: blowin' in the wind album: the freewheelin' bob dylan (1963) artist: bob dylan

Originally published in the late May 1962 publication of Broadside Magazine, it is considered one of Dylan’s best compositions in his over 60-year career. Its iconic introductory line, “How many roads must a man walk down / Before you call him a man?”, has been sung by countless artists such as Stevie Wonder, Neil Young, and Mary Travers. This line can be interpreted in many different ways and contexts, but one way it can be interpreted is simply, how many experiences and how much life should a man have lived before he is considered an “adult”? Before he has the privileges that men have in our society? This can also be linked back to the Civil Rights Movement and how people of color, specifically Black people were not considered human and still are dehumanized to this day. The fact the tune is based off of an old slave protest song called “No More Auction Block for Me” emphasizes this idea even more. The next line I’d like to focus on is “Yes, and how many years can some people exist / Before they’re allowed to be free?”. Again, Dylan tackles slavery, and calls for the freedom of all oppressed individuals and groups. Dylan is clearly tired of white Americans and Europeans “deciding” when certain peoples are “allowed” to be free, and instead wishes that people who have existed for so long should finally just exist without prejudice. The next line of the song is also significant here; Dylan sings, “Yes, and how many times can a man turn his head / And pretend that he just doesn’t see?” -- and just a few lines later -- “Yes, and how many ears must one man have / Before he can hear people cry? [See Joan Baez’s “To Bobby”] / Yes, and how many deaths will it take ‘till he knows / That too many people have died?”. Here, he is actively calling out those who choose to ignore the oppressions that plague society. Within the context, it was likely written about the Vietnam war as Dylan was outwardly and adamantly anti-war in the early '60s, but can be interpreted to just about any atrocity in history. And finally, the refrain of the song; “The answer is blowin’ in the wind”. Dylan has said in reference to this song that people who choose to ignore the wars are the biggest criminals, and I believe here, he is saying that the answer is obvious, yet so many people actively ignore it. Obviously, from the very second one hears human suffering, their response should be to help, but so many stay neutral and act like they don’t have basic human decency or common sense. Neutrality is one of the biggest crimes in the eyes of 21-year-old Bob Dylan.

Bob Dylan The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan 1963 Columbia ————————————————— Tracks: 01. Blowin’ in the Wind 02. Girl from the North Country 03. Masters of War 04. Down the Highway 05. Bob Dylan’s Blues 06. A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall 07. Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right 08. Bob Dylan’s Dream 09. Oxford Town 10. Talking World War III Blues 11. Corrina, Corrina 12. Honey, Just Allow Me One More Chance 13. I Shall Be Free —————————————————

Bob Dylan

* Long Live Rock Archive

Corrina, Corrina

Gal, you’re on my mind

Corrina, Corrina

Gal, you’re on my mind

I’m a-thinkin’ ’bout you, baby

I just can’t keep from crying.

Lecture 6: Bob Dylan (a.k.a., Robert Allen Zimmerman), the towering giant of the folk revival, performs his legendary song “Blowin’ in the Wind” on television, 1963. The song originally appeared on his second studio album, The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan (1963). It went on to become one of Dylan’s most beloved ballads, and was remade a number of times by such singers as Joan Baez, Stevie Wonder, and  Peter, Paul and Mary. Dylan’s songs were anthems of a generation and reflected the idealism and the despair of the 1960s. Even today, Dylan remains one of the most important and influential American songwriters and musicians of all time.

I PRESENT TO YOU -> MY RECORD COLLECTION:

A Day At The Races (1976) - Queen

All Systems Go (1987) - Donna Summer

Azra (1980) - Azra

Berlin (1973) - Lou Reed

Besane noći (1988) - Magazin

Bitanga i princeza (1979) - Bijelo Dugme

Blonde on Blonde (1966) - Bob Dylan

Boy (1980) - U2

Bridge Over Troubled Water (1970) - Simon and Garfunkel

Ćiribiribela (1988) - Bijelo Dugme

Eto! Baš Hoću! (1976) - Bijelo Dugme

The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan (1963) - Bob Dylan

Gore iznad oblaka (1987) - Tutti Frutti Band

Grupa Zana (1988) - Zana

Hajde da ludujemo (1990) - Tajči

Live At The Bowl '68 (1987) - The Doors

Magical Mystery Tour (1967) - The Beatles

Nebeske Kočije (1988) - Novi Fosili

Paket aranžman (1981) - Električni Orgazam, Idoli, Šarlo Akrobata

Pearl (1971) - Janis Joplin

Pokvarena mašta i prljave strasti (1981) - Riblja Čorba

Primitive Cool (1987) - Mick Jagger

Prodavnica tajni (1988) - Bajaga i Instruktori

Rank (1988) - The Smiths

Revolver (1966) - The Beatles

The River (1980) - Bruce Springsteen

Rubber Soul (1965) - The Beatles

Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967) - The Beatles

Speaking in Tongues (1983) - Talking Heads

Street Legal (1978) - Bob Dylan

Šta bi dao da si na mom mjestu (1975) - Bijelo Dugme

Tonight (1984) - David Bowie

True Blue (1986) - Madonna

The Wall (1979) - Pink Floyd

Živo i akustično (1996) - Električni Orgazam

Timothée Chalamet and Elle Fanning as Bob Dylan and Sylvie Russo for A Complete Unknown (2024) Bob Dylan and Suze Rotolo in the cover for The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan (1963)

Jerry Schatzberg     Bob Dylan, New York City     1965

“Anything I can sing, I call a song. Anything I can't sing, I call a poem.” Bob Dylan, liner notes on “The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan”  1963

Tracklist:

Blowin' in the Wind • Girl from the North Country • Masters of War • Down the Highway • Bob Dylan's Blues • A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall • Don't Think Twice, It's All Right • Bob Dylan's Dream • Oxford Town • Talking World War III Blues • Corrina, Corrina • Honey, Just Allow Me One More Chance • I Shall Be Free

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The Best Album Per Year for Sixty Years

No-one asked for it, of course, but I do like making lists, so here's me pondering what have been the best Long Players in the album artform the past 60 years. I originally tried to keep it to just one per year, but many years that proved impossible: when listing multiple albums I have tried ranking them with the one I feel narrowly edges out the others first, and I use lower case to indicate an album that is not at the same level as others on the list but was the best I've heard from that time.

Feel free to have fun with the list and make up your own.

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1962 Bob Dylan - Bob Dylan 1963 The Freewheelin' - Bob Dylan 1964 another side of - bob dylan 1965 Highway 61 Revisited - Bob Dylan 1966 Pet Sounds - The Beach Boys / Blonde On Blonde - Bob Dylan / Revolver - The Beatles 1967 Magical Mystery Tour - The Beatles / The Velvet Underground & Nico / Parsley, Sage, Rosemary & Thyme - Simon & Garfunkel / Safe As Milk - Captain Beefheart 1968 Astral Weeks - Van Morrison / The White Album - The Beatles / Bookends - Simon & Garfunkel / We're Only In It For The Money/Lumpy Gravy - Frank Zappa 1969 Let It Bleed - The Rolling Stones / Abbey Road - The Beatles / In A Silent Way - Miles Davis 1970 Bridge Over Troubled Water - Simon & Garfunkel / Plastic Ono Band - John Lennon 1971 Imagine - John Lennon / Blue - Joni Mitchell / What's Goin' On - Marvin Gaye/ 2 - Moondog 1972 Exile On Main Street - The Rolling Stones / Discover America - Van Dyke Parks / Clear Spot - Captain Beefheart / Ege Bam Yasi - Can 1973 Raw Power - Iggy And The Stooges 1974 Blood On The Tracks - Bob Dylan 1975 Horses - Patti Smith / Discreet Music - Brian Eno / Wish You Were Here - Pink Floyd / Velvet Donkey - Ivor Cutler 1976 The Ramones - The Ramones 1977 Low - David Bowie / New Boots & Panties - Ian Dury / Marquee Moon - Television / 77 - Talking Heads 1978 Music For Airports - Brian Eno / This Year's Model - Elvis Costello / Third (Sister Lovers) - Big Star / More Songs About Music & Food - Talking Heads 1979 Unknown Pleasures - Joy Division/ Fear of Music - Talking Heads / Into The Music - Van Morrison / Sheik Yerbouti - Frank Zappa / Rust Never Sleeps - Neil Young 1980 Remain In Light - Talking Heads / Closer - Joy Division / One Trick Pony - Paul Simon / Common One - Van Morrison 1981 Faith - The Cure 1982 Thriller - Michael Jackson / 1999 - Prince / 4 - Peter Gabriel / Too Rye Ay - Dexys Midnight Runners / Big Science - Laurie Anderson / Nebraska - Bruce Springsteen 1983 Swordfishtrombones - Tom Waits / Murmur - R.E.M. / Hearts & Bones - Paul Simon / Off The Bone - The Cramps 1984 Purple Rain - Prince & The Revolution / Hatful Of Hollow - The Smiths / Various Positions - Leonard Cohen / Reckoning - R.E.M. / The Unforgettable Fire - U2 1985 Don't Stand Me Down - Dexys Midnight Runners / Rain Dogs - Tom Waits / Around The World In A Day - Prince & The Revolution / Suzanne Vega - Suzanne Vega / Hounds of Love - Kate Bush / Hunting High & Low - A-ha 1986 Parade - Prince & The Revolution / So - Peter Gabriel / The Queen Is Dead - The Smiths / Graceland - Paul Simon / Steve McQueen - Prefab Sprout / Blood & Chocolate/King of America - Elvis Costello 1987 Sign O The Times - Prince / Strangeways Here We Come - The Smiths / The Joshua Tree - U2 / Actually - Pet Shop Boys / Tango In The Night - Fleetwood Mac 1988 Irish Heartbeat - Van Morrison & The Chieftains / Green - R.E.M. / Viva Hate - Morrissey / The Serpent's Egg - Dead Can Dance / Surfer Rosa - Pixies / Naked - Talking Heads / Introspective - Pet Shop Boys / I'm Your Man - Leonard Cohen / Blue Bell Knoll - Cocteau Twins 1989 Disintegration - The Cure / Technique - New Order / Doolittle - The Pixies / Oh Mercy - Bob Dylan / Avalon Sunset - Van Morrison / Rei Momo - David Byrne / Behaviour - Pet Shop Boys / Candleland - Ian McCulloch 1990 Extricate - The Fall / The Good Son - Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds / Songs For Drella - Lou Reed & John Cale / Jonathan Goes Country - Jonathan Richman 1991 Screamadelica - Primal Scream / Achtung Baby - U2 / The Bootleg Boxset - Bob Dylan/ Having a Party with - Jonathan Richman 1992 It's A Shame About Ray - The Lemonheads / Henry's Dream - Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds / Automatic For The People - R.E.M. / Good As I Been To You - Bob Dylan / The Future - Leonard Cohen 1993 Debut - Bjork / Dubnobasswithmyheadman - Underworld / Neroli - Brian Eno / Exile In Guyville - Liz Phair / Come On Feel - The Lemonheads / Zooropa - U2 / Vena Cava - Diamanda Galas

1994 Selected Ambient Works Vol. II - Aphex Twin / Toward The Within - Dead Can Dance / Let Love In - Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds / Dummy - Portishead / Autogeddon - Julian Cope / Vauxhall & I - Morrissey 1995 Anthology - The Beatles / The Ugly One With The Jewels - Laurie Anderson 1996 Boys For Pele - Tori Amos / Gone Again - Patti Smith 1997 Ladies & Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space - Spiritualized / The Boatman's Call - Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds / Time Out Of Mind - Bob Dylan / Vanishing Point - Primal Scream 1998 Up - R.E.M. / I'm So Confused - Jonathan Richman 1999 Play - Moby / I See A Darkness - Bonnie Prince Billy 2000 XTRMNTR - Primal Scream / All That You Can't Leave Behind - U2 / The Marshall Mathers LP - Eminem / Kid A - Radiohead / KY - Lemon Jelly 2001 Vespertine - Bjork / Love & Theft - Bob Dylan / No More Shall We Part - Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds 2002 The Eminem Show - Eminem 2003 Room On Fire - The Strokes / The Man Comes Around/Unearthed - Johnny Cash / The Wind - Warren Zevon 2004 Has Been - William Shatner / How To Dismantle An Atom Bomb - U2 / You Are The Quarry - Morrissey / The Milk-Eyed Mender - Joanna Newsom / Smile - Brian Wilson 2005 Another Day On Earth - Brian Eno / Le Fil - Camille 2006 Modern Times - Bob Dylan / Surprise - Paul Simon / Love - The Beatles 2007 for emma, forever ago - bon iver 2008 vampire weekend - vampire weekend 2009 No Line On The Horizon - U2 / The XX - The XX 2010 show me the face - michelle gurevich 2011 Angles - The Strokes / So Beautiful or So What - Paul Simon 2012 Life Is People - Bill Fay / Old Ideas - Leonard Cohen 2013 Comedown Machine - The Strokes / Crimson Red - Prefab Sprout 2014 Ghost Stories - Coldplay / 1989 - Taylor Swift 2015 ★ - David Bowie 2016 Lover, Beloved - Suzanne Vega / Stranger To Stranger - Paul Simon 2017 American Dream - LCD Soundsystem / antisocialites - alvvays 2018 music for installations - Brian Eno 2019 weezer (teal album) - weezer 2020 rough & rowdy ways - bob dylan 2021 happier than ever - billie eilish / lindsey buckingham - lindsay buckingham 2022 dragon new warm mountain i believe in you - big thief

Joan Baez "Blowin' in the Wind" 1985.

Bob Dylan,1963. Rare stereo original Freewheelin' album w/four deleted songs; "Rocks and Gravel," "Let Me Die in My Footsteps," "Gamblin' Willie's Dead Man's Hand" and "Talkin' John Birch Blues." (John Birch Society was/is a white supremacist and antisemitic organization.

Hiiii Mack do you have any music recs you’d like to share??? I started listening to Hozier recently (which is relevant I promise) and I saw that he’s inspired by Joni mitchell and like some other folk artists so I was wondering if you could give me some folk reccomendations!!! (Also any other genre hehe I’m a always up for exploring new genres hehe so just as much recs as you want!)

YES OMGGGGG

ok i don't know a lot about hozier BUT from what i've gathered he was inspired by a lot of black blues musicians, which i'm sure you can google and find some he's mentioned somewhere, but that's an Accquired Taste. there are older folk bands like the Weavers, and Woody Guthrie, but cos that music is so far removed from how music today is made it is also an accquired taste, the music below is probably a little easier to get into :D (i don't mean this in a mean way i promise i really hope it doesn't come across like that)

joni mitchell is AMAZINGGGG i love her, her most famous album is Blue, which is really really good, some of my favourite songs of hers are That Song About The Midway, River (the one i just covered hehe), the Arrangment, This Flight Tonight, and also Court & Spark and Night Ride Home are some of my favourite albums of her's but they're not reallllllly folk. joni is amazing she plays guiatr in all these interesting tunings and also is a brilliant piano player :D (most of her songs aren't on spotify anymore but it's all on youtube, also cds hehe)

JOAN BAEZ oughhh joannnn she's more traditional folk music, her first self titled album she did when she was NINETEEN and it's really good, she has an amazing almost operatic voice, she didn't write as much of her own stuff but her version of old folk songs are usually some of the best versions, silver dagger, wildwood flower, love is just a four letter word and farewell angelina are some of my favourites - the last two are covers of bob dylan songs

bob dylan is arguably the most influential musician Ever and i'm not kidding, BUT he kind of only got famous cos Joan baez brought him on tour with her which is a Whole Thing (there's a lot of lore) - he has lots of famous songs but kind of only did folk music for like. a decade. sort of. it depends. but the Freewheelin' Bob Dylan 1963 is one of my favourites, also Blonde on Blonde is sort of not quite folk anymore and is really long, but Sad Eyed-Lady of the Lowlands is a brilliant song oughhh.

nick drake!!! he has this one album Pink Moon which is So Beautiful i need to listen to it again actually, he is another amazing guitar player who uses alternate tunings, his stuff is just oughhh so pretty.

simon and garfunkel! scarbourough fair and feelin groovy are nice songs hehe, for more pop-oriented folk, teh mamas and teh papas are good (california dreamin' band)

these are just some of my favourites, they're all from the early 1960s-early 1970s which was when a lot of the best folk music recordings were done, i used to be Really Into this music and i'm still very fond of a lot of it hehe <3

hope this is of some use! :D

Top 5 albums from the 60s/70s/80s

60s: the freewheelin' bob dylan (1963), highway 61 revisited by bob dylan (1965), blonde on blonde by bob dylan (1966), songs of leonard cohen (1967), bookends by simon and garfunkel (1968) honourable mention: song to a seagull by joni mitchell

70s: blue by joni mitchell (1971), for the roses by joni mitchell (1972), court and spark by joni mitchell (1974), blood on the tracks by bob dylan (1975), hejira by joni mitchell (1976) honourable mentions: the stranger by billy joel, tapestry by carole king, darkness on the edge of town by bruce springsteen, songs of love and hate by leonard cohen

80s: born in the u.s.a by bruce springsteen (1984), various positions by leonard cohen (1984), hounds of love by kate bush (1985), storm front by billy joel (1989), bleach by nirvana (1989)

MORE BOB DYLAN IN BOSTON IN ‘63 MATERIAL PART ONE -->

Today it was my pleasure to share a story about an eventful weekend Bob Dylan had in Boston sixty years ago this week over in the Boston Globe. Thanks to everyone who read, shared, and sent along kind words. The Globe let me go loooooooong, and yet, there was still lots of interesting things we simply had to cut for space. Here’s some of the cut material, plus images and links we couldn’t include, too.

Why the name error? Likely just some residual confusion from the pre-Columbia Records era where Robert Zimmerman had indeed toyed with using both spellings of the soon-to-be-famous moniker.

A 1962 Michigan show also used this spelling. Thanks to author Elijah Wald for helping me make sense of this! Here's one opinion that thinks the 'Dillon' spelling was an homage to a Green Bay Packer. But Wald's guess is that this spelling was an homage to "Gunsmoke"‘s Matt Dillon.

ABOVE: Broadside lets the cat out of the bag about the April 19 + 20 Dylan show. The Brandeis Folk Festival performance two weeks later became an official release in 2011.

Ok, so now for some weirdness that is sure to spark curiosity. The great David Wilson runs a wonderful Broadside group on Facebook. When I got going on the story, I searched for posts that mentioned Cafe Yana. I found David saying something curious in 2011:

So, I read this and get dizzy. Is there a full tape of one of the Yana performances? When asked today, Wilson believes he was confused about this earlier online assertion and that he must have been thinking of a different tape. Either way, when reached for comment, Geoff Muldaur stated, “I trust Dave’s memory, but I have no recollection. It was the Jug Band days and the party was on.” So, it’s a dead end, but sure to fuel some conjecture out there in Bob-world, for sure, yeah?

While his first LP only contained two originals, almost all of these new tracks were “Dylan compositions”—quotations are employed here to indicate that Freewheelin’ marks the blossoming of Bob Dylan’s extremely elastic interpretation of what it meant to be the ‘writer’ of a song, nicking old melodies here and lines of verse there, sometimes in alarming quantities, both from recordings and his folkie friends. In the big picture, this is simply how the folk process works, and in the organic, non-commercial world of the genre, for centuries, this is how it evolved and was sustained, and no one ever, er, thought twice about it. But as Dylan’s compositions started to turn into hits, and hits begat huge paychecks, many in the folk music scene began to look around and ask, “Wait, is this how it works?”

For instance, one song he learned from Von Schmidt in Boston, “Baby, Let Me Follow You Down,” was a highlight of Dylan’s debut album, but it also led to one of his first run-ins with questions of authorship where lawyers got involved. On the one hand, Dylan couldn’t be more clear about it, speaking over the introductory chords on the recording, “I first heard this from Rick von Schmidt...I met him one day in the Green pastures of Harvard University.” But when Dylan suggested to Rick that he should be getting some money from the sales of his album, Rick explained how he had based it on a song by Blind Boy Fuller titled “Mama Let Me Lay It on You.” Dylan’s legal representation responded that von Schmidt was correct, that he had no claim to the song, and then proceeded to copyright the composition entirely to Mr. Dylan.

Just a few weeks before Dylan’s shows there, Café Yana had been raided by the Boston police narcotics squad, nabbing songwriter Mark Spoelstra (the witness to Bob and Kweskin’s song-off) along with some members of the audience for possession of marijuana. Poor guy, he had just moved here!

SCENE SETTING: Friday April 19th, 1963 was Patriot’s Day in Boston and Paul Revere’s infamous freedom ride was reenacted by Lt. Ben White. Belgian athlete Aurele Van Den Driessche had not only taken first place in the Boston Marathon, he also set a new record. At Fenway Park, the Red Sox bested the Detroit Tigers in both games of their heated double header. Over at Boston College, preparations were being made for President Kennedy to observe the college’s 100th year with some remarks to occur the following day. It was mere weeks after The Boston Strangler’s latest victim, seventeen days before his next, and the $5000 reward for his capture wasn’t resulting in any new leads. Meanwhile, across the Charles River in Cambridge, professors Timothy Leary and Richard Alpert awaited news of their professional fate after controversy arose around their experimental decision to give Harvard graduate students mind-altering substances including Lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) and psilocybin in pursuit of the secrets of human potential.

Below, Bob reads about himself in the Oct 30 ‘63 Broadside of Boston issue backstage at Jordan Hall on 11/2/63.

Fast forward to 1965: Dylan is back in Boston to perform with a full electric band at Back Bay Theater at 209 Massachusetts Ave. David Wilson told me that earlier that day, before the show, Dylan and Bob Neuwirth showed up at the Broadside office and proceeded to just devour all back issues of Broadside, reading as many as they could, making comments to each other about this and that. They were there for hours; Wilson had some nice conversation with Neuwirth, but barely a word with bookworm-Bobby. At the end of the afternoon, BD asked Wilson if he was coming to the concert. Wilson said he had given the newspaper’s comp tickets to a writer who would cover it. Dylan said he wanted Wilson to come too and could leave tickets for him at the door. Wilson politely demurred saying, “Well I’m sure it’s completely sold out by now.” Dylan again insisted that Wilson should come see it. Finally, he agreed, “yes, please leave me tickets and I’ll be there.” Dylan, now satisfied, departed. Later that night, Wilson showed up at Back Bay Theatre only to find no tickets were under his name at the door.

Part II is here.