Bob Dylan review, Rough and Rowdy Ways: There’s real consolation in the easy-going embrace of his contradictions
The IndependentSign up to Roisin O’Connor’s free weekly newsletter Now Hear This for the inside track on all things music Get our Now Hear This email for free Get our Now Hear This email for free SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Over a gentle wash of piano and cello, the 79-year-old Dylan – whose car now sports a World’s Best Grandpa bumper sticker – croaks: “Twas a dark day in Dallas, November ’63/ A day that will live on in infamy…” The early rhymes and clichés are a bit naff. The title, lifted from Walt Whitman, is played off against blood feuds, painted nudes, Bowie’s “all the young dudes” and Chopin preludes – although the games come with menaces. This song finds Dylan’s voice – once described by Joyce Carol Oates as “sandpaper singing” – sounding wonderfully bleached and cracked. Dylan ended his Nobel lecture reminding us that: “Songs are alive.” It’s true.
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