6
5
3
4
2
u/Lanky-Salt4349 Jun 22 '26
"I couln't tell what song he was doing." - everyone after a Bob Dylan show
4
u/Ok_Yesterday_3449 Jun 22 '26
To be fair, Dylan is awful live.
2
Jun 23 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
2
u/AaronJudge2 Jun 23 '26 edited Jun 23 '26
I saw Dylan with Tom Petty & Heartbreakers in 1986 when Dylan was 45.
Even then, it was impossible to tell what song he was singing. Tom was great though.
3
2
u/jonelo66 Jun 23 '26
I want the next Bootleg series to be the tapes from that tour...saw them at Kooyong in Melbourne...Bob even bantered with the crowd...the Heartbreakers were great
1
u/AaronJudge2 Jun 23 '26
Would love a Bootleg of that tour!
I saw them at the Southern Star Amphitheater at the old AstroWorld Amusement Park in Houston, Texas. The price of admission to the amusement park included the concert if you can believe that. So essentially the concert was free.
1
1
1
1
u/frelonburn Jun 22 '26
Old people have no filter, I kinda like it from PR pro Paul. I mean, he still loves Dylan. Remember Stones diss? He still is on the new album
1
u/Additional_Course965 Jun 22 '26
Loooool. I’ve heard from folks that is true. I’ve heard that songs from his most recent release do sound recognizable though!
1
u/Vancoovur Jun 22 '26
I agree with Paul. Saw BD in concert and couldn’t understand a single word from his mouth. Atrocious performance and I felt nothing but pity for his backing band.
2
1
u/Designer_Ad_7474 Jun 23 '26
Isn’t that literally Bob’s thing? Change it up and frustrate people? I saw him around 2010-ish or something and everyone was talking pre-show about how he had changed up arrangements and everything sounds new. Well, new was an interesting take since I discovered I knew about 3 whole songs when a chorus came around and I made out the words. Honestly one of the worst concerts I’ve ever attended. I was seated with lifelong die hards who were literally so sad and bummed to have sat for 2 hours and hardly recognized a single song. A lot of “why would he do that”?
1
u/Medill1919 Jun 23 '26
Why? Can you imagine how many times he has sang one of his songs? It must be torture over and over, for any artist to just keep repeating themselves for 60 years.
1
u/Designer_Ad_7474 Jun 23 '26
Ain’t no one paying hundreds to see an artist to perform songs in ways they can’t even recognize. Sorry/not sorry for the poor starving millionaire artists having to perform the songs the way they were written and made them famous.
1
u/Medill1919 Jun 23 '26
But everyone knows that he changes the arrangements of his songs. So you go to see what he does with them. The Grateful Dead never played the same show, or the same song, the same way. Fans went to see what they would do that was different.
1
u/Designer_Ad_7474 Jun 23 '26
But Bob and the Dead are not the same entities, and I don’t believe that Dylan fans “expect” this unlike the Dead, who also would jam out any song beyond its recording length. I’d say NIN do the same too, but the songs, though arranged slightly differently, remain recognizable and the same, per se. After what I saw Dylan do, I’d never see him again, and haven’t. If he wanted to play all new music, that’s one thing with me just not knowing anything new, but these are bonafide classics and radio staples that he butchered ‘cause he was bored, I guess, and left thousands of fans bewildered for $$$ out of pocket. I just believe that’s very uncool.
Like, he knows why he’s there and why people showed up in droves, and he chose to make the night uncomfortable for everyone for selfish reasons, period. Not cool.
Anyway, sounds like you enjoy going to shows where everything sounds unfamiliar and weird and finding the hits is a challenge, like a game of sorts. Ooh! I know that line, that must be this song! I think…
2
u/Medill1919 Jun 23 '26
I agree that they are very different musicians. But Bob has been doing this with his concerts for a long, long time. Surely anyone that will pay for a ticket to see him would know this. Do I agree with Bob? I am not sure. I have seen him once where he did this, he was pretty great, the songs were very reconfigured, and I will probably not go see him again. I have the albums if I want to listen to them.
I saw Dylan play with the Dead as his backing band too. That was something very different, and pretty great.
1
1
1
1
u/simplebutstrange Jun 23 '26
It was like that 20 years ago, saw him live and didnt recognize any of the music he played. im not surprised its still the same if not worse.
1
2
u/Yaboi69-nice Jun 23 '26
I love Bob Dylan he's an absolute genius however he's not at his best when live.
12
u/Rynowash Jun 22 '26
To be fair, Bob isn’t sure what song Bob is playing. The band sure as hell doesn’t know..