Together Through Life

Well well well....oh well.....

Mrs Wife, myself and our friend Chippy went to see Bob Dylan at the SECC in Glasgow last night. Chippy had seen him before at Stirling Castle back in 2001, but for Mrs Wife and I, it was our first time in the same room as Mr Zimmerman.

I'm a big fan - I've got 20 of his 33 albums - and Mrs Wife knows enough of Dylan's music to be aware which songs are "the big ones".

Chippy and I went along knowing full well that this wasn't going to be a note-perfect rendition of Bob's classics from the 1960s and 1970. We knew that a lot of the songs are unrecognisable until he and the band hit the chorus (and even then some of them remain a mystery). We knew that his voice is essentially buggered beyond repair, although it still sounds vaguely passable on his two most recent albums.

When he and the band arrived on stage slightly later than expected (we had been told he would begin his performance at 7.30pm sharp), Bob burst straight into Maggie's Farm. And it was good. Not "wow that sounds just like the version on Bringing It All Back Home" good, but good enough that we could recognise it.

The band were good. No, correct that, the band were REALLY good - as tight a blues band as you'll ever see. But Bob seems to be enthralled by the country/blues sound at the moment, and each song was twisted to fit that template.

Far be it from me to tell a man who started performing before my parents were born how he should be singing his own songs, but when 12,500 people have shelled out fifty quid each to see you, I'd be of the opinion that you should perform your best-known songs, and perform them in such a way that they're in some way connected to the originals.

Like A Rolling Stone was horrendous. And I think Bob made it harder for himself than he needed to. If he'd stuck to the original arrangement so that the crowd could keep time and sing along, all he'd have needed to do would have been to sing the "How does it feel?" line, and the audience would have drowned him out on the rest. But it was too slow and too bluesed up. Still, at least he played it....

....which is more than can be said for most of his back catalogue. OK, he has 500 or more songs to choose from. And he must be bored of playing some of the older ones. But there were few concessions to history. All Along The Watchtower (which started with the band playing opening bars so thunderous that Chippy and I were both convinced that it was Hurricane) rolled out, and it was one of the highlights of the show, alongside The Ballad of Hollis Brown from The Times They Are A-Changin', which has long been one of my favourite Bob songs.

But. But, but, but, but. There was no It Ain't Me Babe, The Times They Are A Changin', Subterranean Homesick Blues, One Of Us Must Know, Rainy Day Women, Hurricane, Knockin' On Heaven's Door or Mr Tambourine Man.

In the case of the latter, that's probably just as well. Blowin' In The Wind closed the show, and it was the undeniable lowlight, the simple beauty of the acoustic peace anthem ripped to shreds by a band overplaying and a singer-songwriter no longer able to sing.

If any other band or artist mutilated their back catalogue the way Dylan did last night, they'd be pilloried. Imagine if Paul McCartney charged fifty quid a ticket, played two Beatles songs and another two hours of songs from his two most recent albums, all the while singing like a stroke victim. Or if Michael Jackson decides to freshen up his back catalogue at his London shows this summer by giving them a hip-hop overhaul. In either instance, there would be condemnation.

But it seems that with Bob, the very fact that he's a catankerous old bastard, and a living legend, seems to forgive to all sins. I heard countless people leaving the SECC state that the gig had been incredible.

I'm not entirely downhearted - I've seen Dylan. When all is said and done, I can say I've seen the man in the flesh, and heard him perform Like A Rolling Stone and Blowin' In The Wind. If I ever visit the pyramids in Egypt, I'll do so in the knowledge that I won't see Tutankhamun wandering around and lording it over some slaves. And I suppose it's the same with Bob - I didn't go along expecting to see the man at the peak of his powers, but instead just wanted to say I'd been there, just once, when Dylan played in Scotland.

Now I can.

(As a post script, I address this to Bob - If you're charging people fifty quid a ticket to see you, let them take photographs. I had three Group Four security guards tell me that photographs were banned by Bob himself, two tell me to delete photographs I'd already taken (aye, right) and one jump in front of me with his arms outstretched with the express intention of ruining a photo.)

Setting Off On Highway 61

Mrs Wife and I are off to Glasgow to see Bob Dylan today. So I'll leave you with the man at the peak of his powers.