Artist: Bob Dylan
Album: Highway 61 Revisited
Year: 1965
Man, this guy Dylan's churning out albums left and right at this point. Bringing It All Back Home arrived in March 1965, and by August of the same year, its follow-up, Highway 61 Revisited had arrived. While The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan had been strictly a folk affair, and Bringing It All Back Home had a mix of folk and rock, Highway 61 Revisited was all about the rawk.
Really, at its core this album feels like blues mixed with rock and interesting lyrics. The music isn't too far off from B.B. King's Live at the Regal. I can understand why this album is as lauded as it is. There are two songs that are absolutely smashing. "Like a Rolling Stone" is usually considered one of the best songs of all-time, deservedly so. It's everything you want in a pop song--catchy, thought-provoking lyrics (maybe about "Factory Girl" Edie Sedgwick?), an empassioned delivery (how does it feeeeeeeeeeeel?!?). The other one is slow-burner "Ballad of a Thin Man," which sounds like the prototype for "Hotel California" to me for some reason, an attack on a faceless member of the media, "Mr. Jones," who is incapable of understanding Dylan's music or the counterculture movement at-large. The acoustic closer "Desolation Row" is also fantastic.
I think I prefer the full set of songs found on Bringing It All Back Home. It feels like a tighter set to me. Both albums, however, are well worth listening to. I can see Highway 61 Revisited as an album that will grow upon me the more I listen to it. I can also see it as a gigantic influence on lots of other bands I have liked over the years. Maybe in due time I will come to love it as much as everyone else seems to.
Rating: Worth repeated listens
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