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15/02/2006

Dylan among the folkies

Great musicians such as Dylan - and Miles Davis - have the ability to transcend genre. Just as Davis could ennoble less-than-engaging musics such as funk and rap, so Dylan and folk music.

Recent TV coverage of Dylan among his early 1960s US folkie peers – Baez, Seeger, Paxton et al – was a vivid reminder of just how much he raised the folk game. While I struggle to listen for more than two bars to the drear, drab self-regarding ideologues spouting their simplistic worldview in unconvincingly “authentic” voices, I can listen to Dylan’s folk recordings for hours on end.

Almost alone in the folk genre, Dylan writes and performs traditional acoustic music as if it’s current - as if it’s actually saying something worth hearing.


Gerry Smith

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