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24/01/2007

Theme Time radio – a weekly delight

I can’t remember the last time I sat down for an hour every week to listen to a radio series, but I’ve been cancelling everything to get into my favourite armchair to hear Theme Time Radio Hour as it’s broadcast.

Dylan’s series, now playing in England on Fridays at 9pm on BBC 6 Music, is a weekly delight. Just as he did with Chronicles, Dylan is displaying his mastery of yet another medium.

Last week’s show, Fathers, was typical of the quality of the series: a delicious setlist which, inter alia: underlined the sheer quality of Hank Williams’ writing and performing; revealed the little-heard country side of the timeless Everly Brothers, and reminded you why John Hiatt was widely regarded as the coming man in the 1980s, when Dylan was still in his least productive period (note to self: dig out Slow Turning, Hiatt’s masterpiece from 1988).

You’d be very hard-pressed to find a more telling introduction to 20thC American popular music than Bob Dylan’s theme Time Radio Hour series.

Dylan’s scripts are so beautifully written - and delivered - that they’re bound to be stitched together, without the music, by hardcore Dylanistas. And the cod-nostalgic production style, replicating (but slyly, in a Dylanesque, Post-Modern way) the style of radio before TV, is inspired.

Theme Time Radio Hour, like the other media in which Dylan has worked (OK, maybe not film), shows a peerless creativity in action. I’ll be surprised to hear of any Dylan aficionado who doesn’t own a complete series of recordings before too long.

This week’s programme tackles the theme of Weddings. Can’t wait!


Gerry Smith

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