In this week's throwback, I am continuing with Bob Dylan's albums. Blonde on Blonde is the first double studio album in the history of music and probably the best record of Dylan's career. It's as if Dylan wanted to say with this record that he is the best and he can do whatever he wants, even make a record that is two times better than the average. And he was right. Maybe only The Beatles could compete with him at that time.
Today's generation can not comprehend fully the social turbulence and creative outburst of the 60s. We can often hear how 21st century is the pinnacle of humanity, how our knowledge of the world and development of technology gave us ample opportunities. I am not impressed. Besides technogical advancement, I am pretty sure we are far from social and creative revolution of the 60s, and the abundant opportunities are only reserved for the rich an unscrupulous. Music, film and art is general is significantly less thrilling then it was back then, and no one can convince me that it's other way around. Dylan is also aware of this. He knows how important the whole movement was, and how major his role was in it. In the center of that paradigm shifting hurricane were The Beatles and Bob Dylan with their albums Revolver and Blonde on Blonde.
Blonde on Blonde was released in 1966, a year before summer of love and LSD boom, and Dylan has already opened the gates for drug-friendly universe in a song that opens the album - Rainy Day Woman #12 and 35. The band sounds like a circus, tune sounds like it was made in thirty minutes and Dylan screams Everybody must get stoned. Brilliant.
Pledging My Time is ordinary blues, but it is performed magnificently on mouth harmonium. Following is Visions of Johanna, a foggy and trippy melody full of halucinogenic and undetectable, obscure styles. I would say this is one of the best pieces Dylan has ever created. The same applies to Stuck Inside Of Mobile With the Memphis Blues Again, the song I return to the most. It is phenomenal on so many levels: from the simple melody, warm play and vibrant atmosphere to poetic inspiration that only Goddesses could provide you with. An angelic song.
I am also biased about I Want You, a cute little love song. Dylan yearns, whines and cries while harmonikais truly pathetic, but it is still a golden tune. And there is a lot of gold here: Absolutely Sweet Marie has a catchy piano phrase you will not get rid off for months; One Of Us Must Know (Sooner Or Later) kicks ass with organ and Dylan's powerful interpretation; 4th Time Around seduced with its simplicity. One of his biggest classics is Just Like A Women with Dylan's charming vocal cementing it in the pantheon of contemporary music. Leopard Skin Pill-Box Hat is electric blues number that covers tendencies of consumeristic minds, and I don't think blues has ever sounded so fucking good. The album is closed with 11 minute long Sad Eyed Lady Of The Lowlands that many perceived as acquired taste.
This is not a regular album. This is the best album of one of the best artists this planet has ever witnessed. If you listen to Blonde on Blonde carefully, you will hear the soundtrack for revolution.
