Retro Review Robert Style

Robert Zimmerman is the greatest rock and roller of all time in my opinion. He did it all: he wrote beautiful insightful acoustic material, then shunned this whole crowd and turn out a few amazing rock, almost garage, albums. Then shunned that audience by going country. The he had a huge fall and holed himself up for eight year. He released an album that by most people’s interpretations was intentionally flawed to lose all his fans. A decade after his “creative peak” he released a masterpiece that could have never been written by him at any other period of time. He then went very secular Christian, which of course and very beautifully alienated most of his liberal “open minded” fan base. Then he similarly reject the G-O-D. Then he fell into that awful 80s slump (but who didn’t?) but now seems to have fallen into an old age streak of quality albums. He made turn after turn after turn that seemed to contradict everything he had done in the past but he never mentioned it or apologized or tried to explain. I’m pretty sure he sold his soul to the devil and/or was crazy but that seems to be all cleared up now. That Christianity thing does work.

His music styles were as varied as his lyrical content. He's the King of the Put Down song while he can also sing about goddess women. He can write absurdist humor and serious protest. He can write straight forward obvious lyrics and metaphorical song that couldn't be figured out, even with an index. He could rip apart the entire world then build it back up. For a period there, he could write any god damn thing he wanted to.

This description, of course, sucks because a few brief paragraphs could never sum up what thousands of scholars still can’t figure out: “What’s the deal with that Dylan guy?”

So since Dylan’s catalog is so extensive (and I don’t even own it all) I’m gonna split it up so it’s not one giant post.