OT: introductions and music-Dylan and Green Day

[ameliagoldfeesh]

--- In the_old_crowd at yahoogroups.com, SongBird3411 at a... wrote:
> <SNIP>
> Finally managed to upgrade most of my Beatles collection to CD, so 
I  have been enjoying that.  
> U2- "How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb"
> Green Day- "American Idiot"
<SNIP>

Jen Reese wrote:
<SNIP>
***Current/recent listening:
Recently bought a bunch of college favorites that I never converted 
from cassette tape: Dire Straits, Bob Dylan, U2, Meat Loaf.
<SNIP>

A Goldfeesh:
You ladies are after my own heart. Just two days ago it was brought 
forcibly to my attention that I both need to update and burn some 
CDs.   I went to listen to Dylan's Planet Waves (Forever Young and 
You Angel You) and Nashville Skyline (Lay Lady Lay) and found that 
not only do I not have them on CD, that I don't even have them taped 
off anymore.  On top of that I found my 1970s, awesome portable 
record player needs a bit of speaker repair!  I get a fiancee and 
neglect my record player and collection- who knew? :)

For anyone who loves, or at least, knows Dylan and needs a new book 
to read, I can recommend two.  The first goes without saying, 
Chronicles Vol. 1, his autobiography. He is so Bob in it, he talks 
of his life yet is so so very elusive at the same time.  From this 
first book you wouldn't know he was married twice, the names of his 
parents or even the names of his wives, while at the same time he 
tells a lot of his story that you didn't know.  At one point he 
gives the name Becky Thatcher as a childhood friend- I said "wow, he 
named a name!" until I realized it was Becky Thatcher to his Tom 
Sawyer. *L*

The second book, the reason I was looking for my CDs, is by 
Christopher Ricks, "Dylan's Visions of Sin." Ricks, a humanities 
prof and Dylan fan focuses fourteen or so songs reflect the 7 Deadly 
Sins and the 7 Heavenly Virtues.  In additon, he brings in Keats, 
William Blake and other poet comparisons.  This book made me 
remember why I love Bob so much. He points out things on word usage 
and rhymes that I would never dream of and made me reappreciate 
songs that I'd became over-familiar with.

This book also makes mention of A.S.Byatt, reviled of Potter fans, 
who says (with equal lack of vision) paraphased that-- she could 
find layers and layers in Keats yet couldn't go through a Dylan 
lyric because she wouldn't know where to begin.  Well that just 
reinforces my opinion of self-important has-beens.

To change the subject a bit- Green Day!  I recall them in high 
school on the radio but I was too much into the Beatles and Dylan.  
I would have never guessed that in ten years they would come out 
with such a masterpiece as American Idiot.  They are so right on 
when it comes to media and politics and politicians and the average 
person. I never would have dreamed they had it in them.  There is so 
much I'd like to say about the media and politics and the media 
eating out of the hands of the politicians and lobbyists and the 
powerlessness of the average person but- I'd better not.

A (wordy) Goldfeesh- 

Idiot wind, blowing like a circle around my skull,
>From the Grand Coulee Dam to the Capitol  

or 

Don't wanna be an American idiot.
One nation controlled by the media.
Information nation of hysteria.
It's going out to idiot America.