Last night I journeyed to lovely St. Paul, MN to see the festival with 14,000 other people. Generally, I am not a Jam Rock fan but the tickets went on sale when it was snowing, and the last time I was at Midway was in the 90s when Wilco opened for REM, and the heavens opened up as Michael Stipe started “It’s the End of the World as We Know It” and nobody who was there has ever forgotten it ever.

Also, I figure there aren’t going to be too many chances to see ol’ Bob. Now, onto the observations.
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• I do not care for the music of My Morning Jacket. They do nothing for me at all. I hear them and there’s no quickening of my pulse or stirring in any region music ought to stir. My favorite parts of the MMJ set was when they brought out Trampled By Turtles and did Wonderful and TBT’s Alone.
• Even so, MMJ’s “Wonderful” felt really Clapton-y to me. Perhaps he’s ruined the word wonderful for all the other singers.
• After Dylan shirts and Wilco shirts, there seemed to be a high preponderance of Old 97s shirts, which I thought was kind of rad.
• My niece, Jaycie, who went to the concert with me thanks to Robin who couldn’t make it, took that picture up there.
• Incidentally, she enjoyed Bob’s set way more than I did.
• I think that’s because she had no expectations and little knowledge of Bob’s catalog and so had no shattered hopes and dreams when he busted into an unrecognizable rendition of “Tangled Up in Blue.”
• Also, I was totally ready to bail halfway thought the Dylan set, especially after the Wolfdogg pack had to leave so Wolfdogg could get to work. However, I remember back sometime in the 90s when I went to see Dylan & Paul Simon with my mom and Sister #3 and they made me leave before the show was over which I thought was totally bogus and unfair and I dragged my feet for at least two songs until they rose up and kicked my lollygagging ass.
• My favorite thing: While Heather was off flitting about the front of the stage with Delilah and Jaycie, Wolfdogg confessed that “Impossible Germany” got him right in the heart. A little while later when Heather came back she confessed how the song made her cry. I swooned a little with the adorableness of it.
• This show reminded me of why I have such a hard time quitting Wilco — they did “New Madrid,”At My Window,” and “I’m the Man that Loves You.” In fact, this show was so good it erased the Northrup show where I kind of decided to break up with Jeff Tweedy because there were entirely too many boring guitar solos.
• Every time I see Jeff Tweedy, I have flashbacks to that dream I had about him having a vagina.
• At a concert headlined by Bob Dylan you think the audience would have been rife with Faux Hippie Hipsters, however it was not. Or at least not within my field of vision. There was one hoola hooper, but I cut them some slack because it was, after all, Dylan.
• Dancing white-haired Baby Boomer hippies are kind of cute.
• After the concert I nearly had to beat down a 20something BroDude who was trying to hit on my 15-year-old niece. He totally freaked her out, but then he apologized for freaking her out and it was okay.
• People who smoke skunk weed, why? That stuff smells so bad I can’t imagine it’s doing much for you.

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I was babysitting The Tibbles last week when the new Paul Westerberg song hit my Gmail.

Because I have the job of a fifteen-year-old girl, I reacted like a fifteen-year-old girl when I saw an mp3 attached to that email. By which I mean, I dropped the Beezus, my iPad, on the couch, jumped up and did a sort of screechy, shimmying dance accompanied by about seventy-seven “holy shits!” and sixty-seven “oh my gods.”

My antics roused Cade from his deep examination of the Cocoa Krispies box. The kid is convinced that Snap, Crackle & Pop are modelled after he and his brothers. Because just like The Tibbles, the spokescharacters have one blonde, one brunette, and one redhead. Also, two brown-eyed guys and one greenish-blue-eyed guy. I think this is where the similarity ends. Cade believes someone saw The Tibbles at the grocery store and decided to turn them into cereal mascots. Trying to refute this theory with facts will earn you an evil stare and a plaintive wail of “you don’t even know the truth.”

Whatever.

So on Friday, when he noticed my dance he asked me what was going on.

“My favorite favorite favorite favorite favorite favorite favorite singer released a new song today,” I said. “AND HE SENT IT TO ME!” I added in a voice so high and squealy I don’t think he understood it. Also, I realize that Paul Westerberg did not send me a song. However, I did not want to explain artists and managers to a ten-year-old.

“Is it Bob Dylan’s 15-minute song about the Titanic?” he asked, getting a little excited himself.
“No.”
“Is it out yet?” he asked.
“Yeah. It came out last week.”
“We should go to YouTube and listen to it.”
“I don’t know if it’ll be on YouTube yet.”
His mouth dropped open and he said all exasperated like I was the dumbest person to ever breathe. “You just said it came out last week!”
“It did!”
“So let’s go to YouTube and lisssSSSSTTTtttten to it.” He kind of wagged his head and extended the word listen. Ten-year-old kids know all the ways to be condescending and annoying at the same time.

It took me longer than I’d like to admit to understand why he didn’t understand what I was saying.

“Cade,” I said. “Music doesn’t come out on YouTube.”
“It doesn’t?”
“No.”
“It should,” he stomped his foot. “Don’t they know everyone goes to YouTube for music?”
“And videos of fainting goats,” Nolan, his eight-year-old brother added.
“Well you can write the record companies about that,” I said. “Go put your bowl in the dishwasher and then brush your teeth.”
“You should have Bob Dylan email you the song like that other guy did,” he said.

Yeah, kid, I’ll get right on that.

The post He wants to listen to Bob Dylan & yet I have the antiquated notions about music appeared first on I Will Dare.

Are Clarence Clemons and Jackson Browne really friends? Are we supposed to believe Darryl Hannah is really singing backup? Does the line “I’m the one who always makes you laugh until you cry” really mean I’ll be nice to you until I get all domestically violent on your face?

P.S. VH1 Classics is also, apparently, running a Bob Dylan marathon on Thursday that includes No Direction Home: Bob Dylan, Don’t Look Back, and Unplugged. I am oddly excited.

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