Chips Fontaine

Sometimes we as human beings look to the past for answers. You would be shocked at how many times during an average day you rely on things taught to you as a child that has shaped you and made you the person who you are. I recently caught myself telling my young son some of the same things my parents said to me, its a never ending cycle...

Recently, I have been going through the vaunted Rolling Stone top 500 albums list and album by album I started going through them, one of the biggest surprises for me was listening to Bob Dylan's Highway 61 Revisited. This album, when talked about usually accompanies universal acclaim, how this record broke barriers and torn down walls.

I have to scratch my head here...This album sucks.

No, I appreciate music. I love music, all kinds. I understand influence, I comprehend spellbinding lyrics and the bad ones too.

But words cannot describe how this record just didn't age well. The themes just don't resonate with me because I know how things turned out. Compare this to any record by the Beatles, most of which if they were released today would still top the charts. Compare it to Bruce Springsteen's Born to Run.

Dylan, along with Paul Simon and the Doors are performers living off the 60's and quite frankly, I never got what all the hoopla was about. If you could magically erase them from humanities timeline, you could have replaced them with just about anyone from the era they performed in, and not missed a beat.

Highway's only merit is the title track, its the only thing that's intrigued me as listenable. That's it, next...

As more and more of the hippies from the 60's get older and older, I believe Dylan and his ilk will fade away into the either. Hype does not equal talent, and in this albums case, it has lived off hype for far too long. Think that is harsh? Find someone who has never heard of this record and ask them to listen to it, they whole thing. If they don't fall asleep and get through it all, do you really think they will know what Dylan was bitching about, or better yet, do you think they will even care?

Hype indeed.

1.5 out of 10.

Chips Fontaine