The Philosophy of Modern Song

The Philosophy of Modern Song by Bob Dylan (2022) It might be okay to be Bob Dylan (able to write and publish a book like this and know it’s going to sell, so you get to pick out lots of intriguing, fun, and expensive photos to go along with it—which will just help it sell more). But it might be hard to be him (and someone close to him)—a man whose mere mention causes so many people to lose their minds with worship, while compelling others to curse and spit—not an enviable place. Me, I like him. I only recently read his Chronicles book and was surprised how much I enjoyed it, so I figured I’d read this one right away. I didn’t like it quite as much, but I zipped right through. Organized as it is—a list of 66 songs—you might expect it to be something like Bob’s fav 66 tunes (as if he, or anyone else, could make that list), but no—it’s using these songs to help illustrate something (the philosophy of modern song, perhaps?)—so really, it’s better to read straight through, rather than skipping songs you don’t know and jumping to your favorites. It would probably make more sense to be structured thematically (it is to some degree) but it wouldn’t be as compelling—we love lists. If you look at it as simply a list, it might come across as a little nuts—but you’ve got to read it to make sense of it. Interesting—I knew roughly half the songs (one, as luck would have it, that I was writing about at the time, for a record review). Dylan’s writing is all over the place—multiple styles and approaches—which I thought was a lot of fun, as well. At its most enjoyable, I felt like I was taking a bottle of Ripple over to Uncle Bob’s shack in the woods in order to get him in the mood to pontificate about this and that—stream of consciousness-like—half-drunk, on the edge of brilliance, nonsense, anger, preaching, geeking out rabid fan, harsh critic, and even philosophy.

3.28.23