The Liquid Kosmos

Dylan and Racism

I just finished watching Martin Scorsese's film biography "No Direction Home: Bob Dylan." It made me happy, sad, a bigger fan, and furious in one long (actually two) sittings.

The thing with Dylan is he is a perfect example of the human condition. A man who wanted to do one thing in life, but was dragged into places he didn't want to go because what he did touched so many people. He is one of the most important songwriters of our time, but he never wanted to believe that.

The biography made me happy because it was the story of this little kid from Minnesota who never felt like he belonged. Especially there, and his lifetime has been spent trying to find his way home. He took his guitar to New York when he was 20 years old - and never looked back.
I love stories like that.

It made me sad because it doesn't seem like it was that long ago, but most of his legacy was created in the 60's. They showed live footage from the Newport Folk festival of certain artists playing with such life and vigor, then cut to them "now" and they looked so old and beat down. It is a fact and will happen to us all, but it's still not fun to think about.

It wasn't the film itself that made me furious. There was a scene in it that reminded me of a time when I was listening to talk radio and was actually compelled to call-in because the host had me so iritated. I used to "sort of" like this guy. Hallerin Hilton Hill was a talk-jock on "The Zone" in Nashville and came on after the Zone's morning show. He is one of those black guys that is very white, but his attitude is over-the-top "black." I suspect the kind of guy brothas roll their eyes at when he leaves a room.

His on-air discussion that day was "Rolling Stone's" Top 100 Songs of all time. This included R&B and just about anything else that had been played on pop radio. The Beatles, Marvin Gaye, Aretha Franklin, Zeppelin, Stevie Wonder, and of course, Bob Dylan.Hill was livid that "Rolling Stone" had chosen Dylan's "Like A Rolling Stone" as the greatest song of all time. He kept playing it every 5 minutes and mocking it with his "down-home" attitude, then throwing around things like, "What about Earth Wind and Fire?, Kool and the Gang?," etc. Then he'd play "Like a Rolling Stone" again and laugh. "What a joke," he would say.

Now, I'm a HUGE fan of "Earth Wind and Fire" and many many other black artists, but Hill's attitude was too much. (Surely this is what he's paid to do, but it really got under my skin and I wasn't even crazy about the idea of "Like a Rolling Stone" being number one, but I had to call.)

My point was simple. I just stated that "Like a Rolling Stone" influenced so many artists and musical styles that it had to be a viable selection. Sure, the recording wasn't that great, but its pure rawness set the table for what we know today. Like Rap for example. It was the crossover tune for folk artists going into rock-n-roll. Setting the stage for all of our "singer-songwriters" of today. It's about independence and moving on from the things in the world that tie you down. And on and on and on.

BUT what really upset me is that I didn't have the right amunition for my discussion with Hallerin. And that is the part of the documentary that woke me up in a big way. I didn't realize this, but Bob Dylan was invited to perform as part of the "March On Washington." He played before Martin Luther King Jr.'s famous "I Have a Dream" speech. Mavis Staples praised Dylan in the documentary and attributed his song, "Only a Pawn in Their Game," with having incredible insight into the true problems facing blacks at the time. That's when it struck me; Dylan is "blacker" than Hill ever dreamed about being and that was the sad part of my angst that morning. I just couldn't put it all together.

"Like a Rolling Stone" isn't my favorite song either, but I understand its importance. Sometimes you have to look beyond your "pop sensibilities" and recognize a piece of work's influence on society.

Anyway, I'm not "really" that pissed, but it you know how some things just pop in your head and it explains a missing link. Yeah, it's kinda like that.

posted by The Oscillator @ 12:44 PM