Wednesday, October 11, 2023
To Lyle Lovett and Leo Kottke last night at Kleinhans, a pleasant evening, although perhaps longer on conversation and shorter on playing than I might have have preferred. It was genial, rambling conversation, with Lovett mostly prompting Kottke. It was originally billed as an evening with Lovett and John Hiatt, but Hiatt hurt himself hiking, so Kottke filled in. Packed house, and I gotta say that any time I go to Kleinhans I marvel at how very nearly the hall comes close to stealing the show. Kottke didn't play any 12 string- he complained of stiffness in the little finger of his fretting hand- and it look a bit for his playing to loosen up, but a stiff Leo Kottke is still pretty amazing. Lovett, who I am a bit surprised we've not seen before, is, of course, hilarious. So that was a nice Tuesday evening
Thursday, October 05, 2023
Bob Dylan's Desire is oddly popular among some people, which suggests to me that with Dylan a person's point of entry matters a great deal. I think there are three of four solid songs on it. I think "Hurricane" slaps along, but is minor Dylan- it got a lot of airplay, and was popular with old hippies who liked Protest Song Dylan, but I've never trusted it.
The real low point on Desire is the song about Crazy Joey Gallo, an endless, tuneless dirge that gets so much wrong that it calls into question Dylan's reliability about everything else he ever wrote that was supposedly fact based. Interestingly this is one of the songs he wrote collaborating with Jacques Levy. Someday I will finish the piece I have in my Dylan files about Dylan's collaborators. In the meanwhile here's an excellent article by Lester Bangs about "Joey".
Wednesday, October 04, 2023
