Dylanphobia Revisited

I've never got along with Bob Dylan's voice. For years I thought he was just a talentless, tuneless exemplar of The Emperor's New Clothes. Then someone pointed out how many of my favourite songs were actually written by The Zim. OK, at some subliminal level, I'd always known The Byrds' "Mr. Tambourine Man" was a Dylan choon, but I'd assumed he must have written it on one of his rare good days. Then I heard his original version of it. Gaaaaahhhddd! The awful whine, the gasping, whooping phrasing - all still in place. Hardly believable it was the same song. Likewise I find his original of "All Along The Watchtower" all but unlistenable, yet Hendrix's version is still sublime to these ears.

So I had the usual aversion hurdle to leap, when I read about Robyn Hitchcock's "Robyn Sings", a double CD of Dylan covers by one of my favourite songwriters and performers. It was hearing Dylan's "Visions Of Johanna" that first made then-teenage Hitchcock decide he wanted to be a singer-songwriter more than anything else in the world, and this loving recreation of 15 Dylan songs is clearly a labour of love. I've always been delighted by Hitchcock's freewheeling surreal imagery (despite the occasional suspicion of misogyny, a trait he readily acknowledges in the sleevenotes), and never realised just how much this also applies to Dylan's lyrics.

I doubt this will inspire me to seek out any Dylan albums - his horrible nasal delivery is one of my very few all-time musical turnoffs. But as a songwriter I now believe the hype, he's pretty damned good. So, Robyn, what I think I'd now like is for you to work through Dylan's back-catalogue, recreating each of his albums. Whilst still turning out your own stuff, with and without various Egyptians and Soft Boys, of course!