Dylan wrote a LOT of very good songs - “Like A Rolling Stone” is one of my all time favs. The Byrds cover of “My Back Pages” is amazing.
That said...
Dylan’s songs lacked the complexity found in Joni Mitchell’s compositions - not only lyrically but to an even greater degree musically. JM’s music ranged from folk to pop to avantgarde to jazz to blues - and all done at a very high level.
Why on every thread about Dylan do you feel a need to make a post about how Joni Mitchell is so much better than Dylan? They are different, okay? So Mitchell uses alternate tunings and Dylan doesn't. So what? Dylan has had a dramatically greater impact than Mitchell, has written far more well-known songs than Mitchell, and his music will be remembered far longer than Mitchell's will. You dig Mitchell, great. With the exception of a couple of songs, I find her music uninteresting.
Happy birthday Bob! You were so much older then, you’re even *younger* than that now! Thank you for “My Back Pages” (I play the Byrds’ version in my mind every Aug. 27 [my birthday]).
However, most influential is another matter. No question Dylan influenced generations. He even influenced the Beatles who in turn influenced most pop/ rock music of their era.
BTW, I am huge Joni Mitchell fan as well. It is possible to like both ya know
I agree with you about Joni Mitchell. I’m used to being one of the few who know and really like her work.
In fact, Joni would agree with you herself about Bob Dylan.
She was always fully aware of her abilities as a performer during her active years, and could be very blunt describing the ‘sub-par’ work of other people. In 2010, Joni had an interview, in which she called Bob a ‘plagiarist and a fake’.
“We are like night and day, he and I” she scoffed. “Bob is not authentic at all. His name and voice are fake. Everything about Bob is a deception.”
In my opinion, sometimes, Joni just gets cranky and jealous of other performers. Of course Bob Dylan ‘is a deception’, he is a performer, Joni, just like you used to be.
She is wealthy, but never hit it really big with mainstream work. People with far less talent, but greater overall appeal have hit it big and got rich. People like Dylan, People like Madonna.
I used to be a big Joni Mitchell fan as a youngster, but in hindsight, now that I’m older with more Conservative views, I find her lyrics to be snobbish, condescending, and self important....and like a typical Liberal, breathlessly unaware of her own biases and arrogance