***Yet Again On The Never-Ending Tour Review -Bob Dylan: The Other Side Of The Mirror

 

DVD Review

From The Pen Of Frank Jackman

Bob Dylan: The Other Side Of The Mirror-Live At Newport 1963-1965, starring Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, and all the other usual folk minute suspects, 2007

At one time, maybe ten years ago, no, more like fifteen, I picked up on the idea of Bob Dylan and his never-ending tour (life tour) as a kind of inside joke. Little did I suspect then that rather than heralding the downside of his career then that period was something like an epiphany for him to never stop playing on the road-somewhere. But that endless concert run was not all that period began as a Dylanmania of bootleg albums (up to ten or eleven at last count), boxed sets, complete set, and, as here with the film under review, Bob Dylan: The Other Side Of The Mirror-Live At Newport 1963-1965, in the video end plenty of documentaries capturing his performances for early in his career had added to material to be commented on. Little did I know as well then that I would be doing a never-ending job of reviewing his released materials. So be it.

I, and others ad infinitum, have noted that Mister Dylan, and to a lesser extent his paramour at the time, Joan Baez, quickly became, whether anybody else liked it or not, the cutting edge of the 1960s folk minute once he headed to New York, established himself in the Village and crowned that kingdom with his early, and somewhat controversial performances at the Newport Folk Festival from 1963 to 1965 (after that year he would not return to Newport for various reasons, both his and the festival’s, until 2002 thirty-seven years later).              

 While there were other smaller summer folk-oriented musical festivals Newport in those years was the premier spot and to be a headliner there meant you had arrived. That is the process we witness in this documentary from the almost country bumpkin (small town Minnesota –born) shy, awkward, earnest Dylan in 1963 who could in effect have been like any number of male folk singers the, Dave Van Ronk, Geoff Muldaur, Jim Kweskin, Tom Paxton, and Phil Ochs come quickly to mind to the 1965 king hell king of the troubadours leading a new wave of folk music into the electric age. That route also details his movement from social protest message songs like With God On Our Side and Blowing In The Wind which made him in some quarters the voice of a generation for a minute to Maggie’s Farm and Like A Rolling Stone which sent him off in a slightly different direction as he amped up. The director/editor of this one and one half hour documentary wisely let that musical progression drive the film and let us draw our own conclusions. Watch the transformation for yourself. 

Note: There is nothing in this documentary about the famous controversy (or better dust-up) around Dylan’s playing electric guitar with a back-up band in 1965 and traditional folk-singer Pete Seeger’s alleged “pulling the plug” in disgust over the transgression. While this controversy was no urban legend I think at least a mention would have been worthwhile to explain why a part of the crowd was audibly booing their hero. I was at that 1965 concert and was glad, glad as hell, to hear him move toward rock. Why? Well as much as I loved those earnest earlier social protest songs Dylan’s earnest nasal twang presentation of the material was beginning to get on my nerves (other covers of his work worked better). I think if he had stayed in the 1963 folk minute I would not now be endlessly writing about the man. Thanks Bob.