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Bob Dylan Plays a Hard-Driving Set in Upper Manhattan
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Bob Dylan, singer and songwriter
Bob Dylan played his last scheduled show of the year on Friday night at the United Palace on West 175th Street in Upper Manhattan. In a set heavy with hard-driving blues, Dylan paid tribute—as he so often has in the past—to African-American music. It’s a tradition he’s immersed himself in deeply for half a century, and it was a shame to see only a few black faces in the audience. But ticket prices starting at $59 almost guaranteed that the crowd would be skewed toward the older and paler.
“Watch out for the terrorists!” shouted an African-American man sitting on a stoop, as hoards of white baby boomers—many of us accompanied by our kids or grandkids—surged up 175th Street toward the Palace. Or did he shout, “Watch out for the tourists”? From the perspective of the stoop, it probably amounted to the same thing.
There was poetry in the setting Dylan chose for the year’s last concert. Opened in 1930 as a vaudeville theater, the over-the-top, gold-filigreed Palace is the church of flamboyant tele-evangelist Reverend Ike, who’s been shaking Harlem’s money tree there for four decades. Dylan’s always had a spot in his heart for snake oil salesmen, so Reverend Ike’s gilded super-church was the pitch perfect venue.
Garbed in a wide-brimmed Panama hat, a black jacket and black pants with a stripe up the side, Dylan took the stage with his five-man-band, looking like a cross between a mariachi and a 19th-century southern planter. Standing center stage with only his harmonica, he opened the set, amidst cheers and flashing cameras, with—what else but—“Gotta Serve Somebody”—the hit gospel song from his 1979 born again Christian album “Slow Train Coming.”
For 30 years, Dylan fans—myself included—have tried to figure out how a Rimbaud-quoting Jewish boy from Minnesota could write two albums of gospel-torched tributes to Jesus and still stay king of hip, 20th-century songwriters. Last night, as the smell of weed drifted over our balcony seats at the Palace, I faced two more conundrums: could I telescope this history for the benefit of my 16-year-old daughter, who was seated next to me? And should I pass her the jay that was heading our way from two good-time party boys in our row? It took all of ten seconds to figure out the answers were No and No.
Moving behind the keyboards for the next two numbers, Dylan charged into a rocking version of “The Times They Are A-Changin”—a song that embodied the spirit of 1964 when he wrote it, and suddenly—post election—seems fitting again. In between verses, he blew a mean harmonica, drawing cheers from the balcony. In “The Levee’s Gonna Break” he and the band pounded out a propulsive beat that felt like 1965. Dylan, who’s now sixty-seven, spread his legs wide, rocked back and forth, and hit the keys with gusto.
Acoustics were fuzzy at the Palace. With the drum-heavy band cranked up louder than Dylan’s gravelly voice, it was hard to catch the lyrics to even his most word-driven songs. When he and the band launched into a raucous, upbeat version of the originally-acoustic and melancholy “Desolation Row,” I felt the disappointment ripple through my companions.
“This song shouldn’t be treated this way,” complained my usually open-minded husband. And I had to agree. A songwriter capable of penning lines like “They’re selling postcards of the hanging. /They’re painting the passports brown. /The beauty parlor is filled with sailors. /The circus is in town,” should know enough to let a good thing alone.
Then Dylan and the band took the same noisy approach with “It’s Alright Ma (I’m Only Bleeding),” and it became clear that Friday night was not about the words. It was about high-energy blues, gospel and country fun. On all sides of us, people in the balcony were drinking beer and bopping in their seats, rearing to party.
For the slightly sappy “’Till I Fell in Love with You,” the usually shy Dylan strutted center stage without his guitar and sang straight ahead into the mike, snapping his fingers and moving like a loose-limbed, old-time blues man. No doubt about it, he was steppin’ out in a way audiences haven’t seen him do for a long time.
Halfway through the corny, country-swing of “Spirit on the Water,” when Dylan crooned, “You say I’m over the hill, / You think I’m past my prime,” he was greeted by a chorus of fierce “Noooo!”s from his fans.
“We can have a whopping good time!” he sang back, bowing his head and doing a fancy step that almost brought down the house with cheering.
After an upbeat set of fifteen songs, an ebullient Dylan concluded the show with three encores. Last among them was an updated version of the 1963 classic “Blowin’ in the Wind,” which a 22-year-old Dylan originally based on a Negro spiritual. Friday night’s rendition bore little resemblance to either version, making it impossible for anyone to sing along. Given how much the times have changed, that’s probably a good thing. The moment for singing and swaying in unison is long gone.
As three-thousand-some people at the Palace applauded ecstatically, Dylan and the members of his band walked to the front of the stage and took a modest bow. Then the spotlights were turned on the audience. Dylan's too reticent to tell the public how important they are to him as a performer, but that's what this gesture conveyed. “It’s all about you, now!” Dylan seemed to be saying. And so it is.
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