Bob Dylan

1970's New Morning could very well be Dylan's most underrated album. Classics like the subtly triumphant "The Man In Me" (popularized by the Coen Brothers in The Big Lebowski), or the George Harrison-covered "If Not For You," reveal a mature and less self-conscious Dylan who seems most at home with love songs.

Well, friends, Bob Dylan is back with us again. I don't know how long he intends to stay,
but I didn't ask him. Didn't figure it was any of my business. Put simply, New Morning is a
superb album. It is everything that every Dylan fan prayed for after Self Portrait. The
portrait on the cover peers out boldly, just daring you to find fault with it, and I must admit
that if there is a major fault on the album, I haven't found it. Nor do I care to. This... More >

In case you were wondering how definitive that self-portrait was, here comes its mirror image four months later. Call it love on the rebound. This time he's writing the pop (and folk) genre experiments himself, and thus saying more about true romance than is the pop (or folk) norm. Two side-closing throw-ins--a sillyditty about a gal named "Winterlude" and the scatting beatnik send-up "If Dogs Run Free"--almost steal the show. And the two other side-closers, which make religion seem dumber than it already is, damn near give it back. (Grade - A-)