The Bob Dylan show with Willie Nelson and John Mellencamp - a Review

Okay, I know I am supposed to be blogging about religion and education and such, but I attended a Bob Dylan concert on Sunday night, and, well, that is a spiritual experience, isn't it? Well it is to me anyway...

This has been a very hot summer in Houston and Tuesday night, with the area hosting Bob Dylan with Willie Nelson, John Mellencamp and the Wynos, was no exception. Temperatures were once again in the upper nineties and though rain was predicted to possibly cool things down a bit, not a drop materialized. Did I mention it was hot? I went to the show with April and our son Alex and we decided to upgrade our lawn tickets to three tickets under the canopy to get away from the sun (and potential later rain) and for $ 10 per ticket extra it seemed like a bargain.

The venue (the Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavillion in Spring, Texas, just outside of Houston) is lovely and the heat didn’t manage to spoil it. It is an outdoor venue with a very large canopy over the seated area and a large lawn area behind that. The food prices are outrageous, of course, (a soda was $5.50, bottled water $ 4.00) but that is to be expected these days. To keep Alex’s interest up when there was not music we brought along Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban to read to him. He is really into Harry Potter right now and he asked for it right away as we were waiting for the start of the show. The concert began at 5:30 p.m. pretty promptly with the appearance of the Wynos. They were good but it was so early and with so many folk milling about it was not easy to concentrate on what they were doing. I will definitely keep them in mind and check out a show if they come to a smaller venue down here sometime.

After they were done we got through about half a chapter of Azkaban and Willie Nelson came on. He sounded fine – his voice was strong and he was obviously happy to be back in Texas, dropping a big Lone Star flag behind him and the band for the set. His set consisted of a lot of his hits and some standards and a few medleys of the same. He started off with “Whiskey River” and played (among other) “Always on My Mind,” “Georgia,” “Crazy,” and “Still is Still Moving to Me” (one of my Nelson favorites). The crowd enjoyed him and he threw both a hat and a bandanna into the audience before his set was over. After he was done, it was more Azkaban.

About a half chapter later it was John Mellencamp’s turn. He had a very tight band and they sounded excellent. I am not a big Mellencamp fan (I don’t actually own any of his albums) but I recognized most of the songs as his hits from the 80s and I also enjoyed the new ones. He sang one that he said was written a few weeks ago that was very nice and at least one from the new album. I heard an interview he had with Terry Gross on "Fresh Air" about his new album and was impressed with the songs he played on the radio show. He had a middle section of just him on an acoustic guitar and he sounded good on that too. At one point he asked the audience whether they wanted new songs (April and I rose our hands for them) or old ones (just about everybody else voted for the oldies). He noted that it seemed like the biggest margin of victory for the old songs he had seen on the tour, and that we must be a nostalgic crowd. He was right and I was a bit worried that that would spell trouble for Bob. Mellencamp was a crowd pleaser and probably got the best audience response to his performance. His band was very good and I especially enjoyed the violinist. After he set we got through the second to last chapter of Azkaban before the lights went out and the announcer did the long introduction of “Columbia recording artist…. Bob Dylan!”

The initial cheers were huge. Probably the loudest of the night. The crowd was very ready for Bob. It had been 2004 (with Willie Nelson on a different Baseball park tour) since I had seen Dylan and I was ready too. He opened with “Leopard Skin Pillbox Hat” which seems to me a fine lead-in. It was solid, if nothing special, and I thought Bob mic was turned up a bit too loud making him sound a bit harsher than he needed to but he was clearly engaged, playing guitar, and sounding strong. After that it was “It Ain’t Me, Babe” played (again) very loudly and sang very loudly too, almost shouting. I began to notice, however, that folks were looking around and I heard some people in front of me say that they couldn’t understand anything he was saying. I could understand him well but maybe that is because I know the words already and my mind could fill in what was unintelligible to others. (April couldn’t understand him, she later told me, though she still enjoyed him.)

By the third song, “Rollin’ and Tumblin’,” from the 2006 album “Modern Times,” people were beginning to file out. Quite a few folk left early from our section. I think some folk were pretty lost with his set. He played a lot of new songs and most of the old ones he did couldn't exactly be called "hits." This was in large part not a Dylan crowd but a general set of folk who were attracted by the idea of seeing three “legends” perform. But whereas Nelson and Mellencamp are excellent entertainers who are willing to play to an audience and give them the hits (or “nostalgia” as Mellencamp put it), Dylan is an excellent entertainer who just is not interested in playing to the audience's wishes. He is quite willing to play for an audience but he is not going to cater to their tastes. He didn’t when he got booed for “going electric” in the mid-sixties, or when he got booed for playing all religious songs in the late 70s and he doesn’t now, even when folk walk out on him. He plays what he wants to play and how he wants to play and if the audience comes around to it, great, and if not – there is always the next town…

So, following “Rollin’ and Tumblin’” (for which he switched over to keyboards where he stayed for the rest of the night) he performed the highlight of the night for me, a punching version of “Tryin’ to Get to Heaven.” It was louder and more forceful than other versions I’ve heard (nothing like the live version on "Tell Tale Signs") but this is a great song (one of my favorite Dylan songs) and it sounds fine with most any arrangement. He was very into it, singing the “… you can lose a little more” line with a striking high pitched “lose” that was very effective. He also played the harmonica on this one for the first time of the night and blew a nice solo. Then followed a solid, if unspectacular, “Tweedle Dee & Tweedle Dum.” Next – you knew it was coming – was “If you Ever Go to Houston.” Some others must have been able to understand him because there was an audible cheer when he sang “Houston.” After four "new" songs the crowd was a bit subdued (and getting smaller).

Then he dipped into the sixties for a hard rocking “It’s Alright Ma (I’m Only Bleeding).” But then it was back to the 21 century for “When the Deal Goes Down,” another highlight for me. I admit this was not a song that initially struck me from “Modern Times” but it has grown on me over the years and this was a nice version with Bob on harmonica again. Then back to the mid-sixties for a very loud, rave-up version of “Highway 61 Revisited.” I thought that might be it except for the encore, but he surprised me with a lovely version of “Nettie Moore” (another “Modern Times” highlight) featuring some fine harmonica. Then there was an very up tempo version of “Summer Days” (the best fast rocker of the evening, in my opinion) that closed the main body of the show. Dylan seemed to be enjoying the night, allowing himself a couple of laughs/cackles during “Summer Days” reminding one of the chuckles on "Together Through Life."

The encore was the standard “Like a Rolling Stone,” “Jolene,” and “All Along the Watchtower.” The crowd that remained seem to get into LaRS the most but were pretty hyped during the encore (at least in comparison with the rest of the show). I got the feeling that this crowd would have been happier with Dylan if he had done “Blowin’ in the Wind,” “Rainy Day Women 12 & 35,” "Mr. Tambourine Man," and “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door” and the like but I, for one, was glad to hear a set that consisted of a majority of songs from 1997 on. There isn’t much to say about the encore – they were performed very loudly (a theme for the night) and the crowd responded somewhat better to “Jolene” than some of the other new songs of the night, but that might have been the result of being seated between two “recognizable” songs. The concert came to an end and Dylan and the band did that odd thing they do of standing there looking at the crowd and walking off without even a bow. As usual, Dylan hadn’t spoken the entire night except to introduce the band members during the encore. And as usual, the show was awesome for a Dylan geek like me.

We left, all three of us a little giddy. All three main performers were good. April said she enjoyed the Nelson section the best, Alex said he like John Mellencamp, and I – well, needless to say, all three got one vote as the highlight of the evening. Alex (who is five years old) spotted a Willie Nelson plush doll on the way out and we got it for him. He slept with it last night and tonight, along with Harry Potter. Interesting company Willie! Alex also ended up summing up the night probably the best. Hugging his new Willie Nelson he said “I'll always remember tonight! I liked them all. They all sang good and played perfectly! They must practice a lot!” Amen.