I recently read Dylan's Philosophy of Modern Song; his always entertaining commentary on 66 songs in a handsome coffee table picture book. Very Americana. His list leans heavy on crooners and various Outlaw country music I'm lukewarm about at best. But he always comes at everything with his own angle. Reminds me quite a bit of his Theme Time Radio Hour shows but he's digging a little deeper. It's good rock criticism, I'd say. But also must concede it wears its male privilege out there in a way not likely to win over any women demanding equal billing in gender relations. Johnny Taylor's "Cheaper to Keep Her" and Dylan's goofy polemic for polygamy solicits a groan, he knows this, and dives right in anyway. Only four out of 66 songs include a woman. I know it can be hard to achieve anything like gender parity in most pop musical genres but, yikes, not 4 out of 66 hard! I'd also heard more of the list than I expected; better than what I often do with his radio shows, by comparison. (BTW, short consumer pitch: produce audio versions of music books with hyperlinks to streaming versions of all the music mentioned in the text.) Anyway, Dylan is sharp and funny and often more interesting than his song selections. (Another tell of good rock criticism in my book.) As for his philosophy of modern song there is more of that in his poetic interludes, riffing off what the songs say to him, often reducing songs to a string of clever that's-the-way-the-cookie-crumbles cliches, than anywhere else in the book. Nothing as didactic as a philosophy, of course. Everything with Dylan is an anecdote, a story, a scene, the way things feel. His philosophy is in the way Dylan gets into these old songs, understands them, takes them personally (in many legendary instances, this could model how he turns them into his own songs). It's a neat trick. And he's very good at it; a kind of walking and talking American songbook jukebox. At any rate, been listening to his Philosophy of Modern Song playlist on youtube. Triple shot of Dylan's Modern Song:
"Ruby (Are You Mad At Your Man)," The Osborne Brothers (1956)
"Volare," Domenico Modugno (1958): I was familiar with the 1970s car commercial version for the Plymouth Volare but experienced even in that instance the strange earworm power of this song; occasionally, even decades later, finding myself breaking into a "Volare" chorus in the odd moment. Kindred to me with "Somewhere Over the Rainbow," in this respect. Well, turns out "Volare" isn't just a nice car commercial jingle but translates from Italian to "To fly" and it's charted four times going back at least to this 1958 performance on the Ed Sullivan show; Dean Martin had a hit version, it was near ubiquitous with Italian crooners, apparently. The Modugno original spent five weeks on top the Billboard Hot 100. Dylan claims it could be the first psychedelic song or something like that; "flying," tripping, etc. I don't know about that but the original is quite a performance; it's got that soft, urgent build up til the guy is belting out "Vo-LAR-aye" with everything he's got. The song is a ballad in the chanson song style, says Wikipedia. Maybe also an example of the mysterious and elusive Italian Bel canto style of singing that can simultaneously swell with serious emotion and hilariously overwrought sentiment. Anyway, one of the most uncannily effective and mysterious earworms I've ever encountered and I've banked a few.
"Volare! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh!"
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