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Bob dylan and counterculture
How has bob dylan affected popular music
What was bob dylans impact on society
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From the start of the Counterculture, singers and songwriters took on a role that would dramatically change the way emotions were expressed in music, but not many were as influential as Mr. Bob Dylan. Not only did his works alter his life, but they also altered the lives of everyone living in the historical era. Dylan would not have done any of this without the impact of his past, his biographical and sociocultural influences, and his poetic characteristics. Bob Dylan, a widely known singer whose works are still worshipped today, was born Robert Allen Zimmerman on May 19, 1941. He worked along side his father at an oil company as he grew up in Duluth, Minnesota, and “he taught himself piano and guitar” (Dylan Biography, IMDb). Because of his unique outlook on life, he focused much on words in the form of protest singing, but his lyrics are greatly considered to be poetic by himself and others. He acknowledged this by changing his name to Bob Dylan in honor of one of “his favorite poets”, Dylan Thomas, and by leaving his heart on the stage (Dylan Biography, IMDb). From the start of his career, he loved to perform for others. He played in many bands of Hibbing High, and he graduated only to continue to the University of Minnesota in 1959. Dylan later earned his gain to fame after dropping out of college and playing at various cafés around Greenwich Village, New York. In 1961, Columbia Records signed him and he released his first record in 1963 called “Bob Dylan” (Corbett, Ben). Because of his two-year relationship with fellow singer Joan Baez, he gained large popularity, but in 1966 after his marriage to Sara Lowndes, he was in a serious motorcycle accident. It took him a year or so to recover, but he soon “reinvented” himself ... ... middle of paper ... ...n, n.d. Web. 26 May 2014. . "Bob Dylan Biography." IMDb. N.p., n.d. Web. 26 May 2014. . Corbett, Ben. "Bob Dylan Timeline - A Timeline of Bob Dylan's Career." About.com Folk Music. N.p., n.d. Web. 26 May 2014. . Smith, Nicole. "The Influence of the 60s and Psychedelic Music and Culture on Modern Society." Article Myriad. N.p., 16 Jan. 2012. Web. 26 May 2014. . The New Yorker. "Bob Dylan, the Beat Generation, and Allen Ginsberg’s America." The New Yorker. N.p., 16 Aug. 2010. Web. 26 May 2014. .
In Dylan’s Chronicles Volume One, he says, “folk songs are evasive – the truth about life, and life is more or less a lie, but then again that’s exactly the way we want it to be. We wouldn’t be comfortable with it any other way.” He goes on to also confirm the ambiguity of folk music, saying that “[a] folk song has over a thousand faces and you must meet them all if you want to play this stuff. A folk song might vary in meaning and it might not appear the same from one moment to the next. It depends on who’s playing and who’s listening” (71). One of the characteristics that Bob Dylan possesses, and that has helped him be such a successful folk artist, is his ability to recognize this ambiguity. His ears were and still are immune to the literalness of time, and upon hearing something new, he can apply what he does not know to his listening, instead of confining his interpretation to what knowledge he already has. This is the basis for what folk music taught Dylan in some of his most formative years, that “[i]f you told the truth, that was all well and good and if you told the un-truth, well, that’s still well and good” (35). Even old folk legends are unclear in their origin and factuality, such as the widel...
"Drunk with melody, and what the words were, he cared not." This was a very common view among early commentators about Dylan Thomas (Cox 1). Thomas was a poet who was either loved or hated. It depended on the individual, and how they viewed his poetry. He was very famous for his poetry because it contained visions of life, aspects of birth and death, fear, grief, joy, and beauty. At a younger age, Thomas was a very violent poet. As he grew older, he spoke for all men greatly when he wrote. He wrote his poems referring to the qualities and sensations of life. The strength of feelings, which were expressed in his writings, gave many different impressions about Thomas’ attitudes toward religion and spirituality, relationships, and the passion in his poetry.
The Web. The Web. 22 Apr. 2014. The 'Standard' of the 'Standard'. The "Greatest Bob Dylan Songs - Top Ten List - TheTopTens.com."
The world was in 1950 at a point of multiple crossroads. After two World Wars an exemplary series of bad events followed, like the Cold War and the atomic menace. But it was also the beginning of some prosperity. People started again to gather material values. Nevertheless, the slow awakening from the fog of war was a process too complex to be generally accepted. In an apparently healing world there were still too many fears and too many left behind. On this ground of alienation, isolation and despair Allen Ginsberg’s “Howl” emerged together with the Beat movement. John Tytell observed that the “Beat begins with a sense of natural displacement and disaffiliation, a distrust of efficient truth, and an awareness that things are often not what
In the mid 1940’s a movement began, a generation of writers and poets would emerge; they were called the ‘Beat Generation’. The term was first used by Jack Kerouac while talking to fellow writer John C. Holmes, in 1948, Kerouac said to him, “So I guess you might say we’re the beat generation” (What’s Beat). The ‘Beat Generation’ was a movement that influenced the next generation of young rebellious minds of the 1950’s and ‘60’s through poets and writers who did not follow the rules of society. Growing up I have always liked the poets and writers of that time, the smooth cool way they talked, the slang they used, the goat-tees and black berets they wore and their cool and casual demeanor. The writers and poets of that generation were so passionate in what they wrote, and in their resistance to conformity. Not caring to be like everyone else, instead, they sought to be the individuals that they were, not bowing to what mainstream society thought they should be. Freedom of individuality was their passion. Although it wasn’t until I was older that I really understood what they meant and stood for, the movement had a deeper meaning; to be yourself.
Whitehead, J. W. (2014, February 06). 50 years after The Beatles: Isn't it time for another political & cultural revolution? Retrieved from
Today, the most difficult day in my family’s life, we gather to say farewell to our son, brother, fiancé and friend. To those of you here and elsewhere who know Dylan you already are aware of the type of person he was and these words you will hear are already in your memory. To those who were not as fortunate, these words will give you a sense of the type of man he was and as an ideal for which we should strive. My son has been often described as a gentle soul. He was pure of heart and had great sensitivity for the world around him. He had a way with people that made them feel comfortable around him and infected others to gravitate toward him. Dylan exuded kindness and pulled generosity and altruism out from everyone he touched. He was everyone's best friend.
Pace University. (2008 Aug 1). Bob Dylan & the Sixties: A Social Commentary. Retrieved from
After his grandfather died it was up to Nelson to support his family. Still in the years of the Great Depression, he was forced to pick up oddball jobs until he got his first professional job in the John Raychek Band. Although his straight-laced grandmother disagreed with his working in beer joints, she couldn’t deny the fact that it was better money than cotton picking. He went in between different musical groups until his l...
The emergence of the counterculture of the 1960s set off a new wave of music and created an alternative lifestyle. The association of drugs with the counterculture is a limited assumption as drugs were present in the mainstream culture as well. The predecessor of the 60s counterculture, the Beat movement, was not entirely different and it is evident how the Beat lifestyle fostered an environment where the emergent hippie and acid-head culture could take root. Within the drug culture there were splits in ideology, between the Leary and the Kesey groups and the mainstream culture against the counterculture’s use of drugs.
Dylan experienced a lot of commercial success during his lifetime. By December of 1932, he left his job at the Post to concentrate on his poetry full time. In 1934, when Thomas was 20 years old, he moved to London and won the Poets Corner book prize, and published his first book, 18 poems “The Fortune Press” to great acclaim. The book was mad...
Music can be traced back into human history to prehistoric eras. To this day archeologists uncover fragments of ancient instruments as well as tablets with carved lyrics buried alongside prominent leaders and highly influential people. This serves as a testament to the importance and power of music, as well as its influence in society. Over its many years of existence, music’s powerful invocation of feelings has allowed it to evolve and serve many purposes, one being inspiring change. American journalist and author Hunter S. Thompson once said, “Music has always been a matter of energy to me, a question of fuel. Sentimental people call it inspiration, but what they really mean is fuel.” This fuel is the very things that powers the influence of Rock ‘n’ Roll on American society, that author Glenn C. Altschuler writes about in his book, “All Shook Up – How Rock ‘n’ Roll Changed America.” Between 1945 and 1965 Rock ‘n’ Roll transformed American society and culture by helping to ease racial integration and launch a sexual revolution while most importantly developing an intergenerational identity.
One theme that is prevalent throughout much of the literature we have covered so far is that it is very critical of the conformist values of late 1950s society. In an era of Levittowns and supermarkets and the omnipresent television, there was a call to leave the conformist suburban culture in search of something higher. Two major proponents of the individual as opposed to society were Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg, two of the central figures in the Beat movement. Through their work one can gain a perspective on the anti-conformity spirit that was brewing under the surface in the Beat culture.
Allen Ginsberg was born in Newark, New Jersey. His parents were second generation Russian- Jewish immigrants, left-wing radicals interested in Marxism, nudism, feminism, generally in the modern revolutionary ideas of his times. This background certainly did influence his evolution as a revolutionary poet. His father, Louis Ginsberg, was a teacher and a poet, whose work was published in New York Times. During Ginsberg¡¦s childhood, his mother, Naomi Ginsberg, started to suffer from paranoia. She was institutionalized and eventually lobotomized. She died in an asylum in 1956. her life is the subject one Allen¡¦s poem entitled ¡§Kaddish¡¨ and which was written as a compensation of her funeral service.
To say that the Beat generation has affected modern culture seems at first to be no great revelation; it is inevitable that any period of history will affect the time that follows. The Beat generation is especially significant, though, because of its long lasting impact on American culture. Many aspects of modern American culture can be directly attributed to the Beat writers, primarily Allen Ginsburg, William Burroughs, Neal Cassady, and Jack Kerouac. (Asher) Their influence has changed the American perception of obscenity, has had profound effects on American music and literature, and has modified the public’s views on such topics as sex and drug use.