Bob Dylan and Bono....

[rythemwire]

I was thinking about these two and it seems to me that they have a lot in common...let me explain


Bob Dylan has as we all know completly changed how songwriters and singers are viewed today. Bob has changed the notion that in order to be a "good" singer you had to have an amazing voice and simple lyrics to accompany it. Bob was also one of the first if not the first musican to blurr the lines of Politics,love and life.Dylan also marked the way by stating his view on how society was in the 60's and 70's he was writing songs about society and injustice at a time where musicans did'nt even think less alone write about things like this. Prime examples of this are "These times are a-chagin" and "Hurricane" He mixed sprituality and politics at a time where this was just not "cool" He transfered over from just being a musican and a legend to becoming a landmark in all aspects of the word.

Now for our man Bono, He and u2 came in on the music sene where it ws only popular to have big hair and sing about girls and cars. U2 completly changed that whole factor think about it ...in the eighties everything wasbig and overly done , excess was the "in thing" , U2 on the other hand went small scale, Bono sung about war,God and poltics topics that were not touched on since Dylan.(or atleast with not with such passion and delivery). Enter the 90"s where everything gruge and anti-social and depressing U2 again went the complete opposite with large scale concerts and sexy, optimistic(sp) lyrics. Even now, with hip-hop and glam rock U2 again flipped the turn tables by bring it downscale and more intimate and within all this NEVER losing touch with their fans or the times.(same with Dylan) and lastly Bono stepped out of the rock star rehlem and became an advocate and a voice for Africa and third world debt (something he started to dabble with in the eighties). So....since I am done with my soap-box speech I shall step down and let you absorb. p.s forgive me if i am off on some stuff I am still learning (only 17)

 

[Saracene]

I don't think Bono/U2 are anywhere as influential as Bob Dylan, and I can't agree that no one sang about the politics with passion before U2; what about The Clash?

I'm not sure I agree with generalisations like "everything in the 90s was grunge" or that 80s music was all about cars and girls, when in fact the music scene was always much more diverse than that, with many amazing idiosyncratic artists aside from U2.

 

[Bono's shades]

I'm not sure I agree with generalisations like "everything in the 90s was grunge" or that 80s music was all about cars and girls, when in fact the music scene was always much more diverse than that, with many amazing idiosyncratic artists aside from U2.

Yes, there was a big alternative music/college radio scene in the 1980s. But only a few of these bands, such as U2 and R.E.M., really made it big, so a lot of people don't know the rest of them exist.

As for Bono and Bob Dylan, are both excellent lyricists, but even I have to admit Bob is probably better - or at least more highly regarded (Bono makes up for this by being a much better singer though). Bob also is much more influential than Bono will even be, simply because he was probably one of the first people in rock music to write lyrics that went beyond teen-age romance. If U2 had started in the 1960s instead of the 1980s, Bono might have been seen as a pioneer like Bob. As it is, he's just carrying on the tradition, and adding his own twist to it.

 

[verte76]

Rock 'n roll has always had an anti-status quo position, in one way or the other. Pop music was this nice, white middle class stuff, completely harmless.........then, horrors, they crossed it with the blues, sex was always part of the equation, Elvis broke alot of rules whether he was gyrating or wearing blue eye-liner (something Bono took note of when he created the Fly/MacPhisto personas)..........then Dylan brought political protesting to the scene. The Vietnam war was heating up and getting unpopular. There was an audience for protest music. This led to big time cultural events like Woodstock. People were reacting to the crass materialism and stifling conformity of the '50's as well. Well this turned into the self-indulgence of the '70's...rock 'n roll became excessively hedonistic and self-centered, with stars remote from the lives of ordinary people. Working class people in particular were alienated. Enter the Clash. With their political consciousness and hell-raising they inspired alot of kids.....including the four kids who started U2. U2 picked up the Clash's "we're not going to take it" passion and made a fine art of it, and then started to re-invent themselves when they had to to stay relevant. Their strength is their versatility, their ability to take on new ideas, new sounds, new everything, and make it their own.

 

[Convoy]

What about Springsteen?

 

[verte76]

Springsteen? He came along during the self-indulgent '70's with good, basic, passionate rock 'n roll about ordinary people with ordinary lives and the problems they have, etc, etc. He caught on because he was a breath of fresh air. There was alot of pomposity and such in rock and he brought it back to what it was originally intended to be, something ordinary people could relate to and really like without going on a head trip.

 

[martha]

Bob Dylan himself came out of the folk music/protest tradition, so even he was influenced by others. Some of the folk music of the late fifties was very political and that influenced Dylan.

 

[theSoulfulMofo]

Obi Wan : Luke Skywalker :: Bob Dylan : Bono

I read in some magazine (i forget which) a while back, where it talked about the 100 Most Powerful People in Music...

Bono was #1 ... and in a small textbox next to it, said that the people Bono answers to is his wife, and then Dylan.

 

[martha]

Obi Wan : Luke Skywalker :: Bob Dylan : Bono

I like it.

 

[RickFly]

bob marley is another great great writter. combines all that u2 love, religion, politics, sex, and love.

 

[Elvis Presley]

we may be talking about Bono the way we talk about Dylan, in 25 years.....

no disrespect to Bono, Dylan is king