Saturday, March 12, 2011

Bob Dylan happy to take requests from Beijing

Bob Dylan has happily agreed to play dates in China with a set list approved by the government.

Sure, it's easy to say things like "remember when Dylan was a protest singer" and "wasn't there a political singer called Bob Dylan a few years back? Whatever happened to him" and "what a craven, spineless lickspittle", but let's not forget what a large market China is.


3 comments:

Anonymous said...

dylan has been sabotaging his own political/protest mythology since before the cultural revolution. denouncing of an artist's hypocrisy/insincerity doesnt really work if the artist has a history of actively courting it

Anonymous said...

Ridiculous snarky statement.

Simon Hayes Budgen said...

@anonymous 2.45pm

Yes, who can forget the way that, say, in 1997 Bill Clinton presented him with the Kennedy Center Honor and said "he probably had more impact on people of my generation than any other creative artist. His voice and lyrics haven't always been easy on the ear, but throughout his career Bob Dylan has never aimed to please. He's disturbed the peace and discomforted the powerful."

I'm sure that accepting that award was really just an attempt to deny his political/protest myth.

Dylan has a history of wanting it both ways and, yes, this just keys into that.

But you know what? If Justin Beiber was allowing the Chinese government to select his setlist for him, it'd still be an act of craven cowardice.

Post a Comment

As a general rule, posts will only be deleted if they reek of spam.