Modern Mimes

Overall Album Score: 7.7 out of 10

It had been five years since his last studio album, Love and Theft, and fans and critics alike couldn't wait for the release of this much-anticipated follow-up. Me, I didn't care so much, because I'm only a casual Dylan fan, and I'm not a real critic.

This album was noted for getting universally hailed reviews upon release, and I suppose some of that is warranted. But I honestly don't find this album to be so great. I'm guessing that most professional critics were too afraid to have anything negative to say about a new Bob Dylan album. After all, this could very well he his last album (as he sort of indicated in interviews) and who wants to be the one to have to say negative words about Dylan's swan song?

I guess I'll be that guy. Before you send me flame-letters, I'll have you know that I think this is an altogether decent album. His lyrics are good, and some of the songs are nice and pleasant. A few songs pick up a good atmosphere, and others manage to rock out quite nicely. What I can tell you with a towering degree of confidence is this is clearly inferior to his 2001 album Love and Theft.

Don't you dare say that to his fans, though, because this album broke a pretty significant Billboard record. This is the first Dylan album since 1976's Desire to reach the #1 spot on the charts, and the 65-year-old is now the oldest person to have done that. Hey, if that's going to happen to anyone, that had might as well be Bob Dylan, but I do hope that we all learned by now that an album's commercial success has nothing to do with its artistic merit. *Ahem* not that Modern Times doesn't have artistic merit!

This album sees Dylan continuing down the same old-school rockability vein that he had already been piddling in for the past 10 years or so. He's also adding country ballads and jazzy ballads more predominately now. Most of these tracks tend to extend past five minutes and sometimes up to almost nine minutes. The songs' length are the album's principle problem, because most songs of these genres only last three minutes --- four at most. So, almost everything here ends up feeling pretty overextended, monotonous and unexciting in general. He would have easily fixed this by shortening these tracks and maybe writing a handful of new songs, but --- I guess he wanted to get more lyrics in or something.

Ironically, my favorite song of the album happens to be the nine-minute closing track "Ain't Talkin'." I'd also say that one has a chronic lack of fresh ideas to honestly warrant such a length, but at least that one has such an engaging and beautiful atmosphere and such a flow to let it hypnotize me. Other sheer highlights include two unabashedly enjoyable '50s style rockability tunes "Someday Baby" and "Rollin' and Tumblin'." Also, I really enjoy the first half of "Working Man Blues #2" --- the problem with that song is the second half sounds exactly like the first, and it gets OLD. It doesn't even have the same hypnotizing effect on me as "Ain't Talkin'" does.

Dylan really let his voice go, so to speak. I loved his vocal performances on his previous two albums --- I agreed with most critics about that marking sort of a career renaissance here. But with Modern Times he doesn't even seem to be caring how his voice sounds. You could argue that Dylan was just going for a rawer approach, but that doesn't mean he can't clear his throat every once in awhile. Speaking of the "rawer" approach, the instrumentation isn't that great either. The story is Dylan used his old backing band to record this. I'm a bit confused about that, because I attended a Dylan concert in 2004, and that band absolutely ROCKED. Why they're trying to pull off half-hearted Chuck Berry riffs here is rather disheartening.

The music itself is pretty generic and it has a feeling of sounding tossed-off. Again, the lyrics are fine even though he apparently borrowed some of them from a Civil War poet. That's been accused of him in the past, so it's not worth lingering on it. Lyrics only come secondary to the music anyway! Even though much of it isn't bad, this is pretty sub-par for Dylan. Little of it seems fresh, and the effort comes off as uninteresting and lethargic.

Now I'm going to end the review on a positive note, because this is a positive review whether it might seem like it or not. (I'm only sounding negative, because this is disappointing for Dylan.) The album is nice and homely... And, again, the lyrics are good. BOB DYLAN RULES!!!! OK, that's all.

Overall Album Score: 7.7 out of 10 (This isn't such a great album. A 7.5 is the benchmark rating, and you'd usually think Dylan capable of surpassing that with flying colors. It's kind of respectable, but absolutely BORING.)

Average Song Score: 8.0 (These songs are respectable and OK.)

Album Tilt: 7.5 (Major points off for being BORING.)

Artist Tilt: 7.5 (Major points off for being BORING.)

Track Reviews

Thunder on the Mountain 8.5/10

Here is a nice rockability tune with a walking bassline. It runs on for six minutes and doesn't go so far as to attempt to move these mountains, but at least it's fun and surprisingly doesn't seem to run out of steam despite that it's so dang repetitive. The straight-ahead instrumentation turns in a few good Chuck Berry-esque licks although I could envision those being more rollicking. Dylan's old-man vocals are fine though it sounds like he needed to clear his throat out or something in the second half.

Spirit in the Water 7.5/10

Wow, this country-esque ballad is almost eight minutes long, and it doesn't seem to go anywhere. I'll be positive, because this isn't such a boring experience. He has the ability to engage us for the whole time and usually adds in a new sound or guitar solo to keep the experience relatively fresh. That doesn't make up for the fact that I get tired of that twinkly riff he's always repeating...

Rollin' and Tumblin' 9/10

A thundering old rockability song with some nice guitar in the intro. Dylan delivers a sloppy vocal performance (but that's been a good thing lately). The song's pacing has a great snappy beat, and the guitar instrumental fills keep it interesting. The six minute running length seems a bit excessive, but at least it's not eight minutes! Eh, who am I kidding? I'm having fun listening to this!

When the Deal Goes Down 7.5/10

This is a ballad pretty similar to "What a Wonderful World" except it's much longer and the melody isn't as catchy. This isn't a bad song to listen to at all. It's well orchestrated and the melody is OK. I try not to let it distract me, but the resemblance to that more famous predecessor is a bit strong.

Someday Baby 9/10

A five-minute rockability tune and thus automatically more enjoyable than the previous tunes!! The old-school '50s riff that he uses has enough inertia to keep it going for that long. Meanwhile, Dylan's vocal performance is interesting...

Workingman Blues #2 8/10

This is really fantastic for three minutes. It has such a lovely and calm atmosphere with a modest melody and sweet pacing. But then it becomes pretty obvious that Dylan isn't going anywhere with it, musically speaking, and he drags it out to a full six minutes. There are fans who concentrate on lyrics, and I guess these are alright. I usually criticize musicians for making songs that overextend their stay like this, and I don't know why Dylan doesn't deserve the same treatment. No, I will not be intimidated!!!

Beyond the Horizon 7/10

I like the very very beginning, but the rest of it is among the most uninteresting pieces of the whole album. It has a nice, calm shuffley beat, which is a good thing, but the melody is pretty bland and so is everything else. You can find enough to enjoy about of those sweet guitar solos, but I'm over-stretching myself to notice those.

Nettie Moore 6.5/10

Did I say that the previous song was uninteresting? Not as uninteresting as this. It begins horribly, which is not a good sign since the pattern of these songs are to start out strong and then get really stale. For once, though, I really enjoy Dylan's vocal performance. For a moment, it sounds like he's about to break down crying... Granted, it's arguable if that was actually intentional. This song definitely had potential --- it sounds like he was going to start building up the orchestration in the chorus, but he never does. This song extends for seven minutes, and I'm bored to tears. The good news is that it doesn't get any worse than this.

The Levee's Gonna Break 7.5/10

His lyrics throughout this album have been getting pretty political, but I almost can't escape mentioning that this Katrina-inspired ditty proves that he's trying to be relevant. This has a nice, upbeat rhythm. The melody isn't that great, and the instrumentation isn't inspired whatsoever. To prove my point, you can hear an extremely subdued Chuck Berry-esque sequence that adds absolutely nothing. Is that all Bob Dylan honestly wanted to do?

Ain't Talkin' 9.5/10

If he was going to make one of his songs nine minutes long, I guess it had might as well have been this one! It's funny that I've complained so much about the length of these songs, but this one is the longest by far, and I don't think there's a problem. This is a remarkably calming track with very good flow and an engaging atmosphere. It creates such a feeling that this could have even been lengthier! The instrumentation is very pretty (including a subtle violin that might have still been expanded upon).

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