|
Christmas at the Heart of Bob
Shock horror, Bob Dylan has just bought out a Christmas album!
It’s called Christmas In The Heart, and the cover is pretty cheesy, with a traditional troika scene on the front, a scantily-clad ‘Sister Christmas’ in the centrefold, and a Christmas card-like scene of the Magi following the star on the back.
 At first listening, it’s pretty awful. Dylan’s voice - which David Bowie once described as being ‘like sand and glue’ - grates and rasps its meandering way over gravel and treacle through some of our best loved tunes and carols, like Here Comes Santa Claus, Winter Wonderland, Hark the Herald Angels Sing, Little Drummer Boy, O’ Come All Ye Faithful, Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas, The First Noel and The Christmas Song.
One very confused reviewer said it’s not a like a Dylan album because it’s an album of Christmas songs, but it’s not like a Christmas album because it’s all sung by Dylan!
On second hearing, you think, “Surely this has to be ironic?” The great prophet of poetry could only have done this album as a bet, or as a joke - or in desperation. Or for money, not that he needs it.
At the third time of listening, the truth begins to sink in. Here’s a well-worn troubadour in his 60s taking us back to his musical and cultural roots. And all the royalties are going to the World Food Programme, Crisis UK and Feeding America.
 Dylan was interviewed for a recent edition of the Big Issue magazine. He’s asked about his ‘heroic performance’ of O’ Little Town of Bethlehem. “I don’t want to put you on the spot’” the interviewer says, “but you sure deliver that song like a true believer.”
To which Dylan emphatically replies with a short but direct answer: “Well, I am a true believer.”
In 1979, Dylan controversially became a born-again Christian. His album of that year, Slow Train Coming, held nothing back. The main track of that album, You’ve Got To Serve Somebody - “It maybe the devil, or it may be the Lord” - won Dylan an Emmy. Other tracks, like I Believe In You, chart his personal testimony of coming to faith in Jesus. Dylan plays harmonica briefly on a Keith Green track - they'd met through the Vineyard church they both attended.
The following year Dylan brought the heavily black-gospel influenced Saved. This proved to be even more controversial, and sales dived. For a long time, you couldn’t buy it anywhere. His concerts left out the Dylan back catalogue as he preached the gospel and sang his Christian songs. People thought he’d sold out. But Dylan kept - as one of the tracks says - Pressing On.
In 1981 Shot of Love was released, a roughly hewn rock of an album, which hit on a number of styles, and which was not about exclusively Christian subject matter, or so it seemed. The delicate and poetic Every Grain of Sand is a hymn about the Creator and the mystery of our own existence, which some saw as doubt creeping in, but others saw as an indication of the desire to retreat from the glare of the Christian celebrity spotlight. He also became interested in exploring his Messianic Jewish roots.
 Subsequent albums often referred to biblical imagery and moral issues, but Jesus wasn’t mentioned in such an upfront manner. And yet, so it would seem, Dylan’s faith has remained intact. There is a rich vein of prophetic imagery running through his work that keeps returning the listener to consider God and the truth of the Word. Like St Bono of Dublin, he just can’t stop himself - he can’t get away from what he is. “Well, I am a true believer.”
The inclusion on Christmas At The Heart of four well known carols, among a gentle sea of 50s country and crooning nostalgia, is a reflection of this man’s sincere belief that Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah, the Son of God. No irony - now isn’t that ironic?
You can watch Dylan’s bizarre but entertaining Christmas video of Must Be Santa here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=qVs6X9yIM_k
Dylan’s official website: www.bobdylan.com
Buy Christmas At The Heart here: www.amazon.co.uk/Christmas-Heart-Bob-Dylan/dp/B002MW50KO/ref=pd_sim_b_2
Buy Restless Pilgrim, the story of Dylan’s Christian walk, here: www.relevant.com or www.amazon.co.uk/Restless-Pilgrim-Spiritual-Journey-Dylan/dp/097145762X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1261052400&sr=1-1
Buy I’m Not There, a film about Dylan’s life (inc. his Christianity) in which he is played by 5 actors: www.amazon.co.uk/Not-There-DVD-Cate-Blanchett/dp/B00147AJ8G/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1261052502&sr=1-1
Big Issue’s website: www.bigissue.com (you can buy back issues if you want to read the Dylan interview in full - in no.874)
Don’t like Dylan? Donate directly to Crisis UK or become a volunteer: www.crisis.org.uk
|
Tim Harrold, 17/12/2009 |
|
|
