SuperOT: Dylan

busterkeaton wrote on 9/27/2005, 11:11 PM

I think if your poster was something like:

How Does It Feel
xxxxxxx
xxx and the xxxxx
xxxxxx
sing the Songs of Bob Dylan.

You should be OK, especially since it's truth in advertising.

As for images, the copyright of photos belongs to the photographer, so you can surely find one who licensed the image. I'm pretty sure this is true. For Example, if you want to buy that famous photo of John Lennon, you pay Bob Gruen, not Yoko. There are issues regarding a celebrity's likeness but usually that is regard to having say, Marilyn Monroe in your commercial.

If you can't find a picture of Dylan to use, you may want to commision an artist to paint one

I'm no lawyer, so I would still look into this. If you are having a big festival, you will need a lawyer anyway at some point.

More importantly have you heard about Martin Scorsese's documentary on Dylan, No Direction Home. It just aired on public television here in the US. It's really good. It focuses on 61-66 and includes never-before-seen footage. The DVD is for sale already.

busterkeaton wrote on 9/27/2005, 11:15 PM

My favorite Bob Gruen photo is this one of the Ramones riding the subway back to Queens with their new guitars in shopping bags because the couldn't afford guitar cases. Something inspirational in that.

TorS wrote on 9/27/2005, 11:33 PM

STIM knows. Ask them.

Since the OT is started; I recommend "No direction home", the Dylan documentary by Martin Scorsese that was aired on BBC (and others) this week. Being in London, recovering from a night out with Grazie, I got to see the first half (which in itself was 1 hr 50 min) before I had to rush back home. Can't wait for it to come on Norwegian TV so I can see the second half.

What's good about it? Well here you had the man himself commentating the early years of his career (from Guthrie to Neport so to speak) on camera and with an openness I have never seen before. None of the word-twisting and cleverness he so often hid behind in so many interviews. He even seemed genuinely amused by revisiting some of the images and thoughts.

It's like a new gospel has been discovered. It does not do away with all the mystery of the old ones but it makes some bits fall into place (and leaves some new ones floating around).

I heard Like a rolling stone (the single) the first time it was played on BBC's Top Twenty in 1965 (trust Beeb to play all of the full astonishing six minutes of it) and immediately started pestering local record shops to get it. Very few cultural events has made a greater impression on me.

Good luck on your concert.

Tor

RexA wrote on 9/27/2005, 11:56 PM

>> I recommend "No direction home", the Dylan documentary by Martin Scorsese that was aired on BBC (and others) this week.
<<

I knew I was going to want this, so pre-ordered it from Amazon. Got it last Wenesday and watched it then. All the material was recorded and assembled, then Scorsese was handed it and asked to make it into the documentary we see. It's good, but I think Scorsese might be getting a little too much credit on this one.

The doc stops in 1966, with only two or three of the many metamorposis of Dylan's essence having taken place. Wonder if there will be follow-up docs for the later Dylan? He not busy being born is busy dying, and he ain't dead yet.

busterkeaton wrote on 9/27/2005, 11:56 PM

As we were watching the documentary, my wife and I kept wondering what Dylan's first hit was. I'm 35 so we weren't around then. I figured it The Times They are a Changing. Well that was the first hit he wrote, but not for him. I was kind of surprised to learn that it was Like a Rolling Stone which I associate with later Dylan. After the documentary they had an interview with Scorsese. I amazed to learn the first song Scorsese heard from Dylan was "Like a Rolling Stone." Scorsese's house is walking distance from all those Greenwich Village clubs Dylan was playing, but the neighborhoods are world's apart and it wasn't until he went electric and hit the top forty that Scorsese heard him. Looking back at history can be funny, the story of the Greenvich Village folk scene has been told so many times, you think everyone experienced it at once, but a kid just a mile or two away didn't hear Dylan until his sixth album.

Grazie wrote on 9/28/2005, 12:09 AM

Scorsie's film is brill.

Dylan is STILL brill.

The input from Seger to Clancy to Biaz and all the others was stupendious.

If any of us needed a 101 on how to edit a "free-fall" set of events, then you'd be hard pressed to find a better example.

3½ hours of the history around my formative years - great! Oh yeah, you get to hear some good tunes too!

Grazie

busterkeaton wrote on 9/28/2005, 12:10 AM

All the material was recorded and assembled, then Scorsese was handed it and asked to make it into the documentary we see. It's good, but I think Scorsese might be getting a little too much credit on this one.

Rex, I think you're giving him too little credit. Taking the recorded material and making into a documentary with an overarching theme and narrative is the skill an editor and filmmaker needs.

This could be just PR-talk, but this is how one of the other producers involved described his contribution.
"When we first began discussing this project years ago, we were overwhelmed by the material at hand - home movies and history-making concert footage, fascinating interviews with Dylan's friends and fellow performers and, of course, Dylan himself, speaking so frankly about this incredible period in his life," said Lacy, series creator and executive producer of AMERICAN MASTERS. "What we needed - above all - was an artist with a singular vision who could fuse this material into a unique visual narrative. That artist was Martin Scorsese, who graciously agreed to direct."

busterkeaton wrote on 9/28/2005, 12:11 AM

If any of us needed a 101 on how to edit a "free-fall" set of events, then you'd be hard pressed to find a better example.

Grazie says it better than I could.

RexA wrote on 9/28/2005, 12:34 AM

>> As we were watching the documentary, my wife and I kept wondering what Dylan's first hit was. I'm 35 so we weren't around then. I figured it The Times They are a Changing.
<<

I think "Blowin' in the Wind" and "The Times They are A-Changin'" were my first exposures to Dylan, but it wasn't Dylan's version. It was most popular by Peter, Paul and Mary at the time. The documentary makes a point that the publishers kind of made Dylan a phenomenon by cross-pollinating his songs to lots of more main-stream artists. They also explain in the doc that Peter, Paul and Mary was a group designed and assembled by the music industry.

After learning that Dylan was the author of those songs, I went out and found his early albums and discovered that, in spite of his non-standard sound, I preferred the music straight from the horse's mouth. Folk music was way-big in the mid-60's. When I got to college in '64, I can remember big gatherings where people would listen to and sing these songs. Dylan was a big stimulus to this collective consciousness.

I'm still amazed by the quantity and quality of lyrics and sounds that he has given us. He also has the most uncany knack to change and evolve over and over, and just a little bit ahead of trends that then seemed to become part of the collective world at large.

OK. I'm a fan.

busterkeaton wrote on 9/28/2005, 12:41 AM

So Rex, what did you think when he went electric?

I'm not a huge Dylan-head, but I Love and Theft from a few years ago knocked me out.

Also PBS has a documentary on Pete Best Wednesday night. That looks good too.

RexA wrote on 9/28/2005, 12:45 AM

>>Rex, I think you're giving him too little credit.<<

Yeah, I probably overstated that a bit. Goodfellas is one of my favorite films, so I'm far from a Scorsese critic.

I guess when I heard that he had done this documentary, I assumed that he had done or played a part in the interviews. I think "The Last Waltz" is a similar doc -- and tied to Dylan in a way -- and as far as I know he was active in that one from the inception. Guess I was just a little disappointed when I learned that he wasn't involved in this one until the final crafting.

It's good, though.

rsp wrote on 9/28/2005, 12:45 AM

This was what makes the heart beat - excellent docu and music and truely amazing to see the Man Dylan himself comment to these events.... the shots of him were most powerful. Only minus was indeed the input of some of the sideman and women who got too much airtime. Anyway like all good things it was over too soon. Now let's get that dvd and see if we can learn any menu tricks from that one?!

garo wrote on 9/28/2005, 12:53 AM

my 17 year old son and I will be at the first stop of Dylan's tour, 17th of October in Stockholm - my son is also digging "Hurricain" along side his "normal" musical tastes ........

RexA wrote on 9/28/2005, 12:58 AM

>So Rex, what did you think when he went electric?

Didn't bother me a bit. I liked pretty much everything he has done. I actually went to a Dylan concert at the time of all the controversy covered in the doc. Not sure if it was '66 or a bit earlier. Anyway he played the first half of the show in his early folksy acoustic style. Then the second half was electric and some of the audience was bummed. Dylan played the entire set facing away from the audience.

>I'm not a huge Dylan-head, but I Love and Theft from a few years ago knocked me out.

I haven't followed all the recent stuff much but I feel the same way about "Time Out of Mind". It's great if you are ever in a heart-break situation. A friend of mine broke up with his girlfriend and was all mopy for a while. One night it flashed to me that he needed this Dylan CD so I bought it for him. I said listen to this a few times. It'll make you so depressed you'll get it out of your system.

I saw him a week or so later, and he thanked me. It worked.

>Also PBS has a documentary on Pete Best Wednesday night. That looks good too.

Didn't know that. Will check it out.

busterkeaton wrote on 9/28/2005, 1:16 AM

Rex,

Check out Love and Theft, it's really good.

I think "The Last Waltz" is a similar doc ..... and as far as I know he was active in that one from the inception.

Actually he and Robbie Robertson from the Band were housemates before the movie, so yes, he planned that movie. I think Robbie proposed Last Waltz as something for Scorsese to focus during his drug addiction (just checked that, actually Last Waltz was among the heights of his addiction. Got my stories mixed up, it was DeNiro gave him the book Raging Bull for him to focus on work during his addiction.)

RexA wrote on 9/28/2005, 1:20 AM

Didn't even know Scorsese had a big drug problem. You always have good information.

What are you doing posting at this hour? Pulling some kind of all-nighter?

busterkeaton wrote on 9/28/2005, 1:47 AM

Apparently, the Scorsese that sipped 15-20 espressos all day segued very easily into the Scorsese that did coke all day. Also he's asthmatic and the inhalers in those days contained benezdrine. When New York, New York failed, his life went into a tailspin.

I highly recommend this book. It has many amusing anecdotes including when Scorsese worked on the crew filming Woodstock and he showed up in a blazer and cufflinks or when he was having an affair with Liza Manelli who was also married and according to Andy Warhol, they showed up at Halston's house and asked for "all the drugs you have."

OK, I'm going to sleep now.

FuTz wrote on 9/28/2005, 2:17 AM

Buster, bingo!
Never thought Bob Gruen had a site on which I can watch all these bands that made my heydays (quite a few years ago that is... :/ )
Cooper, Kiss, Led Zep, Blondie, Ramones, NYC/LA/UK 70's and 80's ; you name it: he's a MONSTER in picture world !!
Thanks for the pointer !

BrianStanding wrote on 9/28/2005, 4:45 AM

buster, thanks for the Ramones pic. Personally, I find ANYTHING related to the Ramones to be inspirational.

While we're on the topic of Dylan docs, go rent "Don't Look Back" by D.A. Pennebaker, about Dylan's first London tour. One of the all-time classics of the documentary form, and some fascinating interactions between a young, snotty Dylan, the press and a whole bunch of wannabes. (Dylan's exchange with Donovan is hysterical.)

I'll be curious to compare Pennebaker's film with Scorcese's.

JJKizak wrote on 9/28/2005, 5:32 AM

I thought the documentary was absolutely brilliant. There was some repetition but it was expertly assembled.

JJK

earthrisers wrote on 9/28/2005, 9:56 AM

Logging in as another fan of the "No Direction Home" Dylan documentary.
Nice coincidence, if that's what it is, that the documentary covers the same period of time as "volume 1" of Dylan's own autobiography. Wonder if there's enough film/video footage around for a next-period documentary, when (if) the next volume of the autobiography comes out...

ALSO... a couple years ago, I bought (cheap) a DVD of an extended interview/documentary with Robbie Robertson. It was from the PBS "Going Home" series. It includes some great reminiscences about being part of Dylan's going-electric period, including getting booed all over the place and then getting hailed as visionaries a couple years later when the world's tastes morphed to catch up with them.
I'm personally a fairly big fan of Robbie Robertson, although he occasionally comes across as a bit too impressed with himself. I love the way the emotion of the music is so visible in his face and body when he plays.
-Ernie

busterkeaton wrote on 9/28/2005, 1:08 PM

Scorsese used a lot Pennebaker's footage, stuff that didn't wind up in Don't Look Back and also a lot from Murray Lerner's movie on the Newport Folk Festival, called Festival. Pennebaker is interviewed in a movie.

Futz, one night me and my friends went out to a bar and accidentally walked into Bob Gruen's 50th birthday party. I also think it was a launch party for a book he did. There were tons of photos hanging up, my favorite was Dee Dee Ramone with the Bay City Rollers at a White Castle in Queens. There was another good one with Springsteen hanging out backstage with the Ramones.

Bunch of years later I went to see Link Wray, (surf guitar god, invented the power chord). This guy steps in front of me with a camera and asks he could take a picture. The club was really crowded and I kind of just leaned back to get out of his way, cuz I figured it would just take a few seconds. About a minute or two later, he's still taking pictures and I'm still bent over. So I put my forearm in his back and start leaning into him and asking "Did you get it yet?" He turns around to apologize and I see it's Bob Gruen, now with white hair. I saw it was him and said "Go ahead." and found a new spot to stand.

busterkeaton wrote on 9/29/2005, 1:47 AM

The editor of the movie and the supervising producer from the American Masters series had an online chat at washingtonpost.com (you may have to register to view this) and they took one of my questions:

Brooklyn, NY: What state was the documentary in when you approached Martin Scorsese. Was there a rough cut?

Susan Lacy: There was no documentary before we approached Martin Scorcese. There was simply a massive archive which needed to be organized and screened.

_______________________

David Tedeschi: I wanted to add to Susan's response, that Marty felt complete freedom to do the kind of the film he wanted to do, without pressure from PBS or from Bob Dylan's management. It is why Marty likes working with a non commerical entity, like PBS.

_______________________

Susan Lacy: In addition to the archive, Marty and David directed a significant amount of original and additional research for this film. This film is not just from Dylan's management's archive. A significant amount of additional research was done under the guidance of David and Marty.

link

filmy wrote on 9/29/2005, 9:13 AM

You cando a concert withotu any issues - if it is only music of Bob Dylan you need to make sure all the fees are paid and because you are in Sweden you need to check with the venue to see if they pay the fees that would allow you to do cover tunes.

Advertisng wise I wouldn't see any issues as lonmg as it was clear that Bob Dylan was *not* going to be there. For example don't have a huge ad that says "Bob Dylan" in 30 point but have a line that says "The music of" in 7 point on top. "Tribute" bands are huge and they always will advertise what bands music they are doing with no issues. Each year around here there is always a "Bob Dylan" party where local artists play only Dylan music and it is advertised as such. So you could have a poster and advertisng that said something like "How does it feel - an all day music festival featuring some of the regions best artists in a musical tribute to Bob Dylan"

T-Shirts are another quesiton. You couold make up shirts, sans any image, without much issue. As people have pointed out if you use an image you need to pay fees to the person who owns that image. Most photographers will charge more if an image is going to be used on a t-shirt. Some will even ask for a set amoutn from each shirt sold.

Making a video for sale bring up the oft discussed publishing and roaylites issues. No you won't need permission to perform the songs, or even to record them, but you will need to pay the publishing on them. You would also need to clear all the acts ahead of time that they understand what is going on because the end result would be their version of the song being sold and, in theory, they would need their cut of the pie.

Further off topic - You may not like the music but if you see that Stream of Passion is playing go see them. They just signed with Sony over there and their CD is set to come out next month I think. The guitarist is a good friend of mine so i am a bit partial.