Bob Dylan: Tempest

Not gonna lie: pet peeve when people speak bad of Bob Dylan's voice. Never been able to defend well my position but this guy does it!

Lyrics and Singing: Bob Dylan's voice has always been a little odd. Nobody is going to call him a great vocalist, but over time his voice has become more and more ragged. At some point his voice went past the point of being 'shot out' or 'shredded' and has gone into the realm of being ideal for an aging folk rock icon. It isn't a pretty voice, and it can't be called pleasant, but it is absolutely expressive and just drips with character. I have had an issue with a lot of Dylan's last several releases not being able to reconcile his current voice to the voice from his early career (even then it wasn't a pretty voice, and was indeed very weird even from the beginning), but as of the release of this album either I've grown accustomed to his voice or his voice has progressed so far into the realm of vocal degradation that it sounds good to me – in an elder archetype of folk and americana kind of way. Regardless, people don't listen to Bob Dylan for his voice, they listen for his lyrics and on "Tempest" they are still extremely poignant, though much darker than anything released by Bob Dylanin the past.

- Brandon East (c) 2012