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Keith Richards’ opinion on Bob Dylan
One of the most influential guitarists and songwriters of his generation, Keith Richards changed the world with The Rolling Stones, showing everyone what rock and roll is really about. Beyond being a talented musician, he’s also known for his blunt honesty, sometimes more than he should be, which has often gotten him into trouble.
Over the decades, he’s had the chance to meet and work with many incredible musicians, but his opinions on certain artists can be unpredictable, Bob Dylan, for example.
What is Keith Richards’ opinion on Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan is one of the artists that Keith Richards loves. He praised him throughout his career and also shared the stage with the American artist multiple times. Keith credits Bob with showing that songwriters could write longer songs and explore topics beyond just love. “He showed you that rock’n’roll didn’t need to be quite so restricted by that verse-chorus-verse formula. We app pushed each other in those days. Bob’s a nasty little bugger. I remember him saying to me, ‘I could have written Satisfaction, Keith – but you couldn’t have written Desolation Row.’ I said, ‘Well, you’re right there, Bob!’” he told NME in 2014.
Two years later, Dylan won the Nobel Prize in Literature, the first time a songwriter had received the honor, and Richards agreed with the decision. “I thought it was very far-reaching for the Nobel people to give Bob the prize for literature. I think it’s the first time us songwriters have been begrudgingly let into the literary world. But that’s good, especially because all those bastards like Shakespeare ever did was to steal songs and ballads from minstrels (medieval folk singers in England)!” Keith Richards told New York Post in 2016.
The Bob Dylan song Keith Richards said it’s one of his favorites
As he told Rolling Stone magazine back in 2011, one of his favorite Dylan songs is “Girl From The North Country”, which was part of the 1963 album “The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan”.
“While the British Invasion was going on, Bob Dylan was the man who really pulled the American point of view back into focus. At the same time, he had been drawing on Anglo-Celtic folk songs, and that’s certainly true of ‘Girl From the North Country.’”
“It’s got all the elements of beautiful folk writing without being pretentious. In the lyrics and the melody, there is an absence of Bob’s later cutting edge. There’s none of that resentment. It’s very hard to write songs like that. He recorded it again later with Johnny Cash, but I just don’t think it’s a duo song. I think Bob got it right the first time. In a way, I see ‘Girl From the North Country, ‘Boots of Spanish Leather’ and ‘To Ramona’ as a trilogy.”
“Is Ramona the girl from the north country? Is she the same chick who sends the boots of Spanish leather? There’s some connection between them. Also, the guitar picking is almost the same lick in ‘Boots of Spanish Leather’ and ‘Girl From the North Country.’ It’s like an extension of the same song. Before he went electric and submitted himself to that relentless discipline of a rhythm section, there was a beautiful flow in Bob’s songs that you can only get with just a voice and a guitar.”
He continued:
“He can float across the bar here and there. He’s not restricted by anything; it’s a beautiful form of expression. You let certain notes hang longer, and it doesn’t matter because it all goes with the song. He’s the most prolific writer: I think he’s written more songs than I’ve had hot dinners. So, Bob, just keep ’em coming! He’s an inspiration, really, to us all, beyond even the songwriting, because he’s always trying to go somewhere new. I love the man and I love that he rock & rolls, too!” Keith Richards said.
The Rolling Stones famously covered Dylan’s hit ‘Like a Rolling Stone’ in 1995. Their version was featured on the live album Stripped. The track was quite successful, and in the following years, they had the chance to perform the song live with Dylan himself, who served as their opening act on selected dates. Two notable performances took place in Argentina and Brazil in 1998.
On other occasions, the American artist and the British band performed several other famous songs together, including “Blowin’ On The Wind”. In 2016, they were the main attractions on one of the days of the Desert Trip festival. At the time, Richards said he liked Dylan so much that he would work with the legendary songwriter in ‘Hell or Heaven.'”
But their friendship had its ups and downs
“Although they’ve been good friends since the 1960s, like in any friendship, there were occasional ups and downs. According to Black Crowes vocalist Chris Robinson, Bob got angry with the Stones back in the ’90s, gave them the middle finger on stage and walked out.
That happened in Montpellier, France, when the Black Crowes opened for Bob Dylan and Rolling Stones. The fight happened when they were performing “Like a Rolling Stone” as he told Howard Stern in 2019.
(Transcribed by Rock and Roll Garage). “That was in Montpellier, South of France. It was Black Crowes, Bob Dylan and The Rolling Stones. It was the best week. I will always remember because I’ve met Bob that day and he is ultimately my biggest hero. So we were backstage. I mean, behind Keith’s amps and the Stones, ‘Like a Rolling Stone’ was their single in Europe for that tour, when they were on that ‘Voodoo Lounge’ cycle.”
“And they’re gonna have Bob sit in and I’m like ‘Oh my god’. So Mick Jagger is wearing like a long blue satin shirt with a belt, pirate style over it and I just remember things. I don’t know my social security number but I know that. So they’re like ‘Ladies and gentleman, Montpellier’, you know. There’s 60.000, 70.000 people out there. (And they say) ‘Bob Dylan!’. Bob comes walking right beside me and Rich. He is wearing the exact same outfit and I was like ‘That’s fucking amazing’. He walks out on stage and you know, The Rolling Stones are The Rolling Stones, the greatest Rock and Roll band of all time.”
Chris Robinson continued:
“They’re playing a Bob Dylan song and Bob is there. The Stones don’t jam, they don’t deviate. So it’s like (Chris imitates Mick Jagger singing ‘Like a Rolling Stone’) and then they go around the chorus and then they come up to Bob’s turn. So the band brings the (imitates the song’s rhythm) and Bob goes to the mic and doesn’t sing it. And you see them looking around and they’re like ‘Okay’, it’s kind like you’ve missed the turn at a roundabout and you got to go all the way around.”
“So they go all the way around again and ‘One, two, three’ and he just leans into the mic, turns away. I’m like ‘Oh my god, what the fuck’. It goes on for another half a verse. And then Mick’s gonna come over and save the day and then Bob finally goes and starts singing something.”
“They don’t finish and they’re walking off stage and we were standing there. (Bob) walks off before the end of the song and they are like ‘Bob Dylan!’. He turns around and he looks at them (shows his middle finger) saying ‘Fuck you!’ and his give them the finger. And I’m like ‘The best fucking concert I’ve ever seen in my life, it’s incredible’. I can see Keith, he goes ‘Don’t be like that, Bob!’”
Bob Dylan was inducto into the Rock and Roll Hall Of Fame back in 1988 by Bruce Springsteen, one year before The Rolling Stones who were inducted by The Who’s Pete Townshend.