In the beginning ...

Welcome to Concrete Fiction, a blog created for ... well, music, to start. I read a good number of music blogs (maybe to say I am addicted to music blogs is more apt), and have been toying around with the idea to start my own for awhile now. So if nothing else, check us out for time to time for some good tunes of (hopefully) kaleidoscopic variety. One more thing -- I'm easily distracted by pop culture, politics and the rest of the world, so don't be surprised if I opine on other issues from time to time, but hopefully I'll bring it all full circle back to the music.

To begin, I will post a short, 6-pack mix of my favorite artist, Bob Dylan. I can still remember the first time my father threw Bob Dylan's Highway 61 Revisited on the old radio/record player/8-track/cassette player cabinet that we had in our basement. It kicked of with the unmistakeably significant "Like A Rolling Stone", which was chock full of sneering contempt for the older generation and wildly playful, literate lyrics. Three quarters of an hour later, after the needle gently lifted from "Desolation Row", I was hooked. The album was a revealation to my 14 year-old mind, shaking something in my soul. I can honestly say that this album began my dream to pursue art through letters. It plays out like a cautionary fairy tale, think the brothers Grimm, where characters both historical and mythical meet in a land where danger lurks beyond the boundaries, where time and reality is suspended, revealing a surreal, bluesy look at humanity. This is all done with a creative lyrical and musical playfulness. I've listened to this album hundreds of times and everytime I discover something magical, something I've missed.

The other five songs span Dylan's career -- "Series of Dreams" was recently used in a beautiful montage on the final episode of HBO's now-cancelled drama (damn!) "John From Cincinnati". I hadn't listened to the song for probably a couple of years, and that brought it back to mind as one of my forgotten favorites.

Watching The River Flow
Summer Days
I Believe In You
Series of Dreams
Not Dark Yet
Desolation Row


Hope you enjoy and come on back for more in the time to come.