Re: Subject: Re: [Harp-L] dylan electric @ Newport '65

[icemanle@xxxxxxx]

Without being there personally, this is all postulation at best.
 
Someone was there and wrote another perspective on that set - Al Kooper.
 
"Our portion of the show opened with "Maggie's Farm" and concluded with "Like a Rolling Stone". In the middle of "Maggie's Farm", somebody f*cked up and Sam Lay turned the beat around (played the snare on beats 1 and 3 instead of 2 and 4) which thoroughly confused everyone onstage until the song mercifully stumbled to its conclusion. But "Like a Rolling Stone" was played perfectly and we really got it across. Dylan came off and appeared to be satisfied, and people were yelling for an encore.
 
If you've read any accounts of that infamous evening, chances are they centered on how Dylan was booed into submission and then returned to a tearful acoustic rendering of "It's All Over Now, Baby Blue." A romantic picture, perhaps, but that's just not the way it was. At the close of the set, Peter Yarrow (of Paul and Mary fame and the emcee for the evening) grabbed Dylan as he was coming offstage. The crowd was going bonkers for an encore, as we had only played fifteen minutes! I was standing right there.
 
"Hey," Peter said, "you just can't leave them like that, Bobby. They want another one."
 
"But that's all we know," replied Dylan, motioning toward the band.
 
"Well, go back out there with this," said Yarrow, handing his acoustic guitar to Bob.
 
And Dylan did. That's all there was to it. I was right there.
 
.....Can you imagine (the audience) staring in disbelief as Dylan left the stage after fifteen minutes??? Damn right, they booed. But not at Bob-rather, at whoever was seemingly responsible for yanking him offstage after fifteen minutes. We had just run out of rehearsed material and that's why we stopped.
 
....Bob, seizing the moment, returned to the stage with Peter's acoustic guitar and sang "It's All Over Now, Baby Blue" to these people; banishing the acoustic-folk movement with one song right at the crossroads of its origin. If ever there was a galvanizing moment in musical history, this was it.....
 
But the medea misconstrued (or manipulated) the whole point. They attributed the booing to Dylan's electric appearance."
 
Al Kooper, from his autobiography
 
The Iceman
 
-----Original Message-----
From: billhines4@xxxxxxxxxxx


"The audience could have been booing because it was only a 15 minute set, too"

nah, the footage i've seen showed people holding their hands over their ears and 
upset the whole 15 minutes. they were obviously displeased from the get-go. 
maybe it was "bad" music to them (most likely scenario), or secondary theories 
could still be that it was too loud or distorted to enjoy.

Bill