Dylan's Frank Sinatra

Sometimes, you cannot have enough of a good thing. You could say this of Bob Dylan. Singers may come and singers may go, but Dylan goes on forever.

The singer has sometimes been criticised that he cannot play the guitar or the harmonica, that he is no performer and that he has a croaky voice. Yet his poetic lyrics and his nonchalant way of singing and playing the instruments have a tremendous appeal.
‘Shadows in the Night’, his 36th album, is a Frank Sinatra-covers album, and he does it in his own way. True to his style,  this album has no overdubbing or studio tinkering. It has a kind of raw appeal of impromptu singing.

The album begins with Frank Sinatra’s I’m a Fool to Want You (1951). The ballad is of pop and jazz standard, but Dylan delivers it in his own style. The Night We Called It a Day is a popular song. Of all the covers,  Frank Sinatra’s 1957 version is most liked.

Dylan adds a nostalgic tinge to Stay With Me, a favourite with all music lovers, with its meaningful lyrics (Should my heart not be humble/ Should my eyes fail to see/ Should my feet sometimes stumble/ On the way, stay with me). For sheer variety, Dylan chooses a show tune from the 1949 Rodgers and Hammerstein musical, South Pacific. What’ll I Do is a song that Sinatra originally recorded sometime in the 1940s. It has simple but profound lyrics.

Dylan has chosen an interesting closing song — That Lucky Old Sun. It is a popular 1949 song with music by Beasley Smith. Like Ol’ Man River, its lyrics contrast the toil and intense hardship of the singer’s life with the obliviousness of the natural world.