Bob Dylan – ‘Infidels’
After a much-maligned period out on the creative heath, deeply ensconced in a Christian lifestyle and evangelical music, Bob Dylan served his 22nd studio album, Infidels, an apt title for an apparent return to secular ways. Produced by Dire Straits’ creative figurehead Mark Knopfler and Dylan himself, whilst the record is a point of conversation as the Duluth-born troubadour returns his focus to zenith period’s themes of love, loss, the environment and geopolitics, broadly speaking, this offering is one of the most forgettable in the star’s discography.
Whilst symbolically, it can be understood as Dylan dusting himself off and getting back on his feet, Infidels fails to capture the brilliance of earlier albums, such as Blood on the Tracks. It is Bob Dylan we’re discussing, so it’s not a wholly terrible time, but there’s an inescapable sense of ‘meh’ that permeates its eight tracks. It’s mostly a very laid-back record – languid even – where the space between Dylan’s delivery and the instruments helps to create a warming feel at points. However, a propensity for such a stance makes it feel overcooked. Despite Knopfler, former Rolling Stones man Mick Taylor, Robbie Shakespeare, and Clydie King featuring, the absence of any discernible wow factor lets the album down. Adding to this are a handful of terrible songs.
With that said Dylan’s lyrics can be excellent. The languid opener, ‘Jokerman’, which comes with the album’s most infectious earworm of a chorus, features some of his best lines to date. Ballasted by a reggae-esque groove coloured by Shakespeare’s bassline, Dylan embarks on a heady journey that fuses the Biblical imagery of his previous chapter with what is ostensibly a political metaphor. He comments on populists with lines such as, “Fools rush in where angels fear to tread”. Regarding the current state of our times, although lyrics like these are arcane, it imbues them with an extra sense of pertinence. This all makes for a joyous anthem that lulls you towards thinking that he has crafted another epic record, which is perhaps why everything that follows is tainted with disappointment.
The second track, ‘Sweetheart Like You’, is also one of the better pieces on Infidels. A melancholic number boasting a stirring piano line and a sultry guitar riff closely in line with Dire Straits’ style. In the track, Dylan appears to be paying tribute to a fictitious woman, “What’s a sweetheart like you doing in a dump like this?”. However, the following lyric, “You know a woman like you should be at home”, makes you wonder if there’s more going on here. In the traditional Dylan style, there are also flecks of religious and patriarchal critique that emerge. Regardless of these thematic questions, the sentimental spirit of the song and Dylan’s delivery are hard to ignore. It is a song that urges repeat to be pressed after the first listen. That is the only time that happens on Infidels.
Another one of the better songs is ‘License to Kill’. Keeping it steady and not in a rush musically, Dylan’s lyrics mark it out from the crowd again. Helped by the keyboard’s tender, almost celestial sound, Dylan makes us seriously contemplate humanity’s present juncture, with him criticising violence and imperialism, as well as standing up for the environment. He sets his stall with the first lines, “Man thinks because he rules the Earth / He can do with it as he please”. He follows this up with a classic reflection of his intellectual power, “And if things don’t change soon, he will / Oh, man has invented his doom / First step was touching the moon”. It’s brilliant.
Elsewhere, the slow, bluesy rock of ‘I and I’ is satisfactory, with the closer ‘Don’t Fall Apart on Me Tonight’, yet another rather lethargic piece that sees Dylan’s delivery slightly more enthusiastic than most other pieces on Infidels. However, it must be said that there isn’t anything overly immersive about either cut. The harmonica on the latter is a nice throwback, though.
Then we come to the tracks that let the album down. The Clydie King-featuring ‘Union Sundown’ is one of the cheesiest moments in Dylan’s oeuvre. This is not helped by the song’s overtly political angle, which does away with Dylan’s compelling mystique and the incredibly grating slide guitar line, which does not go away. It’s relentless. It reminds us that Dylan was not at legend status when writing this body of work.
A cut like ‘Union Sundown’ could be considered an isolated incident, but it’s not. The most strenuous listening experience on Infidels comes from ‘Neighbourhood Bully’, which might just be Dylan’s most annoying song. A prescient comment on Israel’s place in the world, and a scathing critique of people questioning the country’s right to exist by providing a historical account of the injustices the Israelites faced, the music lets it down. The “he’s a neighbourhood bully” hook is grating, with the repetitive Blues Brothers-esque music compounding this – it feels like you’re out of your mind somewhere in the deep south.
All in all, Infidels is not an album I’d note as one that’s particularly pressing in Dylan’s oeuvre. There are highlights, but they are scarce, and, with the exception of the magnificent ‘Jokerman’, barely qualify as golden. As a whole, it’s a damp squib that bounces between mostly uninspiring balladry and cheesy 1980s rock. If we were being kinder, we could say that this was him just warming up, but if we were being cruel, then you could call it very lukewarm.
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