Bob Dylan
The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan

1962: Pope Roncalli convenes the Council of the Faiths and promulgates the "Pacem in terris"; in Italy, Fanfani forms the first government with an opening to the left; Kennedy governs firmly in the USA a year before the definitive loss of innocence; the Berlin Wall turns one year old; Elvis Presley is the king of rock; the Beatles definitively explode with "Love me do".

Politics and dirty affairs are the order of the day (in truth, today as yesterday), young people begin to emancipate themselves (but the road leading to '68 is still very long) and in Vietnam, the war finally explodes. It seems like an apocalyptic scenario, and perhaps it is. It's forbidden to shock the masses: the common people cannot and should not be roused. Yet, despite laws and prohibitions, in the USA a 21-year-old with distinct European features, named Robert Zimmermann, known as Bob Dylan, decides that perhaps it's time to start stirring the masses.

"The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan" is a record that will enter history beyond its real merits. To be fair, Bob Dylan wasn't entirely unknown: he had already recorded an album, "Bob Dylan," but success had been scant and hostile. Here it is, encapsulated in a handful of songs, the early Bob: guitar, harmonica, and voice. Before the much-criticized rock shift (1965) and after the natural adolescent phase. Yet, to be fair, no such controversial yet dazzling debut is remembered in the American and European music world. Young Bob is no naive: he is a mature young man, consciously critical and politically aligned, condemns (and rightfully so) the made-in-USA venture on Vietnamese soil as disgraceful and maliciously asks when the world will be able to do without living by fighting.
More than "Blowin In The Wind," it's "Master Of War" that is the true cornerstone of this delightfully (almost) debut album. It's a simple track, quite lengthy, and undoubtedly very unsettling. Dylan uses the weapon of harshness to crush, in one fell swoop, the dreams and illusions of an America sadly doomed to death and defeat. If we had (and they had) listened a bit more to wise Bob, perhaps the American dream wouldn't have shattered so harshly.
Anyway, it's impossible not to review "Blowin In The Wind," an evergreen classic that, through a series of indisputably effective questions, hits its target: confronting us with the world's horrors and, if possible, before changing it, at least understanding it. Where is the answer? It's in the wind. Never was a Q&A more incisive.

Worthy of note is also the excellent "A Hard Rain's Gonna Fall": harsh words that lash against a world we unfortunately did not choose and that, unfortunately, by not choosing, we have partly created.
Beyond some undeniably effective gems, the album is poor in music and sound depth. Only in 1964, thanks to the extraordinary "The Times They Are A-Changin," will Dylan, despite the usual musical flaws, manage to be incisive from start to finish of the album. For now, he is just a phenomenon: a phenomenon of the highest purity (class, of course, will come with complete chronological maturity).