BOB'S TOUR DATES (MORE NOW ADDED)

June 16, The Marquee, Cork, Ireland

June 18, The Feis, Finsbury Park, London

June 20, Ramat Gan Stadium, Tel Aviv, Israel

June 22, Alcatraz, Milan, Italy

June 24, Zirkusplatz, Sursee, Switzerland

June 25, Volkspark, Mainz, Germany

June 26, Stadtpark, Hamburg, Germany

June 27, Funen Village, Odense, Denmark

June 29, Bergen Calling, Bergen, Norway

June 30, Spektrum, Oslo, Norway

July 2, Peace and Love Festival, Borlange, Sweden

July 14, Santa Barbara Bowl, Santa Barbara, CA

July 15, Pacific Amphitheatre, 2011 OC Fair, Orange County, CA

July 16, The Pearl Concert Theater At The Palms, Las Vegas, NV

July 18, Comerica Theatre, Phoenix, AZ

July 19, Anselmo Valencia Tori Amphitheatre, Tucson, AZ

July 21, Hard Rock Pavilion, Albuquerque, NM

July 23, WinStar World Casino, Thackerville, OK

Good Enough to Eat: Face Masks

After a long winter, some of us are left with dull, dry skin. Spring is the time to rejuvenate, but spa treatments, cosmetics and creams can be expensive and often disappointing. Beautify from the inside out, and try experimenting with some DIY beauty treatments. They are simple to make, gentle and natural. Most importantly, be aware that what you put into your body affects its appearance significantly. Adequate sleep, exercise, and healthy eating are the best beauty treatments of all.

Carla Emery suggests starting by identifying your skin type:

What you put on your skin should be appropriate for its type. Only very oily skin should be dosed with highly acid treatments like citrus fruits (lemon, lime, grapefruit), Concord grapes, strawberries, or apples. If you don't have very oily skin but want an acid skin treatment, use fruits that are a little less acid than the previous list - peaches, apricots, grapes other than Concord, and tomatoes. If you want a beneficial fruit treatment whose acidity is about the same as that of normal skin, use bananas, green peppers, cucumber, watermelon, or persimmon. If you want a treatment that will moisturize dry skin using substances very low in acid, go with carrots, iceberg lettuce, cantaloupe, avocado, or honeydew melon.

What could be better than playing with food, as well as enjoying an improved complexion? A variety of fruits, vegetables and other ingredients can be combined to make a mask. Here are some basic mask recipes to get you started:

Egg White Mask

This helps drag blackheads and whiteheads out of your pores. Slightly beat an egg white and spread it fairly thickly over your face. Let it dry. Do the same thing with another egg white right on top of the first.

Oatmeal Mask

Mix together 2⁄3 c. oatmeal and enough honey to make a pasty consistency. Optionally, add 2 tsp. rose water.

Honey/Lemon Mask

Mix 2 T. slightly warmed honey with 1 t. lemon juice. Put the mixture on your face and leave for about a half hour.

Brewer's Yeast Mask

Mix yeast with enough water to create a paste. Smooth it over your face (not into eyes!). Let dry. Then remove with warm water. Do this 1-2 times a week. For dry skin, add 1 T. wheat germ oil or 1 egg yolk to mask. You can also add 3 t. brewer's yeast to milk or fruit juice and drink it daily.

DYLAN AUDIO SLIDESHOW ONLINE

I've just seen the BBC's new online Dylan audio slideshow to celebrate the birthday. The interview with me was done two or three weeks ago in a little studio in Pau, France, and I don't say anything particularly striking: but the photographs they've used include some really great ones. It's here.

Snails: How and Why You Should Try Eating These Garden Pests

Snails: Small, slimy, and a common pest in your garden. You might not know that these small brown creatures are identical to the "escargot" variety in France and are often quite edible. Why not avoid pesticides and eat the snails instead? They are high in protein and minerals. However, use caution. Carla Emery notes:

"There's a lot to know about collecting and eating snails. Some are not good to eat. Some need special treatment."

Research your snail varieties to learn which snails are safe to eat, and cook them properly before you decide to eat them. These directions are crucial to follow when eating snails:

Purge. Snails collected for eating must be purged of any off-flavor or toxic materials from previously eaten food. Put about 1⁄2 inch of damp cornmeal in the bottom of a container such as a plastic wastebasket, metal pan, or crock. Put snails in the container and cover with a ventilated top; a wire refrigerator shelf, hardware cloth, cheesecloth, or nylon netting provides plenty of air and let you observe the activity of the snails. The cover should be weighted with bricks or tied securely so the snails do not escape. Place the container in a cool, shady area and let snails purge themselves (by eating the cornmeal) for at least 72 hours. Snails can be kept in containers for a long time if the cornmeal is replaced every other day to prevent it from molding and souring. The snails will feed and then crawl up the side of the container to rest; use only active snails. Throw away without eating those that remain inactive on the bottom. After 72 hours the snails can be removed from the container and washed thoroughly with cold running water to remove the cornmeal from their shells. They are now ready for blanching, another essential procedure.

Blanch. Plunge the live snails into boiling water and simmer about 15 minutes, as is done in preparing live shrimp, lobster, crab, or crawfish. (A bay leaf in the cooking water will give this operation a pleasant aroma.) The water will foam as the snails cook, so heat should be controlled to prevent the kettle from boiling over. After blanching, turn snails into a colander to drain. Then, with a toothpick, nut pick, or pointed knife, pull the snail meat from the shell. Save some shells for later use.

Remove Gall. Remove and discard the dark-colored gall, about 1⁄4 inch long, which is found on the tail end, where the snail is attached to the shell. Wash snail meat several times under cold running water.

Snails can be cooked in a variety of ways and have a tendency to take on the flavor of other ingredients while adding a subtle, earthy flavor of their own.

MAY 14, 1966

 Two days ago, it was 45 years since I first saw Bob Dylan live. The Odeon cinema, London Road, Liverpool. I didn't boo. And listening to the recordings now, I feel the same way I've felt for many years: that surely the 'Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues' performed that night is the absolute transcendent moment of moments among that side of his work that expressed alienation, desperation, the acceptance of chaos yet equally the passionate insistence of belief that "there must be some way out of here".

COMPETITION RESULTS - CD AUDIO-BOOK WINNER

The competition to suggest the most beguiling thing Bob Dylan could do on stage, aside from performing music, has now closed. There was a good response, and some resourceful answers  -  including:

"Recite some of the Brecht that was performed the night Suze, who was working on the production, had him over to drink it all in.  And dedicate his performance to her." (from GL, California USA)

"Treat the band by making them margaritas and serving them from a tray." (from GW, Scotland)

"I would absolutely be mesmerized by watching him paint. So, I would have to say that the most entrancing thing Dylan could do on stage is to paint a picture. I would love to be able to see him create in person." (from JR, Virginia USA)

"Bob reading out loud from a juicy selection of texts: The King James Bible; Rimbaud's Une Saison En Enfer; A Treasury of Nursery Rhymes; and some bits of Ricks and Gray. Especially if interspersed with comments - trying to differentiate between the straight and sardonic would be an enthralling challenge in itself, wouldn't it?" (from AE, Lima Peru)

and

"Really Sing." (from AM, England).

Thanks to these and many others  -  but the winning entry is this:

"Play chess on stage. Not so much for the moves, but for the body language as he concentrates."

So the modest prize, a signed copy of the Bob Dylan Encyclopedia Greatest Hits audio-book CD, will be on its way to Matt Tempest of London SE23, England. Congratulations to him and many thanks to everyone who took part.

BOB ADMITS HE'S A LEADER?!?!?

Bizarrely, the official Dylan website issued this statement today, purporting to come from Bob himself:

"Allow me to clarify a couple of things about this so-called China controversy which has been going on for over a year. First of all, we were never denied permission to play in China. This was all drummed up by a Chinese promoter who was trying to get me to come there after playing Japan and Korea. My guess is that the guy printed up tickets and made promises to certain groups without any agreements being made. We had no intention of playing China at that time, and when it didn't happen most likely the promoter had to save face by issuing statements that the Chinese Ministry had refused permission for me to play there to get himself off the hook. If anybody had bothered to check with the Chinese authorities, it would have been clear that the Chinese authorities were unaware of the whole thing.

We did go there this year under a different promoter. According to Mojo magazine the concerts were attended mostly by ex-pats and there were a lot of empty seats. Not true. If anybody wants to check with any of the concert-goers they will see that it was mostly Chinese young people that came. Very few ex-pats if any. The ex-pats were mostly in Hong Kong not Beijing. Out of 13,000 seats we sold about 12,000 of them, and the rest of the tickets were given away to orphanages. The Chinese press did tout me as a sixties icon, however, and posted my picture all over the place with Joan Baez, Che Guevara, Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg. The concert attendees probably wouldn't have known about any of those people. Regardless, they responded enthusiastically to the songs on my last 4 or 5 records. Ask anyone who was there. They were young and my feeling was that they wouldn't have known my early songs anyway.

As far as censorship goes, the Chinese government had asked for the names of the songs that I would be playing. There's no logical answer to that, so we sent them the set lists from the previous 3 months. If there were any songs, verses or lines censored, nobody ever told me about it and we played all the songs that we intended to play.

Everybody knows by now that there's a gazillion books on me either out or coming out in the near future. So I'm encouraging anybody who's ever met me, heard me or even seen me, to get in on the action and scribble their own book. You never know, somebody might have a great book in them."

This was announced on Twitter as "To my followers and fans..."

Homemade Crackers - Easy to Make, and Fun

Homemade crackers are making a comeback. Crackers are an unfussy, easy alternative to baking your own bread and they are infectiously good, as well as versatile. And, as Carla Emery points out:

It's a lot healthier than feeding the children half-food/half-cookies, or the adults heavily salted treats. Instead you can make their crackers out of all healthy things!

Try experimenting with dried fruit and any herbs you might have in your garden. They are much more impressive at a dinner party than store-bought crackers, and you can pair them with a cheese platter or a creamy dip. Here are three of the many recipes for making your own crackers:

Quick Rye Crackers

Combine:

2 c. unsifted rye flour

3⁄4 c. unsifted white or unbleached flour

1⁄2 c. wheat germ

1⁄2 t. salt, 1 t. baking powder

6 T. butter or margarine.

1. Cut in the butter with a pastry cutter or 2 knives until you have a mixture with particles about the size of cornmeal.

2. Add 3⁄4 c. milk and 1 slightly beaten egg. Mix, roll out, and cut into diamond shapes by making parallel lines one way diagonally and then the other.

3. Lay the crackers onto a cookie sheet, prick with a fork, and bake at 325˚F until lightly browned. Takes about 30 minutes.

Great Crackers From Esther Adams, Poulsbo, WA

Combine:

11⁄2 c. white flour

1⁄2 c. whole wheat flour

1⁄2 c. sugar

1⁄2 t. salt

1. Using an electric mixer, food processor, or pastry cutter, mix in 3 T. butter (at room temperature) until mix is as grainy as cornmeal.

2. Slowly add 1⁄2 c. milk (you may need a little more). Knead 5 minutes. Roll out a fistful at a time to 1⁄8 inch or thinner on lightly floured surface.

3. Cut into 2-inch squares. Place squares on baking sheet (not touching). Sprinkle with salt. Prick each cracker with fork 2 to 3 times, and bake until golden brown.

Sour Cream Whole Wheat Crackers

Combine:

1 c. sour cream

1 T. melted butter

a pinch salt

1⁄2 c. sugar

1 t. soda

1. Add enough whole wheat flour to make a stiff dough that can be rolled. Roll out to about a 1⁄8 - inch thickness.

2. Cut into the shapes you prefer and bake at 325˚F for 30 minutes (or 400˚F for 10 minutes).

COMPLETE LIST OF PUBLISHED ARTICLES PUT UP ONLINE

Last night I completed, and put up online, a list of all the articles, essays and other bits & pieces I've had published down the years, from a Nature Notes paragraph in the Liverpool Daily Post in 1963 (I was a schoolboy at the time, and knew nothing about nature - least of all my own) through to this year's work, which has included an obituary of Gerry Rafferty and the sleevenotes to the Bob Dylan in Concert: Brandeis University 1963 album. What a lot of hackwork I've had to do to keep body and soul together across the decades. More generally, what a lot of work...

The list is titled Articles and is in the drop-down menu under Work on www.michaelgray.net.

ROBERT LEROY JOHNSON . . .

. . . was born 100 years ago today, in Hazelhurst, Mississippi.

COMPETITION: WHAT NEXT AFTER FRYING AN EGG?

Announcing a small competition:

Inspired by one of the entries in The Bob Dylan Encyclopedia, and also featured on the audio-book recording  - 'Frying An Egg On Stage'  -  I'm offering a prize of a free signed copy of the Bob Dylan Encyclopedia Greatest Hits CD to the person who in my judgement answers this question best:

"In Japan in 1986 Dylan reportedly said this: ‘Somebody comes to see you for two hours or one and a half hours, whatever it is . . . I mean, they’ve come to see you. You could be doing anything up on that stage. You could be frying an egg or hammering a nail into a piece of wood.’ "

Apart from playing music, what would be the most entrancing thing Bob Dylan could do on stage?

Answers by the end of Friday May 13th please, to michael@michaelgray.net. Please include your name and address.

TUSCALOOSA

I gave a talk at New College in the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa a few weeks ago, and sat in on a music class. I was sorry to hear last week about the death and devastation caused there by a tornado on Wednesday, April 27 -  and I've just learnt that one of the students in that music class was among those killed. Marcus J. Smith was 21. He'll be buried in his hometown of Richmond Virginia tomorrow.

Food Dye the Natural Way

Recently, the FDA has called in researchers to scrutinize the link between common artificial food dyes and hyperactivity in children. The long-held belief that these dyes pose no threat to our bodies is being questioned, and so there is no better time to set our minds at ease and learn how to dye our foods ourselves using the vibrant colors found in nature.

Dye: Homemade colorings from herbs and other food products are more soft and subtle than artificial ones. Here's what you can use to make different colors:

• Black: barberry leaves

• Blue: blueberries

• Brown: nut hulls (walnuts are best), tea, coffee, rose hips, tobacco, hickory chips

• Green: beet tops, sunflower seeds, birch leaves, Spanish onion skins (outer leaves only), elderberry leaves, spinach, cabbage, rhubarb leaves

• Orange: orange juice

• Pink: cherries; beet and sassafras roots

• Purple: blackberries, cherries, huckleberries, cranberries, raspberries, grapes, purple cabbage

• Red: red onion skins, bloodroot, fresh beet juice, madder root, and logwood

• Yellow: the stem, leaves, and flowers of apple bark; barberry stems and roots; cinnamon; curry; ginger; the stems, leaves, and flowers of goldenrod; hickory bark; mustard; paprika; pear leaves; saffron; tanglewood stems; turmeric

Natural Food Coloring. For a brown color, use a little browned flour, a little burnt sugar, or caramel. Pounded, uncooked spinach leaves make a rich green. Adding some spinach leaf puree makes a lovely deeper green. This green can also be used to tint icings, desserts, etc. Another way to make a cooked-spinach green coloring is by washing some spinach, boiling it until tender, and pouring off the juice for your coloring extract. For a stronger green, let the spinach cool, squeeze dry, mash by pounding, and then put through a sieve. Cooked green peas make a lighter shade of green; split pea soup makes a very pale green color. The coral of a lobster pounded and put through a sieve yields red, as does vinegar or water that has stood on sliced boiled beets.

Take the guesswork out of food dyeing with this helpful chart:

Color Blending Chart. Commercial vegetable colorings can be varied like this:

• 2 drops yellow, 1 drop green, and 1 drop red = blue

• 1 drop red, 2 drops green, and 1 drop blue = gray

• 2 drops blue + 1 drop green = dark green

• 3 drops yellow + 1 drop blue = light green

• 12 drops yellow and 1 drop green = olive

• 2 drops red + 1 drop blue = orchid

• 3 drops red + 1 drop yellow = orange

• 3 drops red, 4 drops yellow, and 1 drop green = tangerine

OCCASIONAL PICTURES NO. 9

 

BOB

© Michael Gray 2011

BEEB BOB MADNESS

The Desolation Row Newsletter reported the other day that we're going to get a large number of BBC programmes around Bob's 70th birthday  -  indeed a "Bob Dylan season". These were the details (apparently from Wicked Messenger Man Ian Woodward):

DYLAN AT 70
Nashville Cats – The Making Of Blonde On Blonde

Monday 16 May

10.00-11.00pm BBC RADIO 2

Ahead of Bob Dylan's 70th birthday on 24 May, Bill Nighy presents the first documentary in BBC Radio 2's Dylan season, telling the definitive story of the recording of his classic album Blonde On Blonde...This is regarded as Dylan's most creatively intense period, and he recalled the album as being: "the closest I ever got to the sound I hear in my mind ... it's that thin wild mercury sound." Nashville Cats features newly sourced interviews with musicians Al Kooper and Charlie McCoy, producer Bob Johnston and photographer Jerry Schatzberg. Presenter/Bill Nighy, Producer/Henry Lopez Real for the BBC

DYLAN AT 70
Afternoon Reading – Ballads Of Thin Men Ep 1/3

Tuesday 17 to Thursday 19 May

3.30-3.45pm BBC RADIO 4

Bob Dylan is 70 on 24 May 2011. The three stories in Ballads Of Thin Men have been commissioned specially to mark the occasion... Dig Yourself, by Nick Walker, The Night Ride, by Simone Felice, and People Carry Roses, by Toby Litt. Producer Jeremy Osborne for Sweet Talk Productions

Thursday 19 May

11.00pm-midnight BBC RADIO 2

As BBC Radio 2 celebrates Bob Dylan's 70th birthday, the cream of the British folk scene re-interpret songs from his iconic album The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan. Mark Radcliffe guides listeners through a collection of specially recorded songs that illustrate Dylan's great writing skills and the inventiveness and creativity of British folk artists. The guest list includes Martin Carthy, Seth Lakeman, Ralph McTell, Cara Dillon, Billy Bragg [of course...], Martin Simpson and winner of the Horizon Award at the 2011 Radio 2 Folk Awards, Ewan McLennan. The songs from this hugely influential album are performed in its original order and feature a series of stunning new versions. Presenter/Mark Radcliffe, Producer/John Leonard for Smooth Operations

On 24 May at 10 pm there will be a programme called "Bob's Ballad Bases". Presented by Julie Fowlis, it will examine the British and Irish folksong roots of much of Dylan’s songwriting and performance, from Pretty Peggy-O on his first album onwards, to show the melodic, thematic and structural roots of much of his work. Producer Rab Noakes.

And Radio 4 has commissioned an Archive Hour programme on Dylan.

But actually there's even more than that. There's a live 45-minute round-table discussion on May 24th, starting at 1.15pm on BBC Radio Scotland. Called 'Slow Train Coming: Dylan's Gospel Years Revisited' it features Sid Griffin, me and Howard Sounes, and is produced by Caitlin Smith. Also currently in preparation is a new Dylan timeline going up on May 24, if not earlier, on BBC News Online. And I've been interviewed for a BBC Radio 3 programme on The Music of the King James Bible, which includes a section on Dylan and goes out on May 28th at 12.15 pm, produced by Peter Everett.

Any more?

OCCASIONAL PHOTOS No. 47

Photo from Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid days  -  puzzling, to me at least, because there's quite clearly a pistol in his lap here, whereas I've always thought one of his Alias character's distinguishing features was that all the film's other males carried a gun while he carried only a knife.

MORE BUSY BEING BORN & DYING

Last Saturday (April 23rd), Roy Orbison would have been 75 - he was born in Vernon TX that day in 1936; the same day 60 years later saw the death in New York City of Len Kunstadt, last husband and manager of pre-war blues star Victoria Spivey, for whose small Brooklyn record label Bob moonlighted in March 1962, the month his own first album was released. Kunstadt took the terrific photograph on the back cover of the New Morning album. He died aged 70.

A week ago, April 24th, would have been the 75th birthday of cult legend Paul Buff, the boyhood friend of Frank Zappa who, with Frank, co-owned the weird and invaluable record-making machine on which early Zappa demo tracks were concocted.

April 25th marked the 50th anniversary of the death in San Bernadino CA of Cisco Houston, aged 42. (Dylan not only namechecks him in 'Song To Woody' but writes about him vividly in Chronicles Volume One.

This last Friday, April 29th, would have been the 80th birthday of Lonnie Donegan, who for most British people, was the first conduit of Leadbelly's 'Rock Island Line', when he had a hit with it in the UK as singer with the Chris Barber Jazz Band in the mid-1950s.

Today Charley Patton would have been 120. He was born at Heron's Place MS on May 1st, 1891.