Indomitable Dylan Troubadour Is Running As Hard As Ever, Riding New Wave Of Popularity

Dylan mania?

Well, not quite. But the Bob Dylan saga has taken a dramatic upswing in recent years. From the fizzle of Live Aid, where he was out of tune and seemingly out of his mind, to the sizzle of Woodstock a decade later, Dylan has reclaimed his throne as the bard who matters most.

Dylan’s concerts are again major events, exemplified by the buzz surrounding his shows with punk heroine Patti Smith. It’s his third tour in the last year - and the last two have seen a sharper, finer troubadour than anyone had a right to expect after his years of shambling around as a slurry-voiced outcast.

This outcast has come in from the cold - and you can see it in the Dylan references again flooding the culture. The Rolling Stones just released Dylan’s “Like a Rolling Stone” as a single. New stars Hootie & the Blowfish paid homage in “Only Wanna Be With You,” featuring the Dylan line “tangled up in blue” and several verses copped directly from his “Idiot Wind” of 20 years ago. To wit: “She inherited a million bucks / And when she died / It came to me … I can’t help it if I’m lucky.”

The inscrutable bard from the north country (Hibbing, Minn.) even had another song verse turned into the title of a recent sitcom, “If Not for You.” And, yes, that was Dylan showing up as a surprise guest at the concert for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum in September. And, yes, that was Dylan singing “Restless Farewell” on the Frank Sinatra tribute on ABC Thursday.

All of which has the Dylan camp in ecstasy, though even close aides don’t know what his next move will be. “There is one absolute about Bob Dylan,” says longtime aide Eliot Mintz. “And that is that anyone who attempts to anticipate his next move is almost always wrong. I don’t have a clue and I don’t even speculate.

“Bob doesn’t preplan career moves,” adds Mintz, who also represents Yoko Ono. “Mostly, gigs are set up and Bob picks up his guitar and harmonica and goes and does them. He’s been constantly on the road. He still does 100 to 150 nights a year. It amazes me when I look at his itineraries. When I ask him about it, he points to jazz musicians who have done the same thing for years. He doesn’t think it’s unusual.”

Dylan’s career moves have had more variation than almost any singer’s, with the possible exception of David Bowie. There’s Dylan’s Greenwich Village phase; his Woodstock days with The Band; his “Rolling Thunder Revue” era; his born-again Christian period in the late ‘70s; his touring with the Grateful Dead (as his backup band); his total embarrassment at the Grammy awards in 1991 (when he mangled his protest anthem “Masters of War”); and his renaissance ever since. (Except for selling the rights to “The Times They Are a-Changin’ ” to an accounting firm last year. Thankfully, he hasn’t repeated that gaffe.)

Musically, Dylan’s revival stems from hooking up with an outstanding band that can handle his chameleon twists (guitarist John Jackson, bassist Tony Garnier, drummer Winston Watson and pedal steel/mandolinist/ organist Bucky Baxter). And partly it’s from reinvigorated health that has many fans wondering if Dylan, now 54, has become another rock star on the sobriety wagon, though he’s never confirmed it.

“Bob is in remarkably good health,” says Mintz. “With the toll it takes to shlep around the world, you’d better be healthy to do it consistently. Rock ‘n’ roll is still a young man’s sport - and many of them still fall down and require outside sustenance. But maybe it’s Bob’s renewed performances that have influenced his state of mind. This is a very good time in his life.”

Dylan once wrote sea-change songs such as “Blowin’ in the Wind,” “The Times They are a-Changin’ ” and “Just Like Tom Thumb’s Blues.” But his more recent songs have avoided much philosophizing. In fact, his ‘90s studio output has included two low-key solo acoustic albums filled with traditional songs. The one exception to this trend was last year’s single, “Dignity,” with its perceptive verse: “Somebody showed me a picture and I had to laugh - dignity’s never been photographed … Sometimes I wonder what it’s going to take to find dignity.”

Dylan’s concerts, meanwhile, have become high-energy affairs. Indeed, many fellow musicians have been knocked out by Dylan’s more recent shows. Pianist Bruce Hornsby recalls seeing Dylan open two stadium dates for the Grateful Dead this summer in Washington, D.C.

“He just seemed to be so into it, so intense. There was a real fire onstage,” Hornsby says in a phone interview from Amsterdam. “In fact, I thought it was hard for the Dead to come up to that intensity. And Dylan added different feels to his songs. ‘Watching the River Flow’ was done like a fast gospel two-beat, like Leon Russell. I went early both days to catch him and he was really happening.”

Dylan redefines his songs each night but has not been deconstructing them to the point that he did in the mid-‘70s. And these days he performs more of his signature tunes than obscurities. Dylan’s last two hard-rocking visits have included such classics as “All Along the Watchtower,” “Tangled Up in Blue” and “It Ain’t Me, Babe.”

Recently, Dylan added “Alabama Getaway” as a tribute to his friend Jerry Garcia. He was one of the last great ‘60s troubadours - and Dylan is upholding that tradition while gaining a new crop of young, tie-dyed supporters in the process.

Can anyone forget the sight of young fans moshing at Dylan’s Woodstock show last year? It may be 30 years since Dylan went electric at the Newport Folk Festival, but he and his fans are still full of surprises.