Here's proof nothing is sacred in rock music

By George Lang
The Oklahoman

When Bob Dylan went electric at the Newport Folk Festival in 1965, fans of Dylan's early acoustic work reacted venomously, as if Dylan had desecrated the entire folk music tradition by plugging in and moving on.

Now, let's see if some chairs will be thrown when those traditionalist holdouts hear Dylan going hip-hop.

Go online to Dylan07.com, where visitors will promptly get hit in the ear with Mark Ronson's "re-version” of Dylan's "Most Likely You Go Your Way (And I'll Go Mine).” This remix of a classic from 1966's "Blonde on Blonde” is the add-on single for a 51-song box set that Sony/Columbia is releasing this fall. On the site, which plays a section of the song automatically and loud enough to wake the dead, Columbia asks for a vote on whether people actually like the thing, probably to poke Dylan worshippers into hysteria over what is being done to "sacred” material and whip up faux controversy.

But the times they are a-changin', especially for anyone who sticks to the rapidly calcifying notion that anything in music is sacred and untouchable. My suspicion is that Ronson's work will bother only the purest of purists.

This was not always the case. In 1983, just as the posthumous re-release frenzy surrounding Elvis Presley started getting cold, RCA released "I Was the One,” a collection of old Presley songs with a distinct and unwelcome difference: Producers Tony Brown and David Briggs surrounded the vocals with pristine, soulless early '80s instrumentation. The hue and cry from rock critics and Presley fans was thunderous; Rolling Stone magazine bestowed "I Was the One” with its rarely deployed half-star rating, and the half was for Presley's voice and nothing else.

Twenty years later, after almost the entirety of James Brown and Parliament-Funkadelic's catalog had been mined for breaks, beats and loops on hip-hop tracks, messing with the King's legacy was no longer an issue. For the 2002 collection "Elvis: 30 #1 Hits,” RCA and the Presley estate commissioned DJ Junkie XL to remix "A Little Less Conversation.” This led to a Paul Oakenfold mix of "Rubberneckin'” and Mocean Worker's take on "Burning Love.”

In Dylan's case, the Ronson remix was sanctioned by the man himself. This is not terribly surprising, since Dylan's recent history with "Victoria's Secret” ads proves he has fewer problems with monetizing himself than do his hard-line fans. The choice of Ronson to do the honors was decidedly inspired: His '60s-inspired production for Lily Allen and Amy Winehouse helped spark some of the best pop songs of the past two years, and his work shows a reverence for classic R&B traditions — something Dylan no doubt appreciated.

But Ronson is setting himself up as today's primo desecrator of music held dear by purists. His cover of "Stop Me If You Think You've Heard This One Before” on his 2007 CD "Version” worked Smiths fans into a lynching mood. I thought it was the weakest track on "Version,” but not because I was trying to protect Morrissey from sacrilege. I just thought it sounded like a cheapola cut-and-paste job that would end up on a late-night commercial for a bad early '90s Eurodisco collection of Technotronic and Black Box tracks. His Allen-augmented version of the Kaiser Chiefs' "Oh My God” was much, much better.

As for Sony/Columbia's online survey, I voted "I like it,” but mainly just as a jab to many, many Dylan acolytes who will completely lose their minds over it. I just find the heretical position more entertaining: If you're going to remix Dylan, why leave the voice?