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Tenderness and menace: Bob Dylan, at the London Palladium, reviewed

Dylan had more to say to the audience than he has done for years

Bob Dylan performs at Hyde Park in 2019. Photographers were banned from the London Palladium. Photo: Dave J Hogan / Getty Images for ABA

Bob Dylan has always toyed with audiences. He plays what he wants, how he wants, letting his mood dictate tempo and often key (sometimes switching songs to the minor). On Dylan’s return to London for the first time in five years, he summed it up early. ‘I ain’t no false prophet/ I just know what I know,’ he gruffly sang. Dylan spent the night at the Palladium doing what he knows best, singing songs of love, loss and immortality.

Covid temporarily ended his ‘Never-Ending Tour’, which had seen Dylan play more than 3,000 shows since 1988. Now it’s billed as ‘The Rough and Rowdy Ways Tour’, with the strapline: ‘Things aren’t what they were’. At the West End theatre they weren’t: Dylan, 81, mostly performed songs from his 2020 album Rough and Rowdy Ways (only the 17-minute long ‘Murder Most Foul’ was missing).

The band daintily grooved around him, allowing Dylan to slot in tenderly like an old crooner

On that ‘Never-Ending Tour’, Dylan played piano side-on. Now, however, he stood at the piano in the middle of the dimly lit stage, with his trademark curls bobbling in silhouette. Following some loose jazz chords, the band kicked into a Chicago-blues version of ‘Watching the River Flow’, and applause erupted when the first line came: ‘What’s the matter with me/ I don’t have much to say.’

Dylan had more to say to the audience than he’s done for years. There were several ‘thank you’s and three times he walked out from behind the piano to pose in the middle of the stage in his black cowboy suit.

‘Key West’ was the stand-out number, beautifully scaled back with a slower and bluesier tempo than on the album. The band daintily grooved around him, allowing Dylan to slot in tenderly like an old crooner.

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