Not Across My Daughter's Big Brass Bed You Don't, Bob

[Sequoia]

My husband had just bought the newly issued CD of Bob Dylan's 1964 concert at Philharmonic Hall in New York, and our 15-year-old daughter was perplexed at yet another addition to our already extensive Dylan archive. She had never understood what made this raspy-voiced guy so important, anyway. "Why is he famous?" she asked.

Delighted at the opportunity to deliver a history lesson, her father — a passionate antiwar activist during the Vietnam years — spent the next couple of hours playing old songs and explaining Dylan's seminal role in the protest music of the 1960s. I listened as I read the morning paper, and thinking about the parallels between Vietnam and the bloodbath in Iraq against a soundtrack of Dylan songs was almost too painful to bear. How many times, indeed?

The next day, I was startled to see Dylan's craggy, hawklike face glaring out at me from the television screen in a Victoria's Secret commercial. He looked angry, dissipated and possibly deranged; his eyes had that paranoid, menacing look one associates with inmates in lock-up wards. He also looked old; Dylan is 62 and, judging by his appearance, has lived hard.

He was singing a bitter song called "Love Sick" as a nubile young model writhed around in her underwear and stiletto heels. Sultry and blank-faced, she looked about as old as my daughter. Was this porno-babe supposed to be Dylan's current obsession? His fantasy? Were we meant to think this was cool and edgy?

The only edge I saw was the distasteful spectacle of a geezer sexually fixated on a girl young enough to be his granddaughter. When the man who wrote "Forever Young" starts leering at jailbait during prime time, the result looks like a recruiting tool for a pedophilia advocacy group.

<snip>

http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0416-06.htm

[Wickerman]

1. So, the likes of Dylan, never attractive, oogles a super model

and its pedophilia. Chee-rist, isn't there some celeb's tit hanging out that we need to be focusing on?

[Skittles]

8. well

I thought it was a tad creepy

[LoZoccolo]

2. Do something sexy and watch me ignore it.

The only edge I saw was the distasteful spectacle of a geezer sexually fixated on a girl young enough to be his granddaughter. When the man who wrote "Forever Young" starts leering at jailbait during prime time, the result looks like a recruiting tool for a pedophilia advocacy group.

And this entire article looks like a recruiting tool for the libertarians as an example of political correctness circa 1992.

If the model really was less than 18, then yeah, I'd say there was a problem. But if she isn't, then it seems like it's saying that if you're past a certain age, not as attractive as you used to be, and still attracted to younger women, you can go fuck yourself.

[Emillereid]

3. He doesn't look fixated on anything -- at best he looks

somewhat lost and bewildered and 'sick of love.' The ad is kinda dumb, but lascivious, NO!

[boobooday]

4. Here's an interesting angle on this

An old friend, who has been following the music scene diligently since the early 60's remembered an interview with Dylan.

The interviewer asked him if he would ever do a commercial and he said, "only if it is for women's lingerie."

If this is true, it makes for an interesting twist. And of course we had Granny Cher and her thong, and the young sailor boys back in the day . . .

http://www.wgoeshome.com

[skooooo]

5. Sheesh..lighten up.

Bob rocks.

[xchrom]

6. i like victoria's secret and i like bob dylan

and like a wish come true -- they're in a commercial together.
i've seen it -- it's not nearly as bothersome as say a get out of debt ad or grow your penis pills featuring a truly gruesome character.

[DifferentStrokes]

7. Found another article

not quite as disapproving.

Reprint from the Boston Globe.

http://www.iht.com/articles/514734.html

The ad is a ridiculously intense scene played out to Dylan's tune "Love Sick." It features supermodel Adriana Lima as an angel sporting wings, push-up bra, underpants, and spike heels as she floats through the streets of Venice. A shaggy Dylan, dressed all in black, stands around a bit awkwardly in the background.
.
The commercial has set off howls from the purists, as did the use of Dylan's music in earlier ads - including one for Victoria's Secret last year. The howls are louder this year because Dylan isn't just selling his music but, by some lights, his very soul for actually appearing in an ad for the first time.

So what's new? Not a thing. Bob has always set off "howls from the purists", from yesterday's folkies to today's grandparents. That's just Bob being Bob.

[Cocoa]

9. her 15-year-old daughter spends a "considerable amount"

at Victoria's Secret? That seems screwed up to me, way too materialistic.

[mike1963]

10. Uh, who's Victoria, and what's her secret? I have no clue on this one...

:eyes:

[stellanoir]

11. Shhhhhh. . .don't tell anyone. . . but Queen Victoria. . .

encouraged her progeny to interbreed with her erstwhile though still regal European cousins which resulted in multitudinous incidents of hemophilia. Wooooo & Shhhhhhh.