Bob Dylan Watching the River Flow
Critics seem to flock around Bob Dylan the way early photographers gravitated to New York's Flatiron Building: there's just so much to appreciate. Of all the scribes who have commented on Dylan's astounding contribution to music, Paul Williams stands apart as the person who perhaps best fit the criticism to the music.  Much in the way that Dylan has created not just art but an entire genre, Williams, over the course of 30 years, has created his own unique style of writing about Dylan as a performer. Williams is not afraid to go out on a limb--some of his observations are eccentric, but he's lucid and never boring.Watching the River Flowcollects the best of Paul Williams's essays about Dylan, from his 1966 comments on the classicBlonde on Blondeto his December 1996 concert dates (at which Patti Smith was the opening act and tributes to Jerry Garcia filled the air).