“But I was so much older then, I’m younger than that now.”
That’s one of the best lyrics ever written and a wonderful philosophical rumination of how our views on things change as we age and gain more experience. The line is from the song “My Back Pages,” which Bob Dylan wrote in 1964.
Dylan wrote “My Back Pages” in an attempt to abandon the protest songs of his early career. The lyrics are self-critical of his previous, perhaps naive political preaching and display his disillusionment with the various protest movements of the early ’60s. While the sentiments were specific to a given time and place, they have universal impact. Every one of us who has reached a certain age has no doubt realized that we said or did foolish things when we were younger, thinking that we knew all there was to know. As we grow older, it becomes apparent that not only did we not know everything back then, but we still don’t. That’s a tough lesson to learn and a tougher thing to admit.
As Mr. Dylan wrote:
Yes, my guard stood hard when abstract threats
Too noble to neglect
Deceived me into thinking
I had something to protect
Good and bad, I define these terms
Quite clear, no doubt, somehow
Ah, but I was so much older then
I’m younger than that now
Bob Dylan recorded “My Back Pages” with just his own guitar as accompaniment on June 9, 1964. It was one of the last tracks recorded for his Another Side of Bob Dylan album and was not released as a single. In fact, Dylan for some reason declined to perform the song in concert for a number of years, not adding it to his setlist until his Never Ending Tour in 1988. Yeah, that’s almost 25 years before audiences got to hear Dylan sing it live.
The public did get to hear “My Back Pages” on the radio, however, thanks to the Byrds recording the tune in 1967 for their Younger Than Yesterday album; the album took its title from the spirit of the song’s lyrics. Bandmember David Crosby was initially reluctant to record the tune, feeling the group had relied too much on Dylan covers over the years. (They’d had previous hits with “Mr. Tambourine Man” and “All I Really Want to Do.”) Crosby was overruled, however, and the group released “My Back Pages” as a single in March of 1967. Their version of the song peaked at #30 on the Billboard Hot 100 and the song became a classic.
Which leads us to today’s daily bonus video of the day, Bob Dylan and an all-star backing band performing “My Back Pages” at his 30th Anniversary Concert Celebration in October of 1992 at Madison Square Garden. That backing band included the Byrds’ Roger McGuinn, Tom Petty, Neil Young, George Harrison, Eric Clapton, and members of Booker T. and the M.G.’s, including Booker T. Jones, Duck Dunn, and guitarist Steve Cropper. G.E. Smith was the bandleader for the event, and Jim Keltner and Anton Fig played dual drums. It’s a good one.
