Bob Dylan

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  • Year:
    1988
  • Inducted by:
    Bruce Springsteen
  • Category:
    Performers
bob_dylan

Introduction

Bob Dylan is one of the greatest songwriters of all time, a gifted wordsmith with a political conscience, incisive storytelling abilities and a poet-like acumen for meter and language.

As a musician, he has shaped popular music in innumerable ways—from inspiring the Beatles and bringing folk-rock into the mainstream to proving that electric guitars could be as revolutionary as acoustic ones.

Hall of Fame Essay

1988

Michael Hill

“You don’t necessarily have to write to be a poet,” Bob Dylan once said. "Some people work in gas stations and they’re poets. I don’t call myself a poet because I don’t like the word. I’m a trapeze artist.” 

Perhaps Bob Dylan has always resisted labels because he has found himself defined and redefined in public so often. He was originally hailed as the musical heir apparent to Woody Guthrie, a rebel with a cause, the most promising and galvanic of the young New York-based folkies Pete Seeger called "Woody’s children.” 

Then he  was transformed into  a renegade rock and roller, a gaunt vision in black who unleashed his stream of consciousness with a stark beat and created a new kind of pop music that was brilliant, challenging, even downright dangerous. 

Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony Program Cover 1988
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I knew that I was listening to the toughest voice that I’d ever heard.
Bruce Springsteen

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Collection

Bob Dylan note
Words and Music by Bob Dylan

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Gallery

Photography: Kevin Mazur, WireImage