Review: Bob Dylan was neither rough nor rowdy in Mankato

MANKATO — Bob Dylan came home again Friday night, for his first performance in Minnesota in six years. Of course, he’s aware that it’s his home state, even if he didn’t say anything to acknowledge that at the sold-out Mayo Clinic Health System Event Center.

We assume he likes Minnesota, even if he’s played in, ahem, Wisconsin four times since his last Gopher State appearance, which was at this same Mankato hockey arena in 2019.

The Duluth-born, Hibbing-reared Dylan has an affinity for the Midwest. Remember his song “Girl from the North Country” that became the inspiration and title of a 2020 Broadway musical featuring his tunes?

“I’m from Minnesota and I like the casual hum of the heartland,” he told Vanity Fair a few years ago.

Minnesotans like him, too. The Mankato concert — the biggest one on this leg of the Rough and Rowdy Ways Tour, accommodating 6,000 fans — sold out quickly. Resale tickets were going for as much as $1,279 for a main floor seat in the Land of 10,000 resellers.

Do people feel this might be the last time to see Dylan — who turns 84 next month — in his home state? Or was it a case of the first-time for younger generations who discovered the enigmatic bard in the Oscar-nominated film “A Complete Unknown”? (Thank you, Timothee Chalamet.) Or did the six-year absence make the hearts grow stronger for Minnesota-based Bobcats?

That leads us to the main question: How was Dylan’s third ever Mankato concert (yes, we’re counting) in the bard’s 65th year of performing?

There were rapturous moments in the thrall of his Bobness, as the attentive audience listened for every nuance, every punched word, every simple twist of phrase. This was not a concert for casual fans. There were no rocking classics like “All Along the Watchtower,” “Like a Rolling Stone” or “Highway 61 Revisited,” the three songs he’s performed the most in concert (more than 2,000 times each, per bobdylan.com, his official website).

That said, it was an excellent, kind of bluesy, piano-dominated show if you were enamored of his 2020 album “Rough and Rowdy Ways,” material from which accounted for more than half of the 1¾-hour performance. If you’re more of a casual fan, then the 2019 Mankato, which was also excellent, was superior since it contained a multitude of eras.

Who was the audience?

To no one’s surprise, the crowd was dominated by gray-haired baby boomers, along with kids of varying ages with their parents and smatterings of college students. After all, Mankato is a university town. And we know those students were super-disappointed that Dylan made them lock their cellphones in Yondr bags for the evening.

How was his singing?

Let’s be honest: His voice has been an acquired taste since Day One. That said, he was in pretty good voice for Bob Dylan. His enunciation was clear, devoid of both harshness and mumbling that have sometimes plagued modern-day Dylan. He even crooned a bit on “I’ve Made Up My Mind to Give Myself to You.” On the other hand, if you were expecting greatest-hits Bob, then you might have begged for closed captioning.

With lyrics on laminated pages in a loose-leaf binder in front of him on his baby grand piano, Dylan seemed focused and surprisingly animated, that is, if you watched him with binoculars. It might have been the most dimly lit stage at an arena concert in history, with no lights on Dylan but plenty of reading lamps shining on his lyric sheets.

Per usual, Dylan didn’t speak to the crowd other than to introduce his four musicians.

What was he wearing?

A black suit with three buttons, a light-colored shirt with dark buttons, and black pants with a white stripe on the side that were tucked into motorcycle boots, not his more familiar cowboy boots. While all four of his sidemen sported headwear, Dylan had only a cloud of brown curls.

How was his band?

Things have changed. Thanks to new drummer Anton Fig, who signed on last month, replacing the legendary Jim Keltner. Best known for his long run on “The Late Show with David Letterman,” Fig played on two Dylan albums, 1985’s “Empire Burlesque” and 1986’s “Knocked Out Loaded,” and at the 30th anniversary concert celebration in 1992. On Friday, Fig pushed more forcefully than Keltner or Charlie Drayton, the drummer that started on this tour back in 2021.

Guitarists Doug Lancio and Bob Britt were given fewer — and barely any — solo opportunities. Lancio unleashed his blues fury on “Goodbye Jimmy Reed,” and Lancio took a nifty flamenco turn on acoustic guitar on the eerie “Black Rider.”

Did he play guitar this time?

That’s a fascinating question. Yes, but. After opening with “I’ll Be Your Baby Tonight” with a New Orleans piano break by Dylan, he turned around on his piano bench and reached down to a guitar laying flat on its amplifier. He played the noisy intro to “It Ain’t Me, Babe” with his back to the audience in the darkness. It was pretty easy to miss Dylan’s sly move.

Indeed, he spent the entire evening behind his piano, though he occasionally picked up a harmonica. His piano was the night’s dominant instrument, with him standing out on boogie passages including one on “To Be Alone with You.” He added pretty filigree on the low-key “Key West,” florid chords on “It’s All Over Now Baby Blue” and a harmonica-like blues piano solo on “Crossing the Rubicon.”

How was his repertoire?

As he’s been doing on the entire Rough and Rowdy Tour, which kicked off in 2021 in Milwaukee, he performed nine of the 10 tunes from the acclaimed 2020 of that name. (Mankato was the eighth show this year.) Dylan mixed in five songs from the ‘60s, and one each from the ‘70s and ‘80s. There was nothing from his made-in-Minneapolis “Blood on the Tracks,” which was released 50 years ago.

In contrast, on the Outlaw Music Festival last summer with Willie Nelson (where they performed in Somerset, Wis.), Dylan crafted a playlist of his classics from different eras (including “Blood on the Tracks”), live rarities (including “Under the Red Sky”) as well as covers by Chuck Berry, the Fleetwoods and Dave Dudley. He’ll be on the road again with Willie this summer, bringing the total of 2025 Dylan gigs to 57 by September. (Yes, we’re counting.)

How were the classics?

The crowd loved the rollicking “Watching the River Flow” and “It Ain’t Me, Babe,” from 1964, the oldest song in his set on Friday, and, for those of you keeping score, the seventh most played tune in his catalog at 1,108 times, per bobdylan.com.

The 1965 epic “Desolation Row” — which mentions the 1920 Duluth hanging of three Black circus workers accused of raping a white woman — was well received. Another 1965 tune, “When I Paint My Masterpiece,” was the night’s high point. It began with Lancio playing an instrumental version of the 1953 novelty “Istanbul (Not Constantinople)” before Dylan, thanks especially to drummer Fig, transformed “Masterpiece” into a masterful tango.

One oldie was underwhelming, the hymn-like finale “Every Grain of Sand” from his gospel period’s “Shot of Love” (1981).

Any other highlights?

Dylan got his mojo working on “Goodbye Jimmy Reed” which contrasted to the engrossing “Key West,” a talk-sing story that was essentially a solo piano piece during which you could hear a pin drop in a hockey arena.

Were there any surprises for Bobcats, those hardcore fans?

The Bobcats analyze a Dylan concert down to every grain of sand so they noticed the excised final verses in “Desolation Row” and some responded with a hoot when he mentioned the lyric “the Gulf of Mexico” (not the Gulf of America) in the long and meditative “Key West.” They might have caught the surprising insertion of “doggone” as “some day it’s gonna be doggone beautiful” in “Masterpiece.”

What’s next?

Wisconsin, of course — performances this weekend in Eau Claire and Green Bay in theaters half the size of the Mankato arena.