Bob Dylan

It seems hard to pick up a new album without encountering a John Hiatt tune. In the last few years, his songs have been recorded by Bonnie Raitt, Bob Dylan, Rosanne Cash, Marshall Crenshaw, Earl Thomas Conley, Marti Jones and a dozen or so others that slip my mind. This summer will see recent Hiatt songs covered by the Dirt Band (two tunes), Iggy Pop (yes, Iggy Pop) and Jeff Healey. Stevie Ray Vaughan, the Fabulous Thunderbirds and Dion already have Hiatt songs in reserve for future albums.

How does it feel, seeing Bob Dylan onstage 25 years after he made the transition from the coffeehouse circuit to stardom? Much better now than it did when he was keeping concert company with the Grateful Dead and Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. The durable troubadour wowed a sold-out Tower Theater last night with a tight, fresh-sounding 90-minute show. Much of the credit goes to his current partners - ponytailed "Saturday Night Live" guitarist G.E. Smith, bassist Torry Garnier and drummer Christopher Parker.

Bluesman Bob Dylan played the Tower Theater last night to a sellout crowd that alternated between standing ovations and head-scratching. Jamming with a three-piece backup band - including guitarist extraordinaire G.E. Smith, bassist Tony Garnier and drummer Chris Parker - Dylan blasted out about 90 minutes of in-your-face blues. The show was a welcome change from the Dylan hit parade that marched through town the last two times he played here. An animated Dylan - he even yelped an "oh" before a solo - went through a relatively obscure set featuring songs like "To Be Alone With You," "Tears of Rage" and the traditional folk song "The Two Soldiers," which stumped most of the crowd.

The Good Samaritan, he's dressing. He's getting ready for the show. He's going to the carnival tonight On Desolation Row. - From "Desolation Row" by Bob Dylan In a scene as surreal as some of his old songs - just off the Boardwalk, upwind from the fortunetelling ladies and down from the gilt pleasures of Bally's Grand, next door to the room in which kids play games such as Xenophobe and Bad Girls, and a stone's throw from...

Bob Dylan in performance, 1988: One minute he's offering a not-quite-sugar- coated rendition of the early, observant gem "Just Like a Woman," carefully following the ebb and flow of the original melody. The next, he's hurling the phrases of "Like a Rolling Stone" bitterly, as though pitching a spiteful batting practice, disinterestedly discarding one strike after another. The dark side of Bob Dylan still rears its head on occasion, and this is a good thing. Last night at the Mann Music Center, Dylan treated the near- capacity crowd to a well-planned 75-minute show heavy on his songwriting gems - many of them recharged by his unexpectedly urgent jabs and an emphasis on living, breathing, sometimes kicking performance.

Are you ready to Dyl out with Bob Dylan - on disc or tonight at the Mann Music Center? If you're in the mood, so's he, but keep in mind, its gotta be on his terms. There's a new Bob Dylan album in the stores, "Down In the Groove. " A sticker on the cover promises an all-star affair with the Grateful Dead, Eric Clapton, Mark Knopfler and Full Force (among others) sitting in. In fact, most are buried in the rubble of poor mixes and slapdash arrangements. But as on the 32 previous albums that Dylan has issued since the early 1960s, there is some brain food worth chewing on here.

"A set of songs and ideas worthy of The Dylan Legacy," reads a sticker attached to the front cover of Down in the Groove (Columbia), the new album by Bob Dylan. Another sticker trumpets that Dylan is a "1988 Rock-and-Roll Hall of Fame inductee. " What's the point of this hype? Perhaps Columbia Records imagined scads of consumers standing around in record stores scratching their chins and saying thoughtfully, "Well, I wasn't going to bother buying this one, but since he's a Rock-and-Roll Hall of Fame inductee . . . " This is a marketing strategy sure to go over big only in Cleveland, where the ill-fated hall remains on the drawing board, a passing thought in architect I. M. Pei's mind.

The pairing of Bob Dylan and the Grateful Dead suggests an ungainly reunion of veteran bohemians, but Friday night at JFK Stadium, the combination worked surprisingly well. After a mind-bending set by the Dead and a sturdy, hits- filled outing by Dylan, the 4 1/2-hour show ended with a Dead encore featuring its new single, "Touch of Grey. " "I will survive," Jerry Garcia, the Dead's founder and psychedelic father figure, sang to a full house of mostly youthful music fans for whom the Summer of Love could just as well be the Stone(d)

As the ultimate singer/songwriter of the contemporary folk and progressive rock eras, Bob Dylan has always had his pick of great and worshipful sidemen (and women), from Joan Baez to the Band, Al Kooper & Mike Bloomfield to the Rolling Thunder brigade and Dire Straits' Mark Knopfler. None has ever put Dylan's gritty visions into as sweet and commercial a context, though, as his latest recruits, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, who joined Dylan for two very satisfying shows at the Spectrum, Saturday and last evening.