Dylan v The Beatles, Ireland v England in Late August
Moville’s DylanFest on the Lough
In the Sixties Bob Dylan and The Beatles were great rivals, though friendly ones at that. The first time that The Beatles and Bob Dylan met, John Lennon asked Dylan what he thought of their songs. Dylan replied “They’re good but they don’t mean anything.”
Soon afterwards, instead of singing She Loves You and I Wanna Hold Your Hand, John Lennon penned Help! and Paul McCartney wrote Yesterday.
However the admiration was mutual. Dylan said that “America should erect a statue to The Beatles. They’ve made America great again.” Indeed recently Bob Dylan said he looked up to Paul McCartney as a songwriter. Indeed, Dylan said “He’s probably the only one I look up to”.
Beatles Week and DylanFest
At the end of the month these friends and rivals will go toe to toe again with the annual Beatles Week in Liverpool From August 23rd to 29th and Stuck Inside of Moville, the DylanFest on the Lough, taking place from August 24th to 27th in Moville, Co. Donegal.
Said DylanFest organiser, Gerry McLaughlin, “people come from all round the globe to Moville’s DylanFest”.
This is the 15th year of the festival which started in 2007 and only Covid stopped it for a couple of years. In that time it has had acts from Italy, France, Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands, the USA as well as England, Scotland, Wales and both Southern and Northern Ireland.
Said Gerry, one guy, Michael Masterson, came from Cleveland one year and just sat in the same spot each day of the festival with a perpetual big grin on his face. He said “it was great to be able to listen to great Dylan songs being played day after day, hour after hour. This was a dream of mine to come to Moville for the DylanFest.
Dylan Session Names
The Sessions are called after Dylan songs. The first session on the Thursday night is called “Come Gather Round People”. The Friday evening session is called “Stuck Inside of Moville”. The Saturday afternoon session is called Mr. Tambourine Man”. We didn’t dare tempt fate by calling an outdoor session “Blowin In The Wind, much less The Hurricane”.
The Saturday Night sessions is called the “Like a Rolling Stone” session. On Sunday afternoon we have another outdoor session called “Forever Young”. The Sunday night final session is called “No Direction Home”.
The organisers are looking for more Open Mic acts for the Thursday night session and the two afternoon sessions.
All the Way from Malibu
One Dylan fan is already on his way to DylanFest 2023 and that is Dominic El Perro from the USA. He told Gerry via the DylanFest Moville Facebook page that that “I’ve started my journey to DylanFest Moville! Left Malibu yesterday morning and drove past Bob Dylan’s gate on my way to Chicago to see Bruce Springsteen play a concert (another Dylan fan) and expect to get to Moville on the Thursday, depending on buses from Dublin.”
Said Gerry, “Bob Dylan is the 4th biggest seller of albums after The Beatles, Gareth Brookes and Elvis so you don’t have to sell the guy and his music. The big task is just to get the news out that there is a Dylan festival in Moville, Donegal. If people hear about it they will come – and from very far away too.
For more info see CraicOn.com or DylanFest Moville on Facebook.
Phone is 00353 87 953 8950
The Program of Events is linked to from the right hand side of this page.