Dylan’s predictions - The times they are still a-changin’

Fifty years ago this week Bob Dylan’s ‘The Times They Are a-Changin’’ entered the consciousness of open-minded, liberal, socially conscious people and has remained active there ever since.

It was, in an almost unprecedented way, a powerful catalyst in the politicisation of popular culture. The threatening but optimistic ballad became many things to many people over the last five decades, but in 1963 it seemed an inter-generational challenge, seditious, revolutionary, defiant and despite all of that, utterly life affirming and hopeful. The song’s power, it’s simple force, and huge sweep is such that it remains an almost unequalled manifesto.

It is not overstating anything to say that this song, and so many more of Dylan’s great conscience calls, played a central role in the moral formation of millions right across the world. It was, it is, that significant.