Bob Dylan Analysis
Welcome to my Bob Dylan Analysis! On this site we will explore various aspects of Bob Dylan's career. This is primarily a data analysis and visualization project. The methods page will focus on how and where I retrieved data and the visualization pages(AlbumTypes and Media Formats) will address the results and findings of my data analysis. If you would like to know more about me,check out my about me page.
This project primarily proritizes Dylan's original albums. I categorize an original album as an album that consists primarily of songs that were written by Dylan himself.This is same terminology as "Studio albums" on the Bob Dylan Fandom Wiki which was a very important source for this project. Overall,there are 33 original albums and a total of 48 live or compilation albums. I consider albums that are covers such as Shadows of the Night or ones that are mostly previously recorded songs as compilation albums. Additionally,I make a distinction from his early years and late years. Based on my analysis,I define his early years from 1962-1980 and his late years from 1980-2020. He produced 17 original albums in the first 18 years of his career-representing his early years and 16 albums in his late years.
My Questions
There are a few questions that I plan on answering:
- What is Dylan's production rate over the years?Has he released more original albums during his earlier or later years?
- What instruments does he primarily use?
- How many different genres does he dabble in? Does he mostly stick with one genre?
- How many formats has he released music on?
My Findings
After analyzing my data,I've learned a lot about Bob Dylan and his career. I analyzed data about instruments played,tracks,verses,genres and album types.Over the year, he his top three most frequently used instruments were the same across both periods.The most suprising thing I learned about his instrumentation was that he does not use a harmonica in all of his albums.He also uses less instruments in his late years. Dylan gets more experimental over the years and explores more genres in the later part of his career. He created music that explored 15 different genres that included jazz,R&B,funk and many more.His most frequent genres are also consistent among both periods. Over the years,he is consistent in number of verses but has a increases his average song length over time.However,he decreases his average track count per album. In terms of album types,he releases more compilation and live albums. This explains why he has a lower amount of original content produced.Lastly,he increases the amount of format types he releases his albums on from 3 to 5.
Pictures
