Bob Dylan is 70 years old today. That’s quite impressive for a man who has sounded, and looked 70 years old since 1962. Really. He owns a voice that sounds older than coal. He’ll be having his little birthday party today, with his little party hat on and cake shaped like a racing car, surrounded by whooping chums while he sits glumly in the middle of it all.

We wouldn’t want him to enjoy himself too much now, would we?

Of course, Grumpy Bob is just one of the many characters he’s made for himself over the years. He’s been Electric Bob, Folkie Bob, Born Again Christian Bob, Gypsy Bob and, unbelievably, for a brief moment, Rapper Bob. So who is he these days?

We all know that Bobby Zimmerman is one of the most drily sarcastic pop stars we’ve ever had. He’s prone to giving evasive answers in interviews and generally taking the Michael out of anyone who tries to penetrate his psyche, which of course, every simpleton Dylanite tries to do on a daily basis.

His biggest prank is that everyone believed him to be a sincere artist, despite the fact he clearly created characters for himself like Bowie.

“All I can do is be me, whoever that is.”

He started off as a Mini Woodie Guthrie, with his little cap, harmonica and battered guitar. Pretty much everyone bought it, although friends of his note that he was very quick to turn himself into a folk singer, stealing everyone’s records when he went ’round their houses. He passed of the hobo minstrel thing and somehow, quite bafflingly for a man with such an uncommercial voice, became a superstar.

A generation of stoners and wastrels kinda liked what he was saying, despite not being able to work out what it was he was actually getting at, and decided to have him as their king. He was the voice of their generation, even though you suspect that Dylan didn’t exactly know what it was he was saying at all. Lest we forget, he was but a kid and still trying to work himself out at this point.

And of course, he enjoyed the trappings that came with fame and got his fair share of women and drugs – which isn’t exactly the life of a poet minstrel. Not that Dylan would care.

Then, it was obvious that Dylan tired of hanging around with worthy folkies and plugged-in. He decided to play “fuckin’ loud”, which prompted Aran sweater wearing trad.arrseholes to cry all over their socialist pamphlets as Dylan started to make ‘pop music’.

Of course, Dylan wasn’t making pop music. Listen to the frenetic lyrics of ‘Subterranean Homesick Blues’, it isn’t exactly a ‘Boy Meets Girl’ song is it? The charts were still dominated by ballads and paeans to being lovelorn, while Dylan was singing from his nostrils and at times, seemingly reading from a bunch of cryptic crossword clues.

And for those that stuck by Dylan through the electric years, they’d have to hold tight as the singer went about dropping more masks to reveal more characters. Country Gent Bob appeared briefly, completely changing the way he sang for tracks like ‘Lay Lady Lay’ and his duet with Johnny Cash. He somehow mixed Folk Bob, Electric Bob and Country Gent Bob for the Desire LP.

All the while, never revealing himself – something that a supposed protest singer is supposed to do. Dylan may have stuck his neck out creatively, but he always had more creations to fall back on and, perhaps, hide behind.

Eventually, this paved the way for Born Again Dylan and… well… Bad 80s Dylan. That’s right, Bad 80s RAPPING Dylan, who appeared on Kurtis Blow’s LP, providing his nasal twang atop a clunking drum machine. As awful as it sounds, you can’t knock him for trying to push himself in new directions, but this writer suspects that he’s probably did it to annoy his fans.

See, the only constant thing in Dylan’s career is his willingness to grate those that love him. It seems that he’s determined not only to challenge his devotees, but to kill his previous incarnation so comprehensively that followers will actually turn on him.

It’s actually impressive how little regard he has for the people who buy his records. With each Dylan Death comes a rebirth and now, on his 70th birthday, we hope he’s planning on killing Croaky Olde Timey Bob and rebirthing himself all over again.

But to what? Dubstep Bob? Heavy Metal Bob? GaGa Pop Bob? No-one knows. No-one ever successfully second-guessed Dylan because he’s too obtuse. But while his chums chew cake and pop corks around him today, we can only hope that he’s hatching some dastardly scheme where he ends up irritating everyone with a sleight of hand so sneaky that we barely notice that he’s spelled out “I Hate You All” with a skywriter. When he releases a new album, we turn to it, not noticing the huge billboard he’s erected behind us all which features Dylan showing us all his arse.

It’s brilliant.

All that is left to do is to wish a miserable birthday to the biggest liar of them all and to imagine a world where he covers Rebecca Black’s ‘Friday’, just to really grind everyone’s gears…

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Okay America – you may have given us rock ‘n’ roll, jazz and punk… but really, you’re not as good as we Brits. Seriously. America is rubbish compared to what we produce. Oh, you gave us hip-hop as well. Thanks for that. We really appreciate it.

But we’re still better than you.

It’s true and we’re going to prove it to you without any trace of irony. Seriously. By the time America reads this list, there’s a very good chance that they’ll take a long look at themselves and seriously consider never making another record ever again. Oh, and you invented country music too. Ta.

Anyway, here’s a completely fair face-off competition which British music slays America.

1. The Beatles – The Byrds

Go listen to Ticket To Ride Americans. Sound familiar? Yep, it’s the blueprint for The Byrds first half a dozen LPs. Sure enough, The Fabs stole the rhythm ‘n’ blues sound from American artists, but lets be honest here, you lot didn’t give a shit about it ’til the Beatles took it back over to you. You screamed your little wigs off at John, Paul, George and Ringo, but couldn’t quite muster up the energy to fawn over the artists the Fabs aped. The Beatles’ short stay in music influenced everything you did and when they disappeared, you were at a loss and ended up giving us The Eagles in return. Hardly fair now is it? Even your greatest son, Elvis, felt threatened by The Beatles, which of course, didn’t bother our Fabs one jot.

2 Rolling Stones – Aerosmith

Hot on the heels of the Fab Four were our rascally Rolling Stones. Again, nicking licks from US rock ‘n’ roll left, right and centre, The Stones wouldn’t have ever written a decent song without your help. However, it took a bunch of sour faced limeys to really show you how great American music was. In fact, the best showcase of American music came from the very English Stones. The Stones took rock ‘n’ roll, soul, country and R&B and threw it to you all like scraps to dogs and you lapped it up. You still do! And in return, you gave us lame Stone copycats, Aerosmith – even down to the flappy lipped lead singer and rake-thin axeman. Seriously lads, give it a rest, eh?

3. David Bowie  – Bob Dylan

You may think that this is a strange comparison as Bowie didn’t exactly make the same type of music as Dylan, but these two have more in common than you think. Basically, each of these dishonest old tarts have employed the falling masks throughout their careers to reveal a new, shape-shifted artist. Bowie went from mod, to acid-folker, to glam, to krautrock, to cocaine pop… and then went shit. Zimmerman went from folkie, to wired-rocker, to faux country-gent, to born again Christian to… and then went shit. What’s more impressive about Bowie is that each change in his career has been radical and interesting. Look at Dylan and country, folk and rock ‘n’ roll all share a similar quality. It wasn’t until his ill-advised rapping in the ’80s that he really tried something new, beating our Bowie by nearly a decade to an embarrassing flirtation with black digital music (‘Little Wonder’). Therefore – Bowie is miles better.

4. Cliff Richard – Elvis Presley

Sir Cliff has given the world loads of ace records – ‘In The Country’, ‘Move It’, ‘Dynamite’, ‘Devil Woman’ and the like. He also starred in a load of dodgy films, just like your beloved Elvis. However, while Presley grew fat, got addicted to all manner of prescription pills and started hanging around with Grand Wankbag, Richard Nixon, our Cliff found Jesus and started playing tennis. Basically, because tennis is better than Richard Nixon, Cliff wins on away-goals.

5. Led Zeppelin – Jimi Hendrix

Led Zep were so cool that they didn’t bother releasing singles. Jimi Hendrix meanwhile, admittedly one of America’s greats, needed to come to England first before anyone took any real notice of him. Further proof that the UK is superior to The States. Jeez! Look at the facts! You had Jimi under your noses and you were all listening to Simon & Garfunkel! When it came to excessive blues licks, Jimmy Page knocks poor ol’ Hendrix into a cocked hat. Zep pushed and pushed, incorporating strings and Moogs and Jimi sloped off and made a bad soul record as The Band of Gypsies.

6. Fleetwood Mac – Fleetwood Mac

The UK version of Fleetwood Mac had it all. It had the best guitar players and the biggest drug-fuckery. The US version pretty much survived their bouts with cocaine, reuniting every-so-often to play AOR for men and women in slacks. The UK version of Fleetwood Mac pretty much disintegrated in a cloud of weed smoke and melted their brains with super potent acid dished out by weird German cults. The tunes were better too.

7. Pink Floyd – America Doesn’t Even Have An Equivalent

Ah. How America must look on enviously at our beloved Pink Floyd. Psychedelic pioneers turned grumpy space-rockers… America doesn’t even have a Pink Floyd equivalent. We’ll keep The Floyd and you can keep Shania Twain.

8. Elton John – Billy Joel

Billy Joel is so rubbish that he had to remind us all what he did in song-titles like ‘Piano Man’. Elton meanwhile, churned out killer song after killer song, leaving America wondering why they never valued singer-songwriters like Harry Nilsson more. Again, America needed Britain to show them what they were good at before they took it on-board. Elton has a better collection of wigs too.

9. Sex Pistols – The Ramones

Okay America, you win this one easily. The Ramones are a vastly superior band to the schlock bollocks of The Sex Pistols. In absolutely every respect, The Ramones are better than all British punk bands of the late ’70s. But wait! America didn’t really take to The Ramones and they first broke big in England. That means, by sheer fluke, we win this round too! Sorry about that.

10. Mark Morrison – Michael Jackson

An easy one this. Basically, Michael Jackson may have sold a million squillion records to the world and done the odd moonwalk for us. Sadly for Mike, his entire back catalogue (Jackson 5/Jacksons included) never matched the utter majesty of Mark Morrison’s ‘Return of the Mack’. When Jackson got in trouble with the law, he looked like he was about to cry all the time. When Morrison got in trouble with the law, he was so laid back that he sent a lookalike to the bar in his place. Mark Morrison wins this round easily! Hell, he’s better than every single soul record ever made in America.

Disagree with this article? Think America is easily better than the UK in musical muscle? Think we should have had a Dizzee Rascal – Wu Tang face-off? What about Crosby Stills and Nash? Do you think that Kraftwerk beat all UK and US groups? Slag us off in the comments.

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Some of you will have gone to V this year, or Reading. Or the Glastonbury one. A few of you might even have been to all of them. You probably had a great time. After all, what’s not to love?

You got those middle management guys staring into the middle distance nonchalantly twirling fire on a rope as if that suddenly makes them at one with the earth. You’ve got loud HR workers chewing their own mouths off in the dance tent. You might even have found yourself in the reggae area, desperately attempting to hold down a gush of puke having mixed a brewski with a marijuana joint. Festival season – it’s just brilliant.

But before you pull your dreads apart and return to civilisation with tales of how great Blur were, or how Dizzee Rascal is totally blowing your mind right now, take a deep breath and scroll through our top five list of the greatest live performers ever. Prepare to be amazed…1. Ian Brown

A humble northern gentleman, Ian Brown likes to let the music breathe. Hence, the intros to songs tend to swirl around teasingly for at least seven or eight minutes, as he strolls back and forth across the stage, counting the beats to check that he comes in at just the right moment. And when he does, the sweetness of his vocals – which sound almost exactly the same as getting told off by a tired bus driver – somehow drown out the rest of the music. It’s like being underwater, and hearing the sound of dolphins. Brain damaged, slow motion dolphins.

2. Amy Winehouse

These days, with all your Twitters and Face Face, it’s important that an artist interacts with his/her fans. They need to make these screaming maniacs feel that they’re part of the show at a live gig. Bono does this by wandering through the crowds, randomly licking people’s faces to make them feel special. But no one can quite beat the Amy Winehouse method, which simply involves a couple of deft jabs with the elbow, then a full lunge with a closed fist. Preferably into a teenage girl’s smiling happy face.

3. Bob Dylan

Bob Dylan famously angered his loyal following when he stopped playing the guitar-plus-drum-on-back-plus-symbols-on-knees instrument, instead hiring actual musicians to play the bits that he had once done himself. The upside of this was that the music bit sounded much better live. The downside was that without a one-man-band to marvel at, the audience was forced to listen to his singing voice properly for the very first time. The results of this were not good.

4. Wu Tang Clan

Rap music at its most lethal can be a thrilling experience. But, then, on other occasions, it can look like a dozen men lolloping around on stage with towels covering their faces, all grunting slightly out of time. It was a common problem for the teenage hardcore grime crew, Blazin Squad, and it even effects old timers like the Wu-Tang Clan. Thankfully in the above clip they’re performing in Paris, so no one in the audience will really understand what’s going on.

5. The Beatles

From about 1966 onwards, The Beatles became exclusively a studio band, which meant that audiences around the planet were robbed of their blistering live shows. Shows that could often include Paul McCartney half-heartedly inviting a very reluctant George Harrison to sing a song, before all groaning wearily into their individual microphones in unison. Like the Wu Tang, the above clip is totally forgivable, as they were in Japan at the time.

This was a guest blog by Josh from Interestment, and jolly good it is too.

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Ah, Christmas. Goodwill to all men, figgy puddings, the first dusting of snow, the scent of nutmeg in the air.

Creepy old men who look like retired cowboy transvestites. Said creepy old men bawling Here Comes Santa Claus in a way that’s so off-kilter and tuneless that it inadvertently leads every child who hears it to believe that Santa Claus is some sort of dangerous child molester, and then honking gracelessly into a harmonica for 45 minutes until the festive spirit of goodwill has been obliterated completely.

That’s right – Bob Dylan is bringing out a Christmas album. It will be wonderful.

Trying to second-guess Bob Dylan is about as definitively futile as it gets. He delights in wrong-footing the world, whether it’s by getting arrested near Bruce Springsteen‘s house or recording a GPS navigation commentary – both of which he’s done in the last fortnight – or steadfastly refusing to record a listenable album since about 1976. And, by jove, he’s gone and done it again.

Because, you see, Bob Dylan has decided to record an album of Christmas standards. Christmas In The Heart will include festive staples such as Winter Wonderland, Must Be Santa and Little Drummer Boy.

And it promises to tap into the very spirit of Christmas itself – specifically the spirit of answering your door to what you believe are carol singers on Christmas Eve, only to discover that you’re actually being serenaded by a tatty-looking homeless man with a mouse in his pocket, a bottle of cheap gin in his hand and more vomit than one human could ever produce on his own down his trousers.

Oh, alright. It’s for charity. Spoilsports. ABC News reports:

Dylan will donate all his U.S. royalties from album sales to the charity group Feeding America. Feeding America said it expects to provide meals to 1.4 million people this holiday season with the album proceeds. Dylan plans to donate his international royalties to two charity organizations that give meals to needy people in Britain and the developing world.

As obviously philanthropic as this is, we’d like to warn Bob Dylan of two things. First, he should remember that people who make successful Christmas albums often go on to shoot women in the face. Second, he should remember that while making a charity Christmas album is a nice gesture, following it up with a charity Halloween album definitely isn’t. Nobody wants to hear Bob Dylan huff and wheeze his way through, say, a 12-minute acoustic version of Thriller.

Oh, like any of that matters anyway. This is Bob Dylan we’re talking about – he could release an album of armpit farts and the Mojo office would still have to crack open a window to stop everyone drowning in excited jism. So, for once, we’re going to withhold judgement on Christmas In The Heart. But know this, Dylan, you go anywhere near Little Donkey and we’ll cut your bloody balls off.

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10 - Our very first thought of 2009: “Jesus, fireworks are rubbish” Try and sit through all of this. Bet you can’t…

9 - Apparently there are shipwrecks on Google Maps. Someone find us one – Informationweek

8 – Bob Dylan is a weirdo – Bite-Dose

7 - 10 things not to say to porn star – Asylum

6 - Look, here’s a freakishly obedient dog – I Am Bored

5 - We love you, Little Jean Claude Van-Damme – Totallycrap

4 – Something new to be terrified about this year: third-hand smoke – NYT

3 - 30 brilliant opening titles to movies – Smashingmagazine

2 - This just in: Darwin Award won by an idiot - Metro

1 - This really exists: the fart silencer - Weirdasianews

Good news, people: the world’s second biggest twat, otherwise known as Jonathan Edward Borrell, is to be murdered.

OK, OK, yeahyeahyeah, it’s only going to happen in a movie, but sometimes life imitates art, right? Right? Right. We can but hope. Our fingers remain firmly crossed.

Borrell is to star in the new film by Antonia Bird and Irvine Welsh, named The Meat Trade, and will be killed by two grave robbers, played by Robert Carlyle and Colin Firth. Jonathan Edward told the Daily Star:

"It's going to be so much fun. I love horror and I'm a really big fan of Irvine Welsh's work. I loved Trainspotting."

Oh, it’s horror! There should be lots of blood then. Let’s hope Antonia and Irvine get twat number one, Bono, involved. And Keane. And The Feeling. Oh, please The Feeling. And why not stab Luke Pritchard of The Kooks in the mouth with a rusty screwdriver while you’re at it? Why not?

The film is about two body snatchers snatching bodies in Edinburgh and should be released sometime next year. Hecklerspray waits with baited breath. But how will Borrell die, Irvine?

Hecklerspray likes to think Carlyle and Firth will recruit sometime actor Bob Dylan to do this excellent deed. On the release of his band’s debut, Up All Night, Borrell spouted some awful shit out of his mouth-arsehole which decided it was better than Dylan’s first album proper. Get your own back, Bob. But do it for real like Brandon Lee. Come on. Be a sport.

Or, if Bob can’t be reached for some reason, why not contact Morrissey? Borrell did “feel sorry” for Moz when he somehow didn’t manage to draw as big a crowd at V Festival a few years back. People really are stupid.

You are now officially 87% stupider if you voluntarily listen to Johnny Borrell’s arsehole gibberings with feelings of enjoyment. Really. They’ve done tests and everything. We don’t know who “they” are but we’re sure these tests have been done. Kind of.

Too harsh? Not harsh enough we say.

Release Mark Chapman already.

Read more:

Johnny Borrell To Be Murdered In New Movie – AngryApe