I'm pretty familiar with the first third and last third of Bob's career. The middle bit with the conversion and difficult and maybe spotty records still seems hazy to me. Any Dylan experts care to clear this up for me? What was the deal there?

Maybe he'll get into that in the next Chronicles...

Your thread title is a hot button. I don't know enough about BD to have much of an opinion, but you might have summed it up yourself. Smack me if I'm wrong. To even reply is setting myself up for the spanking machine.

His first 3rd: He was comfortable in whatever skin he was.
His 2nd 3rd: Doubted himself, re-evaluted his belonging.
His final 3rd: [Re]-comitted to something, rooted, and re-invented?

fair play: I know nothing and less than the general public about Dylan.

The only thing Dylan's conversion means to me is that I, growing up in an extremely religious household, was allowed to listen to his so-called Christian trilogy without having to hide the records from my parents.

Due to my parents' particular anti-secular bent, in the late 70's I listened to a lot of Bruce Cockburn, Dylan and Van Morrison. They may still have been "unpleasant hippies" but at least they were "Jesus hippies."

what's to know? dude had to serve somebody

I think these assessments are right on the mark. The only album I have from this period is Slow Train Coming and I never listen to it. Just seems boring and unfocused to me. Is Street Legal considered one of his christian albums?

word

Slow Train Coming, Saved and Shot Of Love are usually referenced as his Christian albums.