Dylan: Once Again, It's Alright Ma

Only an aquiline nose and a pair of scuffy cheeks peeked out from behind the purdah of colored glasses, gray muffler, and hotel towel anchored Arab-style by a pillbox chapeau. But the imperious stare, the twitching extremities and the spindly silhouette of Bob Dylan, 32, belied the Bedouin disguise. The erstwhile revolutionary folkie, rock-'n 'roll innovator and countrified cop-out was back after an eight-year absence from concert touring. Perched atop a hotel couch in Philadelphia (the second of 21 cities in his current six-week tour), Dylan was solidly re-ensconced as the reigning song-poet laureate of young America.

With him was TIME Correspondent David DeVoss, 26, a member of the generation that grew up on Dylan 's songs and that is now returning to auditoriums and stadiums for a historical second look. De Voss 's report:

"All this publicity," Dylan sniffed tiredly, following two performances in a single day. "Sometimes I think they're talking about somebody else. I take it as it comes, but I'm not certain it's beneficial to my life." He paused to rub a bare foot against his faded jeans.

For thousands of young Americans, Bob Dylan is one of the very few personalities to emerge intact from the '60s whirlwind. A vindicated Cassandra who, in crystallizing once vague discontents, transformed dissent from an intellectual hobby to a public cause, Dylan sang about the turmoil of a generation. The generation listened. Now it remembers.

Thus far on the tour, Dylan's concerts have taken on the panoply of clan reunions. Hours before his scheduled appearance, stadium parking lots become agoras for hundreds who browse about looking at Dylan T shirts, posters and songbooks hawked by local vendors. They are subdued crowds—"laid back" in the vernacular of the present —but once inside they unite to buffet Dylan with waves of applause after each song. Roaring pleas for encores and repeated standing ovations are standard features. Lighted matches, signifying the rebirth of Woodstock solidarity, are regularly held aloft.

Never in the history of American rock has a tour aroused so much public interest. Within hours after mailorder tickets were put on sale, more than 5,000,000 letters, each requesting an average of three tickets, inundated post offices along the tour route. One trade paper calculated that 7.5% of the population of the U.S. had requested tickets to see Dylan and his bluesy bayou back-up group, the Band. In Los Angeles County, the 18,700-seat Forum received about 300,000 ticket requests. In New York City, Dylan followers seeking 12:01 a.m. postmarks on first-come, first-served mail orders created frantic midnight rushes. Frazzled promoters in San Francisco, faced with an ever-growing mountain of mail, finally bought newspaper ads imploring: "Please, no more mail orders."

Most performers would be elated, but Dylan, emerging from his isolation, is almost indifferent. "I try not to deal with the audience response," he said. "Too synthetic. Besides, it would be more than I could handle. I'm just basically interested in real things."