Willie Nelson and Bob Dylan Treat Their Canons With Pomp and Playfulness in a Delightful Hollywood Bowl Tour Stop: Concert Review

variety.com:

Chris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic Mount Rushmore is a movable thing. Two of the greats of musical granite are out on tour together, co-headlining the traveling Outlaw Music Festival and reminding everyone of that old maxim: “Any day above ground in which Willie Nelson and Bob Dylan are also above ground is a good day.” On July 31, their 26-city joint outing touched down at the Hollywood Bowl for a show that did justice to the stone-faced legacies of both greats, while also, thankfully, paying testimony to their shared, enduring playfulness as performers.

Dylan is performing in the undercard slot each night on this tour. (That’s not counting the first seven dates back in late June, when he was elevated to sole headliner due to Nelson’s illness at the time.) It makes sense that Dylan would be in the penultimate slot on a big, half-day bill like this, since he’s less of a determined crowd-pleaser than his older, country-er counterpart.

His current setlist has more familiar songs in it than his last tour, but doesn’t shout “climactic” in the same way Willie’s does.

Nelson leaves an audience with the warm fuzzies; Dylan is all about the cool fuzzies. Really, a Dylan performance on this tour does exactly what it should: leave the fair-weather attendees moderately pleased and pumped to go get another glass of wine before Willie comes on, while leaving the serious Dylanologists in the crowd thrilled.