He didn't name it and doesn't refer to it as such, but folk-rock legend Bob Dylan has been on what's become known as his Never Ending Tour since 1988. The longest the Minnesota native has gone without playing a concert since then was a three-month break he took in 1997 to recover from what could have been a fatal chest infection.
Dylan has played more than 2,500 gigs during this incredible run, and despite a catalog that dates back more than a half century, the shows aren't greatest-hits rehashes. The iconoclastic singer-songwriter tends to focus on whatever his latest musical project happens to be, and he often reworks his well-known songs significantly. Dylan's current backing band -- all of whom played on his 2012 studio album, Tempest -- has a bit of a country vibe, and usually features guitarists Stu Kimball and Charlie Sexton along with Tony Garnier (bass), drummer George Receli (drums), and Donnie Herron (pedal steel, lap steel, banjo, mandolin, violin, viola).
Dylan was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1988, and he would have landed there based on his work in the 1960s alone, when he wrote and recorded some of the most enduring and groundbreaking material in musical history. Though his '60s songbook includes classics like "Blowin' in the Wind," "Subterranean Homesick Blues," "Like a Rolling Stone," and "I Want You," he hasn't stopped writing and recording critically acclaimed material, and is constantly mining his archives to release previously unreleased material.
