Bob Dylan continues to build upon his status as a legend in rock music with his latest album, “Love and Theft.”

His raspy, nasal tone and strong, poetic lyrics are still present; however, there is a blend of new sounds that one has not heard from Dylan in the past.

Forty years of music history show itself throughout these songs. In addition to what Rolling Stone calls Dylan’s “psychedelic mutations of blues,” the album features a wide array of different sounds.

It opens with an up-tempo folk-country feel in “Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum,” yet Dylan does not rest on a sedentary sound.

By the third song, Dylan moves into a more jazz-rock tempo only to return again to a slower, more hardcore folk pace.

However, while “Moonlight” is a slow stroll — something that one expects from a musician at the end of a long night on stage — the song that follows, “Honest With Me” is a frantic dash into “the city that never sleeps.”

If this is an unexpected shift to the listener, it seems that Dylan does not really mind. He is asserting his own preferences on this album.

Throughout the shifts in tempo and genre, Dylan maintains his folk roots of a strong narrative within the song. Many of his frequent themes are also repeated. Disenchantment with the world around him. Problems with women. These have all been Dylan staples in the past.

Dylan was named one of Life magazine’s 100 most important Americans of the 20th Century. Since the early 60s, Dylan has been a force in rock and roll. “Love and Theft” is both like and unlike his previous work.

Artists, like stars, burn at different rates. Some last for a brief time and fade back into the darkness. Others last a great deal longer, but seldom at the power of their early stages. Dylan is the rare exception. His star continues to burn brightly in the sky.