Brett Dennen Steals from Dylan (But then Again, Who Hasn't?)

I know that calling Bob Dylan an influential singer-songwriter may get me nominated for understatement of the young century. This is, of course, stating the obvious. However, if you're an up-and-coming songwriter, at least try to disguise the songs you're lovingly ripping from the Bard. Otherwise, it just comes off a bit pathetic. Case and point: Brett Dennen's "She's Mine." I had been hearing this song every other day or so on XM satellite radio, and it took me about three listens to make the connection that it sounds exactly like Dylan's classic "I Want You," off of the 1966 masterpiece (and my favorite record of all time) Blonde on Blonde. Not that Brett Dennen is the first musician to cop Bob's style, but for whatever reason, to me at least, he just might be most irritating. On "She's Mine," Dennen uses the exact same music and lyrical structure as Dylan's take, only he axes the warm, competent country-rock stylings that Dylan referred to as the "thin, wild mercury sound" of Blonde on Blonde as well as the complex fabric of colorful characters in Bob's lyrics. He replaces these elements with cheesy, white-boy, faux-reggae and lyrics to match. The chorus refrain of "she's mine, she's mine" is in the exact same vain as Dylan's refrain of "I want you, I want you," only when Dylan did it it seemed clever and even ironic because of the complexity of the rest of the song (and pretty much all of his other songs), whereas when Dennen does it it just comes off as lazy. Now I may be being a bit harsh on Brett Dennen, and I'm sure he's probably a very nice fellow, but personally I think if he would have been better off doing a direct cover of "I Want You" than writing his own inferior, watered-down take of the tune. After all, there is certainly no shame in covering Dylan. In fact, for a while it seemed as though nearly everybody and their mother had covered at least one Dylan number while climbing the ladder of musical success. However, since young Dennen has apparently decided to attempt to pull a fast one instead, my only hope is that people begin to point out to him his musical misappropriation and as a result, he'll be as embarrassed to play the song live as I am to hear it on the radio. And I suppose you could make the argument that Bob Dylan blatantly borrowed a great deal from his hero Woody Guthrie on his way up, and this is the same thing. That's a valid point, so as soon as Brett Dennen becomes the voice of a generation and one of the most influential artists in the world, I'll have to remember to cut him some slack.
Judge for yourself:
Brett Dennen - "She's Mine" mp3
Bob Dylan - "I Want You" mp3