FEATURE:
Every Grain of Sand
PHOTO CREDIT: Ted Russell/Polaris
Bob Dylan at Eighty
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I realise that I am a little premature…
PHOTO CREDIT: Ted Russell/Polaris
by marking the eightieth birthday of Bob Dylan. The Guardian recently published an article to mark a series of books that are due to coincide with Dylan’s eightieth. On 24th May, one of the world’s greatest songwriters hits a milestone birthday. Neil Spencer talked to, among other people, Clinton Heylin. He has just released A Restless Hungry Feeling: The Double Life of Bob Dylan Vol 1 1941–1966. I am looking forward to May, when we get to celebrate a musician who continues to release music of the highest order:
“Dylan has certainly lasted extraordinarily well, rebounding from a career low in middle age – his role as a washed-up rock star in 1987’s Hearts of Fire and on disc with the Grateful Dead the same year marked his nadir – into a creative renaissance during his “third act”, a time when most pop stars have long since hung up their rock’n’roll shoes. A revival that began with 1997’s Time Out of Mind has continued with Love and Theft (2001) Modern Times (2006), Tempest (2012) and last year’s Rough and Rowdy Ways, a quartet interspersed with three albums inconsequentially covering the great American songbook (ie Porter, Sinatra and co), a somewhat preposterous Christmas record and a sizeable memoir, 2004’s Chronicles Volume One, not forgetting his brilliant radio series, Theme Time Radio Hour. All have arrived against the background of the “never-ending tour” that Dylan declared back in 1988 and which has since delivered more than 3,000 shows, its progress halted only by the Covid pandemic.
It’s an astonishing work rate that has surely taken its toll. Arthritis means that Dylan can no longer hold a guitar; onstage he plays, and is propped up by, an electric piano. His voice – rarely a thing of beauty and most often an abrasively compelling affair described by David Bowie as “like sand and glue” – is in tatters, obliging him to abandon singing altogether for gravelly, dramatic declamation on Rough and Rowdy Ways. Yet like Matisse, forced to give up oils and canvas for cut-outs around the same age, Dylan remains obstinately true to his art, “refusing to let his career become embalmed” as Paul Morley puts it in his new book, out next month. Once you stop creating, you’re in the past.
Dylan’s trickiness, his elusiveness, indeed his outright dishonesty, are legend. Arriving in New York he would tell people he was an orphan, was born in Oklahoma, had run away with the carnival… anything but the truth, which was always concealed, one reason, presumably, for the title of Heylin’s latest biography, The Double Life of Bob Dylan.
“For sure,” confirms Heylin, “but also something as prosaic as the fact that this exploration of his life will be in two volumes, and most importantly, to reflect Dylan’s Gemini nature; hot and cold, kind and cruel, hard and soft, wild and woolly, and most of all, public and private, artist and man.”
Heylin has long been Dylan’s most accomplished biographer, with 1991’s Behind the Shades moving on the singer’s story from the well-chronicled glory years of the 1960s to the quarter century beyond, and supplying a wealth of original research. The book has been updated three times since, while Heylin has also delivered two volumes analysing Dylan’s songs, Revolution in the Air (2009) and Still on the Road (2010). The arrival of the Dylan archive – Heylin is one of the first to be granted access – has already delivered fresh insights.
“It’s an impressive resource,” says Heylin, “and an important one to have in light of the usual Rock and Roll Hall of Fame approach, which continues to paint Dylan as a quirky protest singer from the 1960s. However, the archive doesn’t really start until after his motorcycle accident in 1966, which is where this volume ends. There are very few manuscripts from before then, but one coup was to go through the entire footage of Don’t Look Back and Eat the Document [DA Pennebaker’s renowned documentaries from 1967 and 1972] in that period of great creativity, where you see Dylan not just in interviews but in conversations, in down time, and witness that mind endlessly whirring… it never turns off!
At 80 Dylan has lived a third of his country’s history, becoming both cultural titan of modern times and shaman from “the old weird America”. He once claimed “the Dylan myth wasn’t created by me - it was a gift from God”, but he has been a willing accomplice, a magus distilling his personal gnosis as much from religion as from music or art, one steeped in Judaism and Christianity, though ancient Rome is a surprisingly consistent strand. Women remain the other element in the alchemy, but despite a trove of love songs, variously tremulous, ardent or betrayed, Dylan remains an old testament prophet, forever promising “A wave that can drown the whole world” or warning “You gotta serve somebody”. Apocalypse is always imminent, but first, he’s heading for another joint on the never-ending tour”.
There will be a lot of articles and features published about Bob Dylan ahead of his eightieth birthday next month. I adore his music and I grew up around his albums. I think my favourite would have to be Bringing It All Back Home of 1965. Although there was a little bit of a slump in the 1980s, I think that he has been amazingly consistent and has released incredible albums through every decade since the 1960s. His thirty-ninth album, Rough and Rowdy Ways, was released last year and ranks alongside his very best!
PHOTO CREDIT: Chris Pizzello/Associated Press
I wanted to write this feature for a couple of reasons. The books that are out/coming out are really useful and different approaches to an artist who has not only influence generations of musicians; he has also had an enormous impact on society as a whole. I am going to end this feature by bringing in a Bob Dylan playlist. It shows the scope and prolificacy of his genius. I will write a few other features between now and Dylan’s eightieth birthday. I was caught by the article from The Guardian and the interesting books that pay tribute to a remarkable artist. I think Dylan has impacted us all and, even if you are not a massive fan, there will be songs and albums of his that resonate. I have been a big fan since childhood, and I continue to be amazed by his brilliance and the fact that, as he nears eighty, he is in peak form! Let’s hope that we get to enjoy his music for many years to come. I hope that people use Dylan’s eightieth birthday to listen back to as much of his material as possible. From his eponymous 1962 debut album through to a trio of masterpiece albums from 1965’s Bringing It All Back Home, to a fascinating mid-1970s period and his hugely accomplished recent albums, Bob Dylan has released so many amazing and timeless albums. It will be exciting to see how the world salutes and thanks a brilliant artist...
ON his eightieth birthday.