If you’re a Bob Dylan fan, you may have felt frustrated by his autobiographical Chronicles Volume 1 in 2003. That book skipped from Dylan’s arrival in New York City to his battle against fame and its trappings, to his feeling of being washed-up in the late 1980s, with nary a mention of any of the music that made him a legend. It was both highly interesting and highly frustrating at the same time.
A new book, Bob Dylan, The Essential Interviews, is also highly entertaining. And while it fills in a few of the gaps of Chronicles, Dylan’s reluctance to self-analyze means you’ll still be left without a much clearer picture of how or why Dylan has created some of the timeless music he has.
As the name suggests, The Essential Interviews contains just about every interview ever done with Dylan — 31 of them. And while you’ll repeatedly read that interviews with Dylan are rare, the book is 442 pages long, so they’re not that rare—Dylan has said plenty, just on his own timetable.
Many of Dylan’s early interviews are full of evasiveness, alternating between playfulness and annoyance. This is apparent in a 1965 press conference, in which Dylan tells a questioner his new songs are about “all kinds of different things — rats, balloons. They’re about the only thing that comes to mind right now.” (He also replies “ladies garments” to the question “If you were going to sell out to a commercial interest, which one would you choose?” Dylan actually did just that almost 40 years later when he and his music appeared in a 2004 Victoria’s Secret commercial.)
In a 1966 Playboy interview, Dylan gives this reply to the question about his decision to go electric after becoming a legend as a folk singer:
Carelessness. I lost my one true love. I started drinking. I wind up in Phoenix. I get a job as a Chinaman. I start working in a dime store, and move in with a 13-year-old girl. Then this big Mexican lady from Philadelphia comes in and burns the house down. I go down to Dallas. I get a job as a “before” in a Charles Atlas “before and after” ad. I move in with a delivery boy who can cook fantastic chili and hot dogs. Then this 13-year-old girl from Phoenix comes and burns the house down…
That’s not even all of the gibberish, but you get the picture.
Article comments
1 - Natalie Bennett
This article has been selected for syndication to Advance.net, which is affiliated with newspapers around the United States. Nice work!
2 - Scott Marshall
At times, McHenry is helpful to potential readers of Cott's new book, but this review also suffers from some factual errors. One error of admittedly little consequence is the publish date of Dylan's memoir, "Chronicles: Volume One"--it was published in 2004 (not 2003).
The substantial errors relate to the nature of the book itself: Cott's book does not "contain just about every interview ever done with Dylan--31 of them." Dylan has granted well over 200 interviews since 1961 (Michael Gray, in his new book, "The Bob Dylan Encyclopedia," claims the number is over 500).
Flowing from this, Dylan was not "silent" from 1969 until 1978, it's just that Cott only chose to include the Weberman "interview" from 1971. It is true that Dylan gave very few (if any) interviews between 1970 and 1973, but if one looks at 1974-1977, one will find that Dylan granted a number of interviews.
Also there have been several books (besides Cott's new effort) that have included Dylan interviews: "Bob Dylan: In His Own Words" (1993) by Christian Williams, "The Bob Dylan Companion" (1998) by Carl Benson, and "Younger Than That Now" (2004) by Thunder's Mouth Press.
Overall, though, McHenry chooses his quotes well and gives readers a nice flavor for the book.
3 - Justin McHenry
Thanks for the comment, Scott. I have to admit I did not check to see about other Dylan interviews, but let the book give me the impression that it was more comprehensive than maybe it is. Would it be appropriate to say that these are the majority of the "major" interviews with Dylan? Not sure. Thanks for setting the record straight.
4 - Claudio Baumann
I linked to this article because I'm a huge Dylan fan and was interested in finding out a little more about "The Essential Interviews" book that came out recently. After reading the article I did what I sometimes do, which is just keep scrolling down the page (I believe it has something to do with the "mouse in motion tends to be a mouse that stays in motion" theory). I then read the three comments that are posted above me and couldn't help but notice how intelligent, well thought out, and polite everybody was. Three comments in a row?? And not one of them sounds like it's coming from a second grade dropout! Or has the word "sux" in it! I guess by that measure, I'm not exactly cutting it either. check out my blog! gesundheit!
5 - Scott Marshall
Justin,
Your impression of the book may well have been the result of its marketing machine (Jann Wenner founded "Rolling Stone" magazine)--and that's not necessarily a bad thing.
I'd say Cott chooses his interviews well and has a good mix of major interviews as well as some obscure ones. I have the book (and the others I mentioned as well) and will say that Cott's book contains the most interviews (and exclusively interviews...the others have a smattering of articles as well, and in the case of Christian Williams' book, just quotation snippets from interviews).