School of rock: On what Dylan has wrought
By John Quinlan, Journal staff writer | Posted: Tuesday, March 27, 2007
Yeah baby! ... as Austin Powers might say in another wayback machine visit to the '60s.
Russ Gifford does just that in discussing the music of the period that he will explore in his three-part presentation on "My Generation: Rock Music Legends" next month as part of Western Iowa Tech Community College's Institute for Lifelong Learning.
He shared some of his occasionally passionate, if stream-of-consciousness-delivered musical musings, particularly on Bob Dylan, the subject of his first class, during a recent interview.
Says Gifford, in his own words:
ON DYLAN
"I've been a Dylan fan for just about as long as Dylan's been there. I'm not quite old enough to have started with him, although I remember very clearly when 'Blowin in the Wind" came out with Peter, Paul and Mary. I was kind of lucky. I had an older brother and sister. So things that were going on, I was watching and I was taking part in things like that. Not that they were Dylan fans. Never would be. Never will be. Things like that. But I feel lucky.
"And I've got to admit, you know, it's really nice that the world has finally come around to where you can have your childhood back. I mean I've got all the 'Hullabaloo''s they've put out on video. I've got 'Shindig' tapes that I watched every week. And now, with YouTube and things like that, it's hilarious because for years I had an audio tape of when PBS was honoring John Hammond who, of course, had signed Dylan, and Dylan hadn't been on, with the exception of 'Hard Rain,' Dylan had had like a 6-year hiatus from television. And he came out for that and did 'Hurricane,' 'Little Sister' and what's the other one? I'd had that audiotape for years. And now you can go on You Tube and find the actual video piece for it. But live pieces like that, you can find Dylan and The Byrds when the Byrds were being honored because, of course, it was The Byrds that plugged electricity into it. And really again, like Peter Paul and Mary, The Byrds did so many of his pieces for an extremely talented
group on their own. And they were the ones that I was really into. In '65, I just thought they were IT.
ON CONCERTS
"Never saw them (The Byrds or The Beatles). Hey, come on. We live out here in Sioux City. I mean, when were you going to see these people? And secondly, honestly, I didn't think of these groups as live acts. You'd see 'em. You'd hear pieces or snippets of them live a lot of times; and you'd go, it doesn't sound anything as good as what they had (recorded). I mean it was '77 before I saw a live act that I liked. And that was Harry Chapin in one great performance. I saw The Who. I saw some other guys.
"I mean now, today, where we travel a lot farther, you don't think about it. But I grew up in a small town of 1,000 people, Thirty miles to Sioux City was a long trip. Were we really going to get in a car and go? I mean ... and since then, I've had friends. I know a couple of people, one or two, I think, from Sioux City, who actually said they went to Woodstock. I have a friend from New York now -- she said she'd gone. Of course, they had a miserable experience. They didn't hear the music. They didn't see anything. They're sitting in a mud puddle somewhere up a hillside. No food. No nothing. My thing's always been, yeah, that's OK, I can enjoy them here (at home). OK. So I don't really think of them.
"But, you know, I always wanted to stay away from Dylan because I always figured if he ever saw me, he'd just break in to 'Do You, Mister Jones?' You know, I mean, there's no way ...
"I've seen him two of three times. Saw him the first time he came to the Auditorium. And then since he's gone into his traveling Riverboat Gambler bit, I saw him once with that, and I was just like ... that just doesn't do it for me. It's fine. I'm glad he's enjoying himself. If anybody deserves it, he does, but ..."
"Dylan is one of the few that because of the fact that every time you hear him do it, he's going to do it differently. When he did that concert at the Auditorium in Sioux City, that first one back whenever it was, it amazed me. He just came out and it was kind of like what he did on 'Before The Flood,' with, I mean, where he just cranks it into high energy, and just wheww -- moving at supersonic speed. It doesn't matter what the song is. It's just going at this pace. And he makes it sound good. But look at the difference between 'All Along the Watchtower' with Dylan and 'All Along the Watchtower' with Hendrix and 'All Along the Watchtower' with U2. And phrasing can be important. Dylan is the master of throwaway phrasing.
"Actually, I think the first concert I ever saw was Johnny Cash. And I don't think about it. It was like watching him on TV. He came in and he had Boxcar Willie up there, and he had the Carter Sisters. I keep thinking it was '69 in Sioux CIty. And it was a wonderful show. But part of my problem was early on and some of my friends, my old friends originally ... I was a Chuck Berry fan. So I loved... The big thing for me, though, was the British Invasion. See, I was a huge Animals fan. I thought that, talk about phrasing, that there was nobody like Eric Burdon because that was more in the '50s stuff that I liked."
ON COVERING DYLAN IN 90 MINUTES
"That'll be tough. In reality, if you look at that, we're going to spend the greatest portion of it for '63 to '75. And that will be a huge part of it, and the starting pieces. And we'll hit the clips. You're not going to get it done in 90 minutes. And I'll tell you the truth, most of the classes end up, well, people can stay as long as they want, as long as you're willing to talk. The key to this is getting everybody else in there.
"We'll show the overview, get some framework, show where he started from, hit a couple of the major chord changes, if you will, as he shifted gears. I'll play a couple of the early press conferences, things like that. A couple of the clips from -- I think I have a clip from the Royal Albert Hall performance when he was going around and people were starting to boo because he was doing the electric stuff with what was then The Hawks but is now known as The Band. But try to show a few of those pieces. And then show him coming back ... with Rolling Thunder Review, which takes us up to about '75, '76, his conversion. And do a pretty quick overview of the later stuff. But you've got to remember, this is the guy that 's had ... what ... hits for how long? Four decades, five decades. I mean '60s, '70s, '80s. In '97, he hit Number One with 'Time Out of Mind.' And he's still out there selling lots of records.
"And his last ROLLING STONE interview was interesting -- you know, it was something like: 'You want the 60s? I own the 60s! I'll sell you the 60s!' I mean he's still that put-on artist, If you watched the PBS special, if you read 'Chronicles,' the book he put out a year or so ago... I mean I got to believe that the last near-death experience with the viral infection or whatever it was, I think he just decided it was time to dip into the bag, you know, and let everybody in on everything. I mean that was stunning to me. I mean reading the book was a surprise because it was like WOW!, and it shouldn't surprise you that he could write, but he was writing in a straightforward way where all his life, everything he'd written is metaphor. I mean nothing is a direct line from here to there. 'Chronicles,' you read that... and then when he had that PBS special, it was hard for me to watch because I'm used to him putting people on and dodging every question, turning every question around. And
instead he's over there, like he's said, he's telling all. He's being straight. I mean He's looking at that thing -- he's leaving behind the final record. I'm surprised he didn't say something like, 'And you can't play it until after my death.' I mean it was just amazing.
"So he's not only turned a new corner here on the other side, but he's got this corner that he's turned in his whole life. But if you think about it, what's he doing? Two-hundred-eighty shows, I mean that's probably too high, but I mean he's doing easily over 200 shows a year. All he's doing is just he's out on the road. They call it the Neverending Tour. And he's been doing it 3, 4 or 5 years now. It's just amazing. He's out doing what he wanted to do. And he's not trying to set the world on fire. He's trying to do music, and it's fascinating.
"And one of the things, one of the important things with Dylan -- If you think about it, he's the Abe Lincoln of music. He set music writers free. He took them out of the Brill Building and said, you know, you don't have to work for The Man any more. Even if you don't have a voice, as long as you've got the material, you can be the one. And (he) started the entire era of the singer/songwriter which changed everything. It proved you could do it.
"Look at everybody that's come since."
ON THAT DYLAN POSTER IN HIS OFFICE
"They asked me to do this. And to me, it's like ... when she (Fiona Valentine) asked about Dylan, you know, nobody knows about the Dylan poster out there (in his outer office). I mean a lot of my old friends know ... theyd be going, oh yeah! But I mean my professional acquaintances and stuff like that, they have no clue. And so when she goes, 'Do you think you could do a class on Bob Dylan, And I'm like ... (a bit TOO casually) yeah, I think I can handle that. I've been waiting 30 years to have that opportunity I'd like to try that. Thanks. When? Could we do it tomorrow? The next day? It's been tough waiting. And it's going to be tough because, as you said, that's a lot to squeeze in."
(As for the poster, he said it was just one of many record album posters he used to cover some boring white space on his walls.)
"You know, I don't idolize people."
ON THE CONCEPT ALBUM
"And then when we get into the later ones. And that's when she asked about the Concept Albums, I was like -- perfect! What we're really going to have, if you think about it, by the time we get through, is you're going to have a three-part class that is essentially going to encompass The '60s. We call it The '60s. But in reality, the '60s go from somewhere around '63 to, you know, what we popularly think of them, from about '63 to '74, '75.
"And if you think about it, where do you draw the end of it? Where's the point? Well, you kind of look at it, you know, when the ones that set the world on fire, when they start to dying from burning out. As (David) Crosby says, 'You know, we got it right on a lot of things, but we got it wrong on the drugs.' And if anybody can talk, he can. He can on that point. But that encapsulates it.
"And when you think about the Concept Album, suddenly you set these creative people free. Just like today, we've had this massive change in technology, and suddenly people are allowed to be creative. People are doing things that had never been seen before. And you go from the 78 record to the 33 1/3 record, you've got this sonic canvas, you know.
"And before Dylan, you had the record execs telling you what you put on there, what you did on there. Things like that. And then all of a sudden, you come along, and Dylan's pushing and forcing a lot of his own stuff. After you get past the first three albums (which) were respectable, but I don't even think the three of them sold a half a million records together. But then he comes along and breaks through, hits another side of Bob Dylan, goes on from there with 'Bringing It All Back Home.' It's the electric side. You've got The Byrds coming out and and putting it in electric. So you've got Peter Paul & Mary on this piece. you've got the folk rock on this piece, and it all comes together and just explodes.
"Well, then all of a sudden you've got somebody like Jefferson Airplane coming along. Hit it big and they make a deal with RCA that says, you know, we have total control. And we get to choose. We put everything. Well, they're a perfect example. A couple of incredible albums. After that, a couple of incessant pieces of just ... I mean they self-destructed. Then it took them years to come back. I mean they fell apart. But individually they went on. You've got Hot Tuna going this way. You've got everything else. They come back together. You've got (Paul) Kantner putting together Jefferson Starship just as Jefferson Starship, you know ... it was just the title of an album and almost got a Hugo because it's a theme album telling, you know, we're going to escape this world. It's really ... I always wanted to ask, you know, if you ever got him alone in a room: Well, OK, was it (SF writer Robert) Heinlein that inspired that? What was it? He would probably say it was pot, but it's hard to say.
"But if you look at everybody he had on that album, then right behind that Crosby turns around and does 'If Only I Could Remember My Name.' And it's almost the exact same people."
ON SONIC CANVASSES
"But you've got these sonic canvasses that are just these entire stories. And of course, in here, you've got The Who with 'Tommy.' You've got the big ones that everybody knows. 'Pet Sounds,' which according to Brian Wilson, inspired Paul McCartney because he sent the acetate to McCartney and McCartney said it was one of the most brilliant things he'd ever heard. And of course right behind that you've got 'Sgt. Pepper.'" And you've got Brian Wilson listening to 'Sgt. Pepper' and just going into a meltdown, going 'My God, what was that?' How incredible! You've got David Crosby who still picks 'Sgt. Pepper' as the Number One album he'd have with him on a desert album if he could only take 10 albums with him.
"You know you've got all these people that only are these canvasses that allow you to suddenly explore all these incredible circumstances and stories. You at the same time turn around and they're cross-pollinating. and they're moving up the ladder with each of them to where you come up with 'Dark Side of the Moon,' followed by 'Wish You Were Here,' followed years later by 'The Wall.' I mean there's a group of guys (Pink Floyd) who essentially while they stayed together wrote the same album 3 or 4 times. But each one of them came at it from a different way. How many times have we seen authors do that, you know, 50 million times? That's how you keep working at the same theme. You keep working through it. And if they stay good...
"Look what happened to Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. They come along. They're huge. They sign a deal with Atlantic Records for 25 albums. And can do whatever the hell they want. They just finished that contract. And by the time they were finished with it, they hated Atlantic and Atlantic hated them because they had no push. I mean you kind of see this utopia that everybody was believing in, and you see the reality. And you kind of get thepetri dish that shows us that these things, you've got to have the push. Creativity is great, but you also have to have the limits in the push at the same time to have that tension to make something happen.
"You know. look at The Who. Everybody else thought Woodstock was incredible. The Who, Pete Townsend thought Woodstock was the worst thing that ever happened in the world. And you turn around with that, and he comes back and is out there creating all these incredible pieces, you know, and a lot of it fueled with anger, a lot of it fueled with detesting where things are going. And you get 'Don't Get Fooled Again,' you know, off of 'Who's Next,' 1970. One incredible album that really is a precursor to his 'Quadrophenia' concept. There's just so many pieces.
"But before it all fragmented, before it all went to just money, before Big Business ... we can not only make a lot, we can make millions on this, before that started being a driving force, you still had an incredible period of time there that was just a massive explosion of, if you think of it, as talent is this flame, this new technology, and you had radio pumping out still the Top 40 stuff, you had albums, and you had suddenly people's income rising in a certain way where, you know, a five-dollar album, the vinyl could go from 2 to 3 to 5 bucks over a short period of time. And a lot of money being available for everybody then to be made. It's all intertwined.
"And it's just fascinating to see. It's kind of like what you saw later in '77 with Kiss, you know, with the guy with the lighter fluid in the mouth and the flame shooting out. I mean you've got the flame, you've got the creativity, you've got the fuel. And BOOM!"
ON THE END TIMES ... AND THE ORIGINS
"Yeah, but at what point did you have business just suddenly take it over?
"I trace that to the '74-75 era. Also, you had the flood. Think about it -- When the Beatles came along, Dylan came along, you know, I mean they had inspirations but they didn't have rock 'n' roll as inspirations. They had rock 'n' roll as a push. And if you go back and review their earliest stuff, what you find with John Lennon, Paul McCartney, what you find with Dylan, they wanted to be bigger than Elvis. But they did not grow up listening to rock 'n' roll. Well now, that' second generation's coming in. They grew up listening to rock 'n' roll.
"And that's why, to me, you listen to some of that stuff, some of that early stuff and it's kind of uneven in some places because ... you know you listen to McCartney with the megaphone stuff and things like that, but they're creating this out of whole cloth. There's no template. There's no pattern.
"Everybody since then has had that pattern. You know, well, you do that studio stuff. We go out and you tour to promote the record. And of course, what happened was you hadd these record execs doing what movies have done since then which is, oh yeah, well, you had tons of expenses, you know, so you really didn't ... yeah, yeah, you sold millions of albums but you owe us money. It was just they used these people like socks. But both sides wanted to be used. Both sides got what they wanted out of it. But where you've got the Beatles doing their first album in 7 1/2 hours, you know, I mean you've got people turning around and spending months and years in a studio, just cranking up the bills because everybody's willing to do that."
ON BRIAN WILSON, THE KING OF EXCESS
"Yeah, well, of course he had other problems, though, between the ... and that's an interesting factor. I mean You don't know who exactly to believe what's happened. I mean first of all, according to him, the abuse as a child, add that to ... to hear him tell it, he did acid once, and that was it. Maybe it was. Who knows. He also had stage fright. You know, the guy didn't want to be on stage. He never did. He loved doing the arrangements. He got that ability, and again, think about it, you take away that push. Here he is. He's got that push to be in the studio. But you allow somebody to just go into something without any limits, and the excess is just ... I mean, look at it, I mean, how many years did we wait for 'Smile?' I mean they took it away from him. I mean we had the pieces and snippets that got thrown on other albums. But we just finally get to hear what we've been (anticipating). The Holy Grail of Music for the past 40 years, you know, the 'Smile' album. (Interviewer, when
asked about 'Smile,' said it was interesting, not great.) And that's the point. We build these things up to the point of where, had it come out when it should have ... I mean, think where he was...
"You know when you think about it, 'Good Vibrations,' I mean it is a hallmark today. It is a touchstone. When they originally heard his arrangement for 'Good Vibrations,' I mean the rest of the band tried to kill it. They didn't want to do it. They're going -- What is this crap? We're not gonna... And the record execs are going... And he's going... Now, this is it, You've gotta do this.
"So there's got to be this push/pull. It can't be just about where the money Is.
"But you know what's fascinating about some of these people, I think if you look at it, a lot of times, think about it. If you get one great album out of somebody, that's an incredible achievement, isn't it? But the record album ... as I said, the record companies have been doing what the movies have come to do ever since, which is -- No, we want the same thing again because that's what the public wants to buy. If they went to 'Rocky 1,' they'll go to 'Rocky 2,' and they'll probably go to 'Rocky 17.' We'll keep mining that until it's gone."
ON DYLAN AGAIN
"And I've got to tell you, 'Nashville Skyline,' I sat down and I just was like... hunnhhhh? And on the other hand, look at the influence he had on Cash. Johnny Cash thought Dylan was incredible, pushed him hard and put him under his arm. And if you really look at it, I heard it said, and it's just a line I can't get out of my head, you know -- Johnny Cash is Dylan without metaphor. (crom Richard Goldstein, rock/pop culture critic). And it's really true. It's that direct punch. It's that gravelly voice. It's that real-life-experience pieces.
"But you're absolutely right,and that was the point I was going to make. Dylan would mine something for one, maybe two, and again, remember, this is that limitation piece. I'm saying that LPs were this great advancement. So we've got LPs. And they give us 45 minutes. That's your upper minutes. Well, they always created more than enough for an album, right. So you've got a few songs hanging over, and things like that. And they might go on and form the basis of that second album. Or in Dylan's case, they're the wealth of bootlegs that are out there. Until 1983 or '84, just a few of us were lucky enough to find them in Sioux City. It was kind of nice -- what was it, the Record Roost out in Morningside? The Record Roost was out there in Morningside, and I remember I think I made it there the first time -- cuz I grew up outside of town. And I think I made it there in'70. And got my first Dylan bootleg.
"And you had these things out there because Dylan just had that wealth of material that never made it out there. But everybody else, if you look at it, there's 2 or 3 albums. And you look at Dylan. He'd do like the first three albums, the Woody Guthrie phase. All of a sudden, he breaks out of that, and you hit another side of Bob Dylan. There's a little bit of that earlier influence, but there's suddenly this new direction that he's heading off on. By the time, and it's really kind of a precursor, you know, 'Bringing It All Back Home' and "Highway 61.' And then you've got 'Blonde on Blonde.' And then suddenly he's done with it. He's moving on. And he goes through that fallow period.
"You see, I love 'John Wesley Hardin (1967). I don't know why but those songs just stuck with me. You know, 'New Morning,' something about that album,But the 'John Wesley Hardin' album, for some reason, I just thought that was great. Joan Baez took a lot of those on 'Any Day Now.' I mean those were incredible. Plus you got to hear a couple songs we never heard, 'Farewell Angeline,', things like that, you know, 'Love Was a 4-Letter Word,' that never got released on any of his stuff but that she picked up.
"But then it comes roaring back, it seems like he's a has-been. And think about it, what happened in 1970? The Beatles. Well time to break up. We're out of here. You know, you turn around. Paul Simon said, well, the Beatles did it. They taught us everything to do to start with, so time to break up. So everything starts shattering. You don't have these groups, except for the Rolling Stones. But you know, you go through all this, and Dylan suddenly comes roaring back with 'Blood on the Tracks,' 'Desire' and 'Street Legal,' which I just love. The first time I heard 'Street Legal,' I mean, that was a shift. I mean the first time I put that on, I put the needle on, thinking, and went -- what the hell is this! I actually let it set for a couple of weeks and came back to it and went, OK, I like that. I like the song, I like this stuff,
"But he's done that all along -- he's drug his audience with him. And didn't care whether they came along or not. And I think you're absolutely right. I think that's the key -- is that he's re-created himself. I also think the other key is that he didn't fall into the celebrity status. I mean, really and truly he is an introvert. And he's dodged every question. He doesn't want people to know the history. you know: 'Listen to the songs, You figure it out. It's not about me. It's about you. I'm writing these. I got what I'm getting out of them. If you get something out of it, that's yours.'
"What was his line? You talk about your dreams without having shoveled into the ditch of what each one means. But then again, you had some incredibly interesting stuff. What was it, Pete Hamill wrote the liner notes for 'Blood on the Tracks' and wins a Grammy for it. But he's analyzing the stuff, you know, so Dylan pulls him off the back of the album. By the time the Grammy is awarded, it's no longer on the back of the album.
"And you've got the stuff he put on the back of 'Planet Waves' which Robbie Robertson produced with The Band, and hell, they had to put a flap over it because of the wording that Dylan uses on it. And you go, oh, that's really odd, and you take the cellophane off... But there's a case -- a song that in retrospect has become huge, 'Forever Young' -- he does it twice on the album, once slow, once the other time. And Robbie's going -- that's a great song, you know, but I can hear your buttons on your coat on the back of the guitar, we've got to recut it. Dylan's already heading out the door, and he's not coming back to recut it. But its great! You played that back in 1971, '72, whatever it was. you played that, That whole album, it sounds like you're sitting in your living room.
"In '75 they put out 'The Basement Tapes' because, you know, Dylan essentially allows it to be released because The Band's basically hurting for money, and they're going to get a cut of this, of all these. So they put them out on a double album set. Honest to gosh, you feel like ... I mean here you'd had the music from The Big Pink before, but now again, they empty the bag. I mean everything's out there. You've got a microphone sitting there in front of them on an open reel tape recorder. You feel like theyr'e sitting in your living room.
"I mean Dylan's always been about the poetry rather than the performance. Although mid-70s he hit that spot where you look at him and you think, are you trying to be Elvis? What's with the suit?"
"And I've got to say the only thing I can say for rap music is finally something I never thought would ever happen, somebody finally came up with something that would make me think that disco sounded OK. I mean it's just...
"And I wonder how much of it is ... is my hearing going or what?"
"Let's face it. I'm a Dylan fan and it's about the words. If I can't understand what your'e saying, and if I reject what you're saying, which is my route with rap you know ... Maybe that's a sign that we're just getting old, is that what we're getting here?
Russ Gifford does just that in discussing the music of the period that he will explore in his three-part presentation on "My Generation: Rock Music Legends" next month as part of Western Iowa Tech Community College's Institute for Lifelong Learning.
He shared some of his occasionally passionate, if stream-of-consciousness-delivered musical musings, particularly on Bob Dylan, the subject of his first class, during a recent interview.
Says Gifford, in his own words:
ON DYLAN
"I've been a Dylan fan for just about as long as Dylan's been there. I'm not quite old enough to have started with him, although I remember very clearly when 'Blowin in the Wind" came out with Peter, Paul and Mary. I was kind of lucky. I had an older brother and sister. So things that were going on, I was watching and I was taking part in things like that. Not that they were Dylan fans. Never would be. Never will be. Things like that. But I feel lucky.
"And I've got to admit, you know, it's really nice that the world has finally come around to where you can have your childhood back. I mean I've got all the 'Hullabaloo''s they've put out on video. I've got 'Shindig' tapes that I watched every week. And now, with YouTube and things like that, it's hilarious because for years I had an audio tape of when PBS was honoring John Hammond who, of course, had signed Dylan, and Dylan hadn't been on, with the exception of 'Hard Rain,' Dylan had had like a 6-year hiatus from television. And he came out for that and did 'Hurricane,' 'Little Sister' and what's the other one? I'd had that audiotape for years. And now you can go on You Tube and find the actual video piece for it. But live pieces like that, you can find Dylan and The Byrds when the Byrds were being honored because, of course, it was The Byrds that plugged electricity into it. And really again, like Peter Paul and Mary, The Byrds did so many of his pieces for an extremely talented
group on their own. And they were the ones that I was really into. In '65, I just thought they were IT.
ON CONCERTS
"Never saw them (The Byrds or The Beatles). Hey, come on. We live out here in Sioux City. I mean, when were you going to see these people? And secondly, honestly, I didn't think of these groups as live acts. You'd see 'em. You'd hear pieces or snippets of them live a lot of times; and you'd go, it doesn't sound anything as good as what they had (recorded). I mean it was '77 before I saw a live act that I liked. And that was Harry Chapin in one great performance. I saw The Who. I saw some other guys.
"I mean now, today, where we travel a lot farther, you don't think about it. But I grew up in a small town of 1,000 people, Thirty miles to Sioux City was a long trip. Were we really going to get in a car and go? I mean ... and since then, I've had friends. I know a couple of people, one or two, I think, from Sioux City, who actually said they went to Woodstock. I have a friend from New York now -- she said she'd gone. Of course, they had a miserable experience. They didn't hear the music. They didn't see anything. They're sitting in a mud puddle somewhere up a hillside. No food. No nothing. My thing's always been, yeah, that's OK, I can enjoy them here (at home). OK. So I don't really think of them.
"But, you know, I always wanted to stay away from Dylan because I always figured if he ever saw me, he'd just break in to 'Do You, Mister Jones?' You know, I mean, there's no way ...
"I've seen him two of three times. Saw him the first time he came to the Auditorium. And then since he's gone into his traveling Riverboat Gambler bit, I saw him once with that, and I was just like ... that just doesn't do it for me. It's fine. I'm glad he's enjoying himself. If anybody deserves it, he does, but ..."
"Dylan is one of the few that because of the fact that every time you hear him do it, he's going to do it differently. When he did that concert at the Auditorium in Sioux City, that first one back whenever it was, it amazed me. He just came out and it was kind of like what he did on 'Before The Flood,' with, I mean, where he just cranks it into high energy, and just wheww -- moving at supersonic speed. It doesn't matter what the song is. It's just going at this pace. And he makes it sound good. But look at the difference between 'All Along the Watchtower' with Dylan and 'All Along the Watchtower' with Hendrix and 'All Along the Watchtower' with U2. And phrasing can be important. Dylan is the master of throwaway phrasing.
"Actually, I think the first concert I ever saw was Johnny Cash. And I don't think about it. It was like watching him on TV. He came in and he had Boxcar Willie up there, and he had the Carter Sisters. I keep thinking it was '69 in Sioux CIty. And it was a wonderful show. But part of my problem was early on and some of my friends, my old friends originally ... I was a Chuck Berry fan. So I loved... The big thing for me, though, was the British Invasion. See, I was a huge Animals fan. I thought that, talk about phrasing, that there was nobody like Eric Burdon because that was more in the '50s stuff that I liked."
ON COVERING DYLAN IN 90 MINUTES
"That'll be tough. In reality, if you look at that, we're going to spend the greatest portion of it for '63 to '75. And that will be a huge part of it, and the starting pieces. And we'll hit the clips. You're not going to get it done in 90 minutes. And I'll tell you the truth, most of the classes end up, well, people can stay as long as they want, as long as you're willing to talk. The key to this is getting everybody else in there.
"We'll show the overview, get some framework, show where he started from, hit a couple of the major chord changes, if you will, as he shifted gears. I'll play a couple of the early press conferences, things like that. A couple of the clips from -- I think I have a clip from the Royal Albert Hall performance when he was going around and people were starting to boo because he was doing the electric stuff with what was then The Hawks but is now known as The Band. But try to show a few of those pieces. And then show him coming back ... with Rolling Thunder Review, which takes us up to about '75, '76, his conversion. And do a pretty quick overview of the later stuff. But you've got to remember, this is the guy that 's had ... what ... hits for how long? Four decades, five decades. I mean '60s, '70s, '80s. In '97, he hit Number One with 'Time Out of Mind.' And he's still out there selling lots of records.
"And his last ROLLING STONE interview was interesting -- you know, it was something like: 'You want the 60s? I own the 60s! I'll sell you the 60s!' I mean he's still that put-on artist, If you watched the PBS special, if you read 'Chronicles,' the book he put out a year or so ago... I mean I got to believe that the last near-death experience with the viral infection or whatever it was, I think he just decided it was time to dip into the bag, you know, and let everybody in on everything. I mean that was stunning to me. I mean reading the book was a surprise because it was like WOW!, and it shouldn't surprise you that he could write, but he was writing in a straightforward way where all his life, everything he'd written is metaphor. I mean nothing is a direct line from here to there. 'Chronicles,' you read that... and then when he had that PBS special, it was hard for me to watch because I'm used to him putting people on and dodging every question, turning every question around. And
instead he's over there, like he's said, he's telling all. He's being straight. I mean He's looking at that thing -- he's leaving behind the final record. I'm surprised he didn't say something like, 'And you can't play it until after my death.' I mean it was just amazing.
"So he's not only turned a new corner here on the other side, but he's got this corner that he's turned in his whole life. But if you think about it, what's he doing? Two-hundred-eighty shows, I mean that's probably too high, but I mean he's doing easily over 200 shows a year. All he's doing is just he's out on the road. They call it the Neverending Tour. And he's been doing it 3, 4 or 5 years now. It's just amazing. He's out doing what he wanted to do. And he's not trying to set the world on fire. He's trying to do music, and it's fascinating.
"And one of the things, one of the important things with Dylan -- If you think about it, he's the Abe Lincoln of music. He set music writers free. He took them out of the Brill Building and said, you know, you don't have to work for The Man any more. Even if you don't have a voice, as long as you've got the material, you can be the one. And (he) started the entire era of the singer/songwriter which changed everything. It proved you could do it.
"Look at everybody that's come since."
ON THAT DYLAN POSTER IN HIS OFFICE
"They asked me to do this. And to me, it's like ... when she (Fiona Valentine) asked about Dylan, you know, nobody knows about the Dylan poster out there (in his outer office). I mean a lot of my old friends know ... theyd be going, oh yeah! But I mean my professional acquaintances and stuff like that, they have no clue. And so when she goes, 'Do you think you could do a class on Bob Dylan, And I'm like ... (a bit TOO casually) yeah, I think I can handle that. I've been waiting 30 years to have that opportunity I'd like to try that. Thanks. When? Could we do it tomorrow? The next day? It's been tough waiting. And it's going to be tough because, as you said, that's a lot to squeeze in."
(As for the poster, he said it was just one of many record album posters he used to cover some boring white space on his walls.)
"You know, I don't idolize people."
ON THE CONCEPT ALBUM
"And then when we get into the later ones. And that's when she asked about the Concept Albums, I was like -- perfect! What we're really going to have, if you think about it, by the time we get through, is you're going to have a three-part class that is essentially going to encompass The '60s. We call it The '60s. But in reality, the '60s go from somewhere around '63 to, you know, what we popularly think of them, from about '63 to '74, '75.
"And if you think about it, where do you draw the end of it? Where's the point? Well, you kind of look at it, you know, when the ones that set the world on fire, when they start to dying from burning out. As (David) Crosby says, 'You know, we got it right on a lot of things, but we got it wrong on the drugs.' And if anybody can talk, he can. He can on that point. But that encapsulates it.
"And when you think about the Concept Album, suddenly you set these creative people free. Just like today, we've had this massive change in technology, and suddenly people are allowed to be creative. People are doing things that had never been seen before. And you go from the 78 record to the 33 1/3 record, you've got this sonic canvas, you know.
"And before Dylan, you had the record execs telling you what you put on there, what you did on there. Things like that. And then all of a sudden, you come along, and Dylan's pushing and forcing a lot of his own stuff. After you get past the first three albums (which) were respectable, but I don't even think the three of them sold a half a million records together. But then he comes along and breaks through, hits another side of Bob Dylan, goes on from there with 'Bringing It All Back Home.' It's the electric side. You've got The Byrds coming out and and putting it in electric. So you've got Peter Paul & Mary on this piece. you've got the folk rock on this piece, and it all comes together and just explodes.
"Well, then all of a sudden you've got somebody like Jefferson Airplane coming along. Hit it big and they make a deal with RCA that says, you know, we have total control. And we get to choose. We put everything. Well, they're a perfect example. A couple of incredible albums. After that, a couple of incessant pieces of just ... I mean they self-destructed. Then it took them years to come back. I mean they fell apart. But individually they went on. You've got Hot Tuna going this way. You've got everything else. They come back together. You've got (Paul) Kantner putting together Jefferson Starship just as Jefferson Starship, you know ... it was just the title of an album and almost got a Hugo because it's a theme album telling, you know, we're going to escape this world. It's really ... I always wanted to ask, you know, if you ever got him alone in a room: Well, OK, was it (SF writer Robert) Heinlein that inspired that? What was it? He would probably say it was pot, but it's hard to say.
"But if you look at everybody he had on that album, then right behind that Crosby turns around and does 'If Only I Could Remember My Name.' And it's almost the exact same people."
ON SONIC CANVASSES
"But you've got these sonic canvasses that are just these entire stories. And of course, in here, you've got The Who with 'Tommy.' You've got the big ones that everybody knows. 'Pet Sounds,' which according to Brian Wilson, inspired Paul McCartney because he sent the acetate to McCartney and McCartney said it was one of the most brilliant things he'd ever heard. And of course right behind that you've got 'Sgt. Pepper.'" And you've got Brian Wilson listening to 'Sgt. Pepper' and just going into a meltdown, going 'My God, what was that?' How incredible! You've got David Crosby who still picks 'Sgt. Pepper' as the Number One album he'd have with him on a desert album if he could only take 10 albums with him.
"You know you've got all these people that only are these canvasses that allow you to suddenly explore all these incredible circumstances and stories. You at the same time turn around and they're cross-pollinating. and they're moving up the ladder with each of them to where you come up with 'Dark Side of the Moon,' followed by 'Wish You Were Here,' followed years later by 'The Wall.' I mean there's a group of guys (Pink Floyd) who essentially while they stayed together wrote the same album 3 or 4 times. But each one of them came at it from a different way. How many times have we seen authors do that, you know, 50 million times? That's how you keep working at the same theme. You keep working through it. And if they stay good...
"Look what happened to Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. They come along. They're huge. They sign a deal with Atlantic Records for 25 albums. And can do whatever the hell they want. They just finished that contract. And by the time they were finished with it, they hated Atlantic and Atlantic hated them because they had no push. I mean you kind of see this utopia that everybody was believing in, and you see the reality. And you kind of get thepetri dish that shows us that these things, you've got to have the push. Creativity is great, but you also have to have the limits in the push at the same time to have that tension to make something happen.
"You know. look at The Who. Everybody else thought Woodstock was incredible. The Who, Pete Townsend thought Woodstock was the worst thing that ever happened in the world. And you turn around with that, and he comes back and is out there creating all these incredible pieces, you know, and a lot of it fueled with anger, a lot of it fueled with detesting where things are going. And you get 'Don't Get Fooled Again,' you know, off of 'Who's Next,' 1970. One incredible album that really is a precursor to his 'Quadrophenia' concept. There's just so many pieces.
"But before it all fragmented, before it all went to just money, before Big Business ... we can not only make a lot, we can make millions on this, before that started being a driving force, you still had an incredible period of time there that was just a massive explosion of, if you think of it, as talent is this flame, this new technology, and you had radio pumping out still the Top 40 stuff, you had albums, and you had suddenly people's income rising in a certain way where, you know, a five-dollar album, the vinyl could go from 2 to 3 to 5 bucks over a short period of time. And a lot of money being available for everybody then to be made. It's all intertwined.
"And it's just fascinating to see. It's kind of like what you saw later in '77 with Kiss, you know, with the guy with the lighter fluid in the mouth and the flame shooting out. I mean you've got the flame, you've got the creativity, you've got the fuel. And BOOM!"
ON THE END TIMES ... AND THE ORIGINS
"Yeah, but at what point did you have business just suddenly take it over?
"I trace that to the '74-75 era. Also, you had the flood. Think about it -- When the Beatles came along, Dylan came along, you know, I mean they had inspirations but they didn't have rock 'n' roll as inspirations. They had rock 'n' roll as a push. And if you go back and review their earliest stuff, what you find with John Lennon, Paul McCartney, what you find with Dylan, they wanted to be bigger than Elvis. But they did not grow up listening to rock 'n' roll. Well now, that' second generation's coming in. They grew up listening to rock 'n' roll.
"And that's why, to me, you listen to some of that stuff, some of that early stuff and it's kind of uneven in some places because ... you know you listen to McCartney with the megaphone stuff and things like that, but they're creating this out of whole cloth. There's no template. There's no pattern.
"Everybody since then has had that pattern. You know, well, you do that studio stuff. We go out and you tour to promote the record. And of course, what happened was you hadd these record execs doing what movies have done since then which is, oh yeah, well, you had tons of expenses, you know, so you really didn't ... yeah, yeah, you sold millions of albums but you owe us money. It was just they used these people like socks. But both sides wanted to be used. Both sides got what they wanted out of it. But where you've got the Beatles doing their first album in 7 1/2 hours, you know, I mean you've got people turning around and spending months and years in a studio, just cranking up the bills because everybody's willing to do that."
ON BRIAN WILSON, THE KING OF EXCESS
"Yeah, well, of course he had other problems, though, between the ... and that's an interesting factor. I mean You don't know who exactly to believe what's happened. I mean first of all, according to him, the abuse as a child, add that to ... to hear him tell it, he did acid once, and that was it. Maybe it was. Who knows. He also had stage fright. You know, the guy didn't want to be on stage. He never did. He loved doing the arrangements. He got that ability, and again, think about it, you take away that push. Here he is. He's got that push to be in the studio. But you allow somebody to just go into something without any limits, and the excess is just ... I mean, look at it, I mean, how many years did we wait for 'Smile?' I mean they took it away from him. I mean we had the pieces and snippets that got thrown on other albums. But we just finally get to hear what we've been (anticipating). The Holy Grail of Music for the past 40 years, you know, the 'Smile' album. (Interviewer, when
asked about 'Smile,' said it was interesting, not great.) And that's the point. We build these things up to the point of where, had it come out when it should have ... I mean, think where he was...
"You know when you think about it, 'Good Vibrations,' I mean it is a hallmark today. It is a touchstone. When they originally heard his arrangement for 'Good Vibrations,' I mean the rest of the band tried to kill it. They didn't want to do it. They're going -- What is this crap? We're not gonna... And the record execs are going... And he's going... Now, this is it, You've gotta do this.
"So there's got to be this push/pull. It can't be just about where the money Is.
"But you know what's fascinating about some of these people, I think if you look at it, a lot of times, think about it. If you get one great album out of somebody, that's an incredible achievement, isn't it? But the record album ... as I said, the record companies have been doing what the movies have come to do ever since, which is -- No, we want the same thing again because that's what the public wants to buy. If they went to 'Rocky 1,' they'll go to 'Rocky 2,' and they'll probably go to 'Rocky 17.' We'll keep mining that until it's gone."
ON DYLAN AGAIN
"And I've got to tell you, 'Nashville Skyline,' I sat down and I just was like... hunnhhhh? And on the other hand, look at the influence he had on Cash. Johnny Cash thought Dylan was incredible, pushed him hard and put him under his arm. And if you really look at it, I heard it said, and it's just a line I can't get out of my head, you know -- Johnny Cash is Dylan without metaphor. (crom Richard Goldstein, rock/pop culture critic). And it's really true. It's that direct punch. It's that gravelly voice. It's that real-life-experience pieces.
"But you're absolutely right,and that was the point I was going to make. Dylan would mine something for one, maybe two, and again, remember, this is that limitation piece. I'm saying that LPs were this great advancement. So we've got LPs. And they give us 45 minutes. That's your upper minutes. Well, they always created more than enough for an album, right. So you've got a few songs hanging over, and things like that. And they might go on and form the basis of that second album. Or in Dylan's case, they're the wealth of bootlegs that are out there. Until 1983 or '84, just a few of us were lucky enough to find them in Sioux City. It was kind of nice -- what was it, the Record Roost out in Morningside? The Record Roost was out there in Morningside, and I remember I think I made it there the first time -- cuz I grew up outside of town. And I think I made it there in'70. And got my first Dylan bootleg.
"And you had these things out there because Dylan just had that wealth of material that never made it out there. But everybody else, if you look at it, there's 2 or 3 albums. And you look at Dylan. He'd do like the first three albums, the Woody Guthrie phase. All of a sudden, he breaks out of that, and you hit another side of Bob Dylan. There's a little bit of that earlier influence, but there's suddenly this new direction that he's heading off on. By the time, and it's really kind of a precursor, you know, 'Bringing It All Back Home' and "Highway 61.' And then you've got 'Blonde on Blonde.' And then suddenly he's done with it. He's moving on. And he goes through that fallow period.
"You see, I love 'John Wesley Hardin (1967). I don't know why but those songs just stuck with me. You know, 'New Morning,' something about that album,But the 'John Wesley Hardin' album, for some reason, I just thought that was great. Joan Baez took a lot of those on 'Any Day Now.' I mean those were incredible. Plus you got to hear a couple songs we never heard, 'Farewell Angeline,', things like that, you know, 'Love Was a 4-Letter Word,' that never got released on any of his stuff but that she picked up.
"But then it comes roaring back, it seems like he's a has-been. And think about it, what happened in 1970? The Beatles. Well time to break up. We're out of here. You know, you turn around. Paul Simon said, well, the Beatles did it. They taught us everything to do to start with, so time to break up. So everything starts shattering. You don't have these groups, except for the Rolling Stones. But you know, you go through all this, and Dylan suddenly comes roaring back with 'Blood on the Tracks,' 'Desire' and 'Street Legal,' which I just love. The first time I heard 'Street Legal,' I mean, that was a shift. I mean the first time I put that on, I put the needle on, thinking, and went -- what the hell is this! I actually let it set for a couple of weeks and came back to it and went, OK, I like that. I like the song, I like this stuff,
"But he's done that all along -- he's drug his audience with him. And didn't care whether they came along or not. And I think you're absolutely right. I think that's the key -- is that he's re-created himself. I also think the other key is that he didn't fall into the celebrity status. I mean, really and truly he is an introvert. And he's dodged every question. He doesn't want people to know the history. you know: 'Listen to the songs, You figure it out. It's not about me. It's about you. I'm writing these. I got what I'm getting out of them. If you get something out of it, that's yours.'
"What was his line? You talk about your dreams without having shoveled into the ditch of what each one means. But then again, you had some incredibly interesting stuff. What was it, Pete Hamill wrote the liner notes for 'Blood on the Tracks' and wins a Grammy for it. But he's analyzing the stuff, you know, so Dylan pulls him off the back of the album. By the time the Grammy is awarded, it's no longer on the back of the album.
"And you've got the stuff he put on the back of 'Planet Waves' which Robbie Robertson produced with The Band, and hell, they had to put a flap over it because of the wording that Dylan uses on it. And you go, oh, that's really odd, and you take the cellophane off... But there's a case -- a song that in retrospect has become huge, 'Forever Young' -- he does it twice on the album, once slow, once the other time. And Robbie's going -- that's a great song, you know, but I can hear your buttons on your coat on the back of the guitar, we've got to recut it. Dylan's already heading out the door, and he's not coming back to recut it. But its great! You played that back in 1971, '72, whatever it was. you played that, That whole album, it sounds like you're sitting in your living room.
"In '75 they put out 'The Basement Tapes' because, you know, Dylan essentially allows it to be released because The Band's basically hurting for money, and they're going to get a cut of this, of all these. So they put them out on a double album set. Honest to gosh, you feel like ... I mean here you'd had the music from The Big Pink before, but now again, they empty the bag. I mean everything's out there. You've got a microphone sitting there in front of them on an open reel tape recorder. You feel like theyr'e sitting in your living room.
"I mean Dylan's always been about the poetry rather than the performance. Although mid-70s he hit that spot where you look at him and you think, are you trying to be Elvis? What's with the suit?"
"And I've got to say the only thing I can say for rap music is finally something I never thought would ever happen, somebody finally came up with something that would make me think that disco sounded OK. I mean it's just...
"And I wonder how much of it is ... is my hearing going or what?"
"Let's face it. I'm a Dylan fan and it's about the words. If I can't understand what your'e saying, and if I reject what you're saying, which is my route with rap you know ... Maybe that's a sign that we're just getting old, is that what we're getting here?
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