Clinton Heylin, the world's foremost Bob Dylan scholar, on researching his definitive new Dylan biography, and his favorite and least favorite Dylan albums.
, which arrives on May 18th. Unlike, this one draws largely on primary source materials and relies as little as possible on the often-unreliable memories of Dylan associates, especially since they’re now recalling things from well over 50 years ago. There’s also very few after-the-fact quotes from Dylan himself since he’s a notoriously unreliable narrator of his own past.
There was a process, but getting a sense of the picture was different. Seeing the boxes and the manuscripts in Tulsa and looking at the audio files, I knew it was time to do something on a bigger scale.Ten weeks. It was four separate trips that total ten weeks. One trip was four and a half weeks. That was the longest. And I worked nine to five. That’s a fair bit of time. I did a lot of work on Volume Two, but the Covid thing shut that down.
As I say in the introduction, at this point, although I’ve kept in contact with a lot of the people that I’ve interviewed over the years, and fact-checked with those people, in terms of getting new oral history, it’s kind of getting to the point where you’re not getting a lot. Either the stories have been told or the memories have been diminished.
One thing that’s fascinating that I do in the new book is look at what people said at the time. When I looked at Charlie McCoy’s version that he gave at the time, that he give inin October 1966, he gets all the historical information right. He remembers Dylan arriving from Richmond, Virginia. That’s a serious little piece of information to have remembered.
There’s no way to get back there, but the name is never referred to in the memos. And the October 1962 long memo that Hammond sends to his bosses absolutely blows the “Hammond’s Folly” story out of the water. The first album had been out less than six months at that point and they are desperately trying to hang on to Dylan. The album is not selling particularly, but they already realize they’ve got something. They go to extraordinary lengths to hold onto him.
To be clear, in Tulsa, you have access to every second of session tape that exists in Dylan’s history? Tempted, yes. But I’m not going to. Unfortunately, the sheer scale of the material is such that I’d literally have to start again. I did those books in good faith. I was thinking, “This is it. This is the 600 Bob Dylan songs that we know.” Now it’s 900. There are so many unknown songs that we didn’t know about, if you follow the story through the present, that would be a whole exercise in itself.
As it stands at the moment. I tried to persuade my publisher in the U.K. and the U.S. to consider the possibility of three volumes, but it doesn’t look like it. I’ve explained to them that if it’s one volume, it’s going to be a bloody big volume []. But they say, “OK.” As long as they’re happy with a 275,000-word second volume, they’ll get a 275,000-word volume.
to wonder what happened. The early drafts, of course they’re Dylanesque, of course they see things very much through his prism, but there’s no conscious attempt to literally destroy history, to bend it to your will and show it to be a sham. The book that was published was very much that.
United States Latest News, United States Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Bob Dylan Visual 'Retrospectrum' Exhibition Coming to U.S.A comprehensive visual exhibition of Bob Dylan's artwork will show in the U.S. for the first time in November when it arrives at Florida's Frost Museum.
Read more »
Dylan Dreyer's husband shares baby announcement, credits 'Bridgerton'Dylan Dreyer's husband shares baby announcement, credits steamy 'Bridgerton'
Read more »
Here's what's next for Kentucky Derby winner Medina Spirit and Bob BaffertMedina Spirit tested positive for betamethasone after triumphing at Churchill Downs on May 1 and could be disqualified.
Read more »
Bob Baffert under fire after another horse's positive testHorse racing legend Bob Baffert came under scrutiny on Sunday after it was revealed his record-breaking Kentucky Derby-winning colt Medina Spirit failed a post-race drug test.
Read more »
Trainer Bob Baffert plans to fight after Kentucky Derby winner fails drug testMedina Spirit could be retroactively disqualified from the race.
Read more »
Kentucky Derby Winner Medina Spirit Tests Positive For Steroids, Trainer Bob Baffert SuspendedKentucky Derby winner Medina Spirit was allegedly juiced up when he won the race, because he apparently tested positive for steroids.
Read more »