More Dylan

[poliphilo]

The second part of the Dylan film has great footage of him talking to the press. The reporters are asking stupid and/or pompous questions and he's swatting them away like flies, mainly saying "no" or turning the question back on the questioner, but it's all good humoured and he's giggling at the inanity and some of the press people are laughing right along. I guess what we're seeing here is the birth of celebrity culture.

The film ends with the incident on the English tour where some protesting folkie in the audience shouts "Judas" and he replies "You're a liar; I don't believe you-" then turns to The Band and tells them to "play it fucking loud." That happened here- in Manchester's Free Trade Hall (now a hotel.) Epic stuff.

Comments

[huskyteer.livejournal.com]

I loved the very intense young man who was obsessed with Dylan's Triumph T-shirt on the sleeve of 'Highway 61 Revisited'.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Yes, that was wonderful...

[cybersofa.livejournal.com]

His obsession was rather prescient, assuming Dylan got the fateful bike in some sort of product placement deal with Triumph over that very album cover.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Interesting sequence of events.

Does anyone know how serious that accident was?

Was he badly injured or did he just use it as excuse to take a sabbatical from touring?

[slatts.livejournal.com]

I'm curious to that answer too....

I remember hearing it was nearly fatal. Someone in one of his biographies said he was pretty lousy driver.

But then I read or heard where he (Dylan) needed to escape the lunatic fans that were just showing up at his house and treating him like a god.

He said that's why he did Nashville Skyline. Hopefully to piss-off and scare away these lunatics. They instead embraced the album....

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

My guess it was a minor accident and he talked it up to give himself a breathing space.

I remember all the rumours going round at the time- that he'd been reduced to a vegetative state, that he'd he was so traumatised he'd retreated into complete silence.....

[slatts.livejournal.com]

...and he had that weird inflection to his voice (almost Jim Nabors-esque) on Nashville Skyline. It sort of supported the rumor that his throat was somehow "damaged" in the accident....

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

It's been a long time since I listened to Nashville Skyline. You make me want to give it another spin.

[slatts.livejournal.com]

Do.

It's a fun album. Almost silly. But good musicians as always. Just a complete about-face from the Dylan of BLONDE...

[cybersofa.livejournal.com]

It says here that he broke his neck, after locking up the back wheel. Given the evident lack of personal protective equipment, I'd say he got off lightly at that. But as you say, it came at the right time for him.

I think the best evidence that it actually happened is the marked change in his vocal timbre between Blonde On Blonde and John Wesley Harding.

[slatts.livejournal.com]

thanks for the link and info

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Interesting.

That does sound like a plausibly true account of what happened.

[cosmolinguist]

I'm told that everything good that ever happened, happened in Manchester. :-) Especially if it's about science or music. Or Vimto. :-)

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I've adopted Manchester as my home town (I'm a Londoner by birth) and I'm fiercely proud of her. Yeah, there's a lot of good things that have happened here.

I'm not so sure about the Vimto. That's one Manchester "delicacy" I've never developed a taste for.

But we've got the best Chinese and Indian restaurants in Britain! :)

[heleninwales.livejournal.com]

Vimto! In my youth in Manchester the sweet shop by the public swimming baths used to sell hot Vimto and as kids we would drink it after going swimming in the winter. I used to love it. I suspect that I would hate it now. Probably far too sweet.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Sweet and sticky...

I'd never heard of it until I moved to Manchester in my mid 20s- and by then I was far too set in my ways to develop a taste for it.

[slatts.livejournal.com]

I thought the interview scenes illustrated the beginnings of Dylan's elusive style when it came to doing interviews in general. The footage goes from him still smiling to him looking a bit angry about the whole scene.

The press did seem particularly stupid. Sending reporters who didn't really seem to have a clue to who Dylan was....

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

They were asking him to explain himself. But that's the critic's job. The artist has fulfilled his contract with the public by delivering the work.

[zoe-1418.livejournal.com]

Very well put!

Although my artist-partner commented to me after the show that now, in the early 21st century, artists are trained/conditioned and expected to explain themselves all the time. Maybe this is more so in the visual arts than in others... So much seems to be required in terms of self-packaging, self-promoting, self-explaining. (And having just helped her rewrite her Artist Bio/Statement for the umpteenth time, I do see this...)

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I can see that the visual arts might be different.

But with a writer it seems ridiculous that he/she should be required to explain his/her words with yet more words.

And there's always the fear that if you dig too deeply into the source of your own creativity you may accidentally kill the goose who lays the golden eggs.

[zoe-1418.livejournal.com]

I agree, it seems ridiculous, especially for writers. And yes, I think one might risk killing the goose.

[halfmoon-mollie.livejournal.com]

I know in the past few years I have been mightily disappointed when Dylan played our State Fair (a venue known for artists on their way *Up* or on their way *down*).

I have mixed feelings about Dylan. While I admire his music. Like many others, I felt he 'sold out'. Then I realized that he'd been selling out, since he began recording. No one is in business to lose money. *We* made him what he is, whatever that is. Needing to get 'away' from the obsessed fans says more about the fans than it does about him, too.

I fell asleep halfway through the first hour, last night. (this says less about the movie than it does about me. I'm very tired.) I'm sure it will be shown again, and I will want to watch it. If nothing else, he is a mass of contradictions.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

For me his artistic restlessness is a big plus. He gets bored easily and keeps wanting to try something new. I can relate to that. I think there's something heroic about the way he's kept surprising (and alienating) his fans.

[balirus.livejournal.com]

That show was produced by my station. American Masters is one of the shows that we produce for the PBS system.

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/

I got to briefly meet Scorsese when he came in to do some voiceover. If you've ever seen him play himself on tv or in a movie, that's not an act. He's a bushy-eyebrowed hyperactive ball of distilled New Yawk, and he's quite a funny fellow.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Well I never....

It's a great show. It had me glued to the screen two nights running.

[halfmoon-mollie.livejournal.com]

Pardon this comment about someone other than Dylan in this thread...I saw the Hank Williams show. FAbulous. I love American Masters, it is one of my favorite PBS Series.

[heleninwales.livejournal.com]

in Manchester's Free Trade Hall (now a hotel.)

It is? Goodness! You can tell how long it is since I revisited my home city. I have fond memories of the Free Trade Hall, having been to many many concerts there both classical (Halle Orchestra) and pop (including a memorable one with Tyrannosuarus Rex (before they became T. Rex)). John Peel read a weird story and there were only a few hundred in the audience. Also our school held its annual speech day there so I've been on the Free Trade Hall stage myself, singing with the choir.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Manchester now has a modern concert hall and- well- I guess the old one wasn't needed any more. They've kept the shell as it was, but the insides have been completely remodelled. I think it's all rather sad.