Review: Bob Dylan’s new book is revealing, misogynistic and a special kind of bonkers.
Bob Dylan’s newest book is one of the most confounding, perplexing, disturbing, and thought-provoking books I have ever read. His latest book, Bob Dylan : The New York Years, is a collection of interviews with Dylan and his crew from the New York City period. In addition to providing him with a unique look at his career for the first time, this book is also full of a bunch of anecdotes about the crew he has over, and the people he has gotten fired from.
In an interview between Dylan, Tim O’Neil, and Simon Frith, one of the interviewers talks about how Dylan was asked to be on the Today show shortly after he started touring with Tom Petty. Dylan was reluctant to go on the show because he considered it to be “too much, too much” but a producer convinced him to do it. He told the three of them he was not going to bring anything up, but he was happy to do it because “it’s good to keep up with where things are in pop culture now.” Dylan said he had the impression that he would be a good guest of the show and that he enjoyed it. What he didn’t know was that he had just given the biggest interview of his career and was forced to put on a goofy act.
When the interview was over, Dylan had the following exchange with Tom Petty:
Tom: Did you have any doubts?
Bob: No. But I didn’t know what to ask the interviewers. I knew I was going to look like a fool on the Today show and I sort of wanted to get it over with.
“My first question to Dylan,” Tom recalled, “was ‘Do you consider yourself some kind of shaman or some kind of spiritual leader?’ His response was ‘No, I’m not a healer.’ And then I said, ‘What do you consider yourself?’ And his answer was ‘A man on the road.’”
Dylan’s book also contains interviews with people like Eric Clapton, Bob Segarini of Clapton’s Blues Project, and