The album Bob Dylan kept walking out of: “I wanted the real thing”
Don’t question the creative process. The mind of someone like Bob Dylan doesn’t work in a linear fashion, and the musical world is better for it.
While Dylan started out playing covers of the folk icons that he loved, he really entered his stride when he started writing original music. His way with words was so innate that even though his music was relatively simple, people still found themselves being deeply moved by his songs. He didn’t just write lyrics, but he observed the world through a lens and allowed other people to look through it with his songs.
His words alone were enough to trigger a response in people, which is why his work hasn’t just influenced music but literature and poetry as a whole. Anyone who was in the vicinity of his work, no matter how complete it was, could hear that he was onto something special. A Dylan draft trumps most other musicians ‘ well-thought-out and rounded music.
Judy Collins once eavesdropped on this creative process at a party once when Dylan was writing ‘Mr Tambourine Man’. She heard him singing and so listened while he tried fleshing out what would soon become a classic.
“It was late at night, and I heard him singing,” recalled Collins, “So I left my room and sat on the stairs by myself listening to him write the song. What a magical moment!”
Bob Dylan’s talent isn’t something which has ever left him. In 1996, Bob Dylan met Daniel Lanois and started talking to him about making some new music. He didn’t have anything concrete yet, just some lyrics, but even reading lyrics off a page was enough for Lanois to recognise that Dylan was onto something. “They had a lot in them,” he said, “They had regret and hope, beauty and optimism. A lot of life experience. They were so complex.”
The issue arose in the fact that Dylan didn’t know what he wanted the music to sound like. We’re a long way from his first pieces of music, and that meant he wasn’t content on just making the usual folk music that he had made a name for himself with. He wanted to use technology but in a way where it didn’t specifically feel like he was relying on it. Lanois helped him put together some loops, but the process proved tricky.
“I wanted something that goes through the technology and comes out the other end before the technology knows what it’s doing,” said Dylan in an interview with the New York Times, “Many of my records are more or less blueprints for the songs. This time, I didn’t want blueprints – I wanted the real thing.”
Dylan brought in some great musicians to help him put the album together, including the organist Augie Meyers, who had worked with bands like Rolling Stones. Meyers remembers the sessions as being quite heated, given Dylan was a bit unsure what sound he was going for, so much so that he would frequently leave recording sessions to try and work out how songs should sound. It was far from a linear process, but many would argue it was worth it, as the record Time Out Of Mind came out on the other side.
“Lanois would direct some of the stuff, but Bob would come in and say, ‘I hear it more this way’,” recalled Meyers. “Sometimes Bob would put down his guitar and just walk out. Half hour later, somebody would say, ‘Bob’s outside riding his bike.’ He’d have to be by himself to figure out what he really wanted, and he did it that way.”
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