It is more than a little daunting to write about the music of Bob Dylan. He has been recording music for fifty years now, and so many beautiful things have been said about his songs for decades.

Taking this as a cautionary guideline, I have always preferred Dylan’s post-1960s output to his earlier, universally-lauded material and wanted to discuss some of his great latter day albums. His earliest records feature ahead of their time political and humanitarian statements, while the mid-60s ones have an amphetamine-fueled surrealistic brilliance to them.

There is no doubt that every album he released up to Nashville Skyline (1969) is unadulterated genius, but his work after that is what I am especially drawn to. I gravitate to the records and songs that Dylan recorded when he was vulnerable and not fully confident. This, to me, is the Bob Dylan that is truly fascinating.

 

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Christopher Knowles is the author of the recently published book The Secret History of Rock 'N' Roll, which ties the rock-era music scene back to mystery cults formed "since the Stone Age." Christmastime is a festive season when we party hard, glory vicariously in exciting fables, and when some of us even shove our mystified beliefs in others' faces in the broader culture. So chatting with the award-winning writer of this elucidating tome on tropes behind our rock idols seemed like a great way to chop up myth, music, and magic just at the right moment in 2010.

Knowles has been a writer and editor for some time, and his Our Gods Wear Spandex: The Secret History of Comic Book Heroes is also an excellent analysis of how ancient archetypes become cheap everyday thrills. But it was his tenaciously intense engagement with a certain UK punk-into-pop band in Clash City Showdown: The Music, Meaning, and Legacy of The Clash that got me into his work. I admire his passion and fierce intelligence at dissecting culture we enjoy and use to transcend our lives habitually. Below is our chat with Mr. Knowles about all these things.

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You know Animal Collective, Grizzly Bear, Dan Deacon and other great indie innovators are getting textural and contextual inspiration from somewhere other than what's reviewed in Rolling Stone or Pitchfork, but where? In The Blink Of An Ear, written by Seth Kim-Cohen, subtitled Toward A Non-Cochlear Sound, might put you on their same journey outside the boundaries.

A cochlea is a the snail-shaped inner ear which receives sound, and this book is all about how we receive sound and what we do with it in our minds. The music business is an industry built on sound, but there are many people who build sound from industry for a livelihood and legend. Kim-Cohen is the Director and Assistant Professor of Art and Theory at the Institute for Doctoral Studies in the Visual Arts, has taught art history at Yale and the Pratt Institute, and has had many art showings in places like Tate Modern and the ICA in London. 

Why is an academic and artist like this of interest to the music fan? Well, alternative rock has its roots in the art school scene -- the Sex Pistols and Talking Heads and Superchunk who have all done songs about the milieu, and bands like Wire and Gang of Four and many others would have never existed without it. That's where they formed (in their physical lives), but it wasn't just a location these young, potentially innovative people obsessed with change and culture came to, it's where a Brian Eno would teach the mutual joys of ambient noise and doo-wop, as recently described in the Wire Pink Flag 33 1/3. It's where ideas met sound, and that's Kim-Cohen's living and playground. 

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One of the best reasons to keeping loving vinyl in the 21st century is the big, gorgeous covers. I'm thinking the Menomena Friend and Foe kind of covers; the Architecture in Helsiki Places Like This kind of covers.They're the covers that you want to hang on your wall and keep staring at, even if it means you can't actually listen to the record.

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In case, for some reason, celebrity endorsements still (or ever) mattered, Bob Dylan has officially announced his endorsement of Barack Obama.

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At more than 2.5 hours long, that’s a lotta Dylan covers, even for a serious fan.

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Anything good you’re in the process of rediscovering?

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SIFF may have ended yesterday (and film-sters all over Seattle are finally getting the chance to see other people outside the confines of a dark theater), but the great movies are still available for the viewing!

Tonight the NWFF is celebrating the 40th Anniversary of Don't Look Back with a showing!

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Looking for a summer vacation?

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Austin City Limits Festival has confirmed this year's lineup which includes Bob Dylan, The White Stripes, Bjork, Arcade Fire, Wilco, Muse and My Morning Jacket. Pretty much all the staples of this summer’s festival scene.

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