Chronicles, Volume 1 by Bob Dylan Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of Chronicles, Volume 1
Book Review: An Alternative Take on Autobiography that Works
Summary: 4 Stars
Let me start off by saying is that I'm not a Dylan music fan; it's not that I dislike Dylan, but I've just never really listened to him. I think I own just two of his songs (Rainy Day Women and All Along the Watchtower, thanks BSG finale). So I'm not what you'd call a fan.
As a result I was kinda surprised by what this book is. It's not a biography per se, it's more of a summation of the inspirations and their effects on his life. There's enough other names thrown around in this book that one could probably write a concordance, but it's obvious Dylan does this for two reasons: one, it acts as basically an ongoing acknowledgements page throughout the book, and two, it shows that Dylan is more interested in people than anything else.
Dylan has deliberately stripped out the big events from his life that have been recounted endlessly: meeting the Beatles, plugging in at Newport (although he does obliquely reference it), even the Traveling Wilburys get little mention when I'm sure there's a wealth of anecdotes he could've provided. What this leaves you with are the people and music that shaped his musical life, not the events. It's a fascinating way to approach his story, and he pulls it off well.
Stylistically it comes off as an oral history, and I believe if I read it again I'll listen to the audiobook instead
Book Review: Bob Dylan Chronicles -- No Direction Home -- Never Ending Tour
Summary: 5 Stars
I'm making way again reading Chronicles, it's my second time through. It takes the entire book to understand what makes an artist an artist, and when Columbia Records signed Bob, it had the power to make him become as the one whom we all know him as today. He follows along the tradition of folk music, and yet, within that tradition he learned so well the ways of the past that he would be accepted as an artist even before he has written the music.
Knowing the book is Dylan's autobiography, I expected to read from the perspective of, or, having a given notion that a story would be told about how the songs were written, by the manner they could be inspired. The latter meaning that finding the inspiration is the deeper more profound nature of the story as Bob does write constructively in the similar form as are his lyrics and music. The catch phrase there being the musical form and with this he tells a lingering story of meeting up with Bono who leads him on to record another record in New Orleans with Danny Lanois.
It is fair to say that even to this day most of the songs are still sung with an affliction of a dialect that captures our time as the measured space from that time the song was first inspired. The passages written throughout the storyline of the book put together a grandeur more complex understanding of just how omni-present ones life becomes to have achieved what Bob has accomplished, beginning within the moments he knew he could play guitar, so handedly playing the music he enjoyed whilst underlying his own talent allowing him to simply play along... In the course of such sanctity he reads one great book after another, as it is the same way he listens to records, and then seeks for artists following relentlessly his own spirit until finally meeting his immortal icon Woody Guthrie, bed ridden. Woody listens to Bob play and Bob stays with Woody until they each can find no end to the meaning of the words their music could have lived for himself.
On the surface the story writes about the times he grew up as a child amongst friends and family living in the iron ore range that is still the driving force of America's industrial revolution. Virtually every car made in Detroit would have been fabricated with the ore that was for a time Dylan's boyhood home and upbringing.
It is in New York though, that if you were from the area yourself or in the same way knew of any other place brought into the discussion, then pieces fit together about the goings on of the emerging cultural lives in such backgrounds as Greenwich Village. It's the most intricate detail to understand how Bob goes about learning an insightful dictation of knowledge that elapses his own will and eventual transformation of self to the impresario that lives the life his words give rise to within the lyric of their own musings.
Ones immediate impression is within the forces of living about New York City, as an artist, Dylan travels in this virtuous manner of that as a performer to such brevity and light, guided by this talent that the magnitude he reveals himself as, is that merely as a person who lived through folk music learning to sing while playing guitar. Generally speaking it's more than just a good time.
It's Alright Ma From deluxe edition Don't Look Back outtakes
- 1965
Book Review: Almost Inside Dylan
Summary: 4 Stars
This is a surpisingly readable book, told as if you were sitting chatting over a cup of coffee (or a few drinks) with the author. Dylan is amazingly down to earth and candid, and in some cases downright self-deprecating. Sometimes insecure over his position, accomplishments, and legacy, Dylan never wavers in his devotion to, and ability to achieve, his purpose: to make good music. BD comes across as human and frail in some areas, and extremely tough in many other and different ways.
Hearing how impressed this icon is and was about those who guided, formed, and helped him in his salad days is heart-warming. Sometimes you have to remind yourself that this is BOB DYLAN writing, not some second-tier also-ran.
If you expect to find the answers to all the accumulated questions about him, or revelations about his deeply private or personal matters, you will be disappointed. He refers to relationships, but does not go into any great detail. I cannot recollect if he even mentions Sara by name, but often refers to his 'wife'. His recall of important moments often include common pedestrian activities like going to the beach with the wife and kids. His chagrin at his failure to accomplish a truly private place for him and his family is charmingly naive in its hopefulness, while distressingly disturbing in its reality.
So, you're not going to get the smoking guns, or smoking guitars for that matter, but you will come away with new consideration for this American enigma that is well worth the time to read it appreciably, and finish anxious for a possible Volume Two.
Book Review: One of the best books on creativity ever
Summary: 5 Stars
And, you get a look inside the mind of a creative genius, both his philosophy and a detailed look at the steps taken to reach his goals.
"...it dawned on me that I might have to change my inner thought patterns...that I would have to start believing in possibilities that I wouldn't have allowed before, that I had been closing my creativity down to a very narrow, controllable scale...that things had become too familiar and I might have to disorientate myself."
This book is worth reading and keeping.
Book Review: I am not he, Babe?
Summary: 5 Stars
What a delightful read! This book is a terrific insight into how an artistic mind finds a way to express itself. I've always liked BD. I like him more now.
Some may object to flawed grammar in this memoir. Bob chooses his language carefully and deliberately and the result is a sort of stream-of-consciousness that speaks to the reader like his songs speak to the listener. BD reveals the incredible impact that lyrics and words had upon him.
I would have loved to hear more of his commentary on the music of the 60's and beyond and more experiences with other artists, but to see how he was impacted by Woody Guthrie and Robert Johnson was fascinating.