The most interesting writer on Dylan over the years has been the cultural critic Greil Marcus. . . . No one alive knows the music that fueled Dylan’s imagination better. Marcus just published Folk Music: A Bob Dylan Biography in Seven Songs. It’s [an] ingenious book of close listening.”—David Remnick, New Yorker“A poignant reminder of everything Trumpism had tried to destroy. His dissections of these songs . . . are thorough and well-referenced.” —Paul Genders, Times Literary Supplement“A book filled with genuine insights. . . . ‘Blowin’ in the Wind,’ the anthem that transformed a little-known folk singer into the conscience of a nation, is exhibit A for Mr. Marcus’s theory of empathy. . . . Mr. Marcus is at his best in exploring this rootedness.”—The Economist“Marcus . . . has written more and better about Dylan than just about anyone, most recently in Folk Music.”—Carl Wilson, Slate“Marcus keeps chasing America’s greatest songwriter down the highway. It’s cultural criticism as a long-running detective story—and a musical love story.”—Rob Sheffield, Rolling Stone, “Best Music Books of 2022”“The book’s openness restores a sense of existential unity, of a whole in which everything has a place and plays a part.”—Devin McKinney, Critics at Large“A perfect storm of things to love: American history, music history, Dylan’s music and beautiful writing. The style is colloquial, but not informal; informative but not didactic, and downright seductive to follow. . . . His in-depth analysis of the songs themselves is unmatched.”—Anne Margaret Daniel, SpectatorFeatured in Globe and Mail’s “Best Books to Gift This Year”“Marcus tends to a hyperbolic style, producing a slightly febrile mood, appropriate to the events being related. He also uncovers, or produces, hidden connections between apparently disparate things.”—David McCooey, New Daily“Marcus’ profound expertise in the American cultural landscape blasts open new fissures in our understanding of this most mythologised of singer-songwriters. . . . The reader comes away marvelling at what Bob Dylan has done with such a violent cultural inheritance, and also at how enmeshed the beauty of the songs are with the brutality in life.”—Gregory Day, Sydney Morning Herald“In elaborating Dylan’s musical journey Marcus puts on display a vast knowledge of America’s popular culture and a sardonic recognition of the flaws in our national character—flaws such as racial injustice and wealth inequality that folk music tries to address. The book is fast-paced, like a song, and hip. . . . [Marcus] closes on an elegiac note punctuated with love. ‘What will go out of the world with him?’”—Arthur Hoyle, New York Journal of Books“Rollicking. . . . Marcus’s close readings are full of discursive, meandering asides, and his prose is full of flourish. . . . Dylan’s fans will enjoy these lyrical reflections.”—Publishers Weekly“Splendid biographical essays on that most elusive of subjects, the shape-shifter once known as Bobby Zimmerman. . . . Marcus delivers yet another essential work of music journalism.”—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)“Reading one of these essays is a little bit like listening to Dylan’s own winding narrative lyricism. The author draws upon the same pop art approach as Dylan himself, merging imagery from popular and mass culture into fine art sensibilities. . . . An informative, if impressionistic, reflection.”—Gregory Stall, Library JournalNamed by Kirkus Reviews to its list of “7 Enlightening Nonfiction Books to Read this Fall”“As always with Marcus, his work is mesmerizing. . . . He creates a rich cultural stew of associations, from the folk revival to Black Lives Matter, from an episode of Homicide to One Night in Miami, and so much else in between as he makes far-flung connections seem inevitable. Just as Dylan allows a song to carry him away, readers will be transported by the sheer poetry of Marcus’ prose.”—June Sawyers, Booklist (starred review)“Marcus mines the music of the artist from Minnesota’s Iron Range for its deeply American soul. . . . [He] combines interviews, liner notes, research and criticism to provide a cultural biography that shows how closely Dylan has followed the news and the zeitgeist over his seven-decade career.”—Bethanne Patrick, Los Angeles Times, “10 Books to Add to Your Reading List in October”“Like a detective haunted by an abiding mystery, America’s first great rock critic has returned his focus to our most enigmatic songwriter. . . . [Marcus] marshals idiosyncratic arguments in a way that makes us hear old songs anew, defying the ever-quickening pace of life.”—Kevin Canfield, San Francisco Chronicle“Marcus explores what he considers Dylan’s greatest gift—empathy—through seven of the artist’s most important songs, which demonstrate Dylan’s continued relevance to American music and history. . . . Dylan reigns supreme, and Marcus’s sharp, elegant prose tells us why.”—Linda Lenhoff, Diablo Magazine“What ennobles [Folk Music] is Marcus’ love for his underlying subject: the soulful search for a truer America.”—Daniel Gewertz, Arts Fuse“This is the good stuff: the stuff you can’t usually get in books. Greil Marcus is already the most important chronicler of Dylan. But here he outdoes himself. This book is rich with deep understanding, with caustically funny commentary, and a psychoanalysis, much needed, of Bob Dylan and of America.”—Rachel Kushner“Decade after decade, Greil Marcus has proven himself to be not only a brilliant cultural critic about the music, lives, and stories that have helped shape contemporary American consciousness; he has also done much to articulate why our music has always stood at the axis of sound and politics. This book is not only a valuable addition to the canon, it further elevates Marcus to what he has always been: a supreme artist-critic.”—Hilton Als“Here is Greil Marcus at his most brilliantly insightful, eloquent, persuasive, brimming with information about Bob Dylan and his music, unique in his ability to combine the most candid sort of memoirist prose with truly inspired commentary. As Dylan ‘sees himself’ in his subjects, so Greil Marcus ‘sees himself’ in Dylan, the most original musical genius of our time, the perfect subject for the most original music critic of our time.”—Joyce Carol Oates“Greil Marcus’s writing on Dylan constitutes one of the great living bodies of work by one mold-breaking creative mind interpreting the art and meaning of another. Dylan’s multitudes find their champion in Marcus’s critical exuberance.”—Todd Haynes“Marcus is unsurpassed in showing how Dylan reflected the cultural moment even as he changed it. This moving, personal, compelling book traces Dylan’s complex relationship to American culture through some of Dylan’s most iconic songs, enabling us to understand these songs in fresh ways while also giving us a profound history of how we understand ourselves.”—Dana Spiotta “Greil Marcus’s writing on Bob Dylan is as essential as Dylan himself. Through the prism of Dylan’s visionary genius, Marcus unveils a fascinating history of the soul of modern America.”—Olivier Assayas
10/01/2022
"There are no straight lines in the language songs speak," music journalist Marcus (More Real Life Rock) declares—and demonstrates—in his latest work. The book is not a linear biography; rather, it's a series of ruminations. Marcus, a critic familiar to the Bob Dylan fan community, is known for drawing on a wide spectrum of references—not all of them musical—to get his points across. His zigzag writing is sensory, using disparate comparisons and analogies to turn facts into feelings and feelings into facts. Reading one of these essays is a little bit like listening to Dylan's own winding narrative lyricism. The author draws upon the same pop art approach as Dylan himself, merging imagery from popular and mass culture into fine art sensibilities. The result is as confounding to the uninitiated as it is rewarding to the converted. VERDICT An informative, if impressionistic, reflection on one of the 20th century's greatest artists, by one of his biggest advocates.—Gregory Stall
★ 2022-06-03
Splendid biographical essays on that most elusive of subjects, the shape-shifter once known as Bobby Zimmerman.
On Jan. 24, 1961, Bob Dylan, “now the archivist of what he once called ‘historical-traditional music,’ then a highwayman whispering about leaving bodies on the road,” arrived as if by magic carpet in New York City and took the booming folk music scene by storm. “Blowing in the Wind,” released 15 months later, became the best-known modern folk song of the day. Having conquered folk, Dylan refused to sit still, plugged in, dropped out for a while, and has taken to multiyear tours that transport him to every continent. He has also shaped himself as an enigma over the last seven decades, remarking, “I write songs, I play on stage, and I make records. That’s it. The rest is not anybody’s business.” It’s a fair statement, but Marcus looks at the rest even as he’s limning the musical periods in the artist’s life, from the heyday of the 1960s to the nadir of the ’80s (“For Bob Dylan the entire decade would be a continuing series of bad hair-dos and bad albums”) and on to his rebirth as an elder statesman of popular music who ushered in his profoundly productive late period, beginning 30 years ago, with a revisitation of folk standards from centuries past. Marcus is both shrewd and appreciative, and he delivers rousing apothegms, as when he writes of “The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll,” written in the summer of 1963, “We heard the ambition to write a history that will last as long as Antigone.” Casual Dylan fans will know at least a couple of the author’s seven chosen songs (of course, he mentions many more), but his explorations of lesser-known tunes such as “Ain’t Talkin’ ” and the extraordinary epic “Murder Most Foul,” with all their allusions to the lost history of America, should inspire them to dive deeper into the discography.
Marcus delivers yet another essential work of music journalism.
