Inkwell: Authors and Artists

    
Dan,

Yet Dylan did live at the Chelsea for a short period of time.  Don't
know if he heard Methodist bells though.
  

    

I seem to recall the research suggesting that Bob wrote Sad Eyed Lady in
Nashville.  The implication for "Sara" is that Bob has made the song
all the more intimate with a ruse that perhaps only Sara herself would 
know, so that all the world would think the song is truly revealing but
only the two of them would know the truth about.  Or something like that.
  

    
      With respect to <stet>'s overreaction, I think Gary and Rats
answered for me just fine.  I never suggested Dylan owes anybody
anything, nor was I demanding anything from him.  I was merely
speculating as to what influences an artist to create certain works. 
<stet>'s petulant tone is what bugs me about The WELL on occasion. 
Calm down, man.  Read what I wrote, not what you THINK you read between
the lines.
      Rats, is there anything in hindsight you would change if you
were writing the book now?
  

    
I don't know what <michaelsimmons> is whining about. I was never even
aware of his contribution. 

>I was merely
speculating as to what influences an artist to create certain works. 

What a goddam _fascinating_ topic: <michaelsimmons> speculations on
what Dylan might have been thinking. Obviously, a subject we should all
listen up on.
  

    
      Ah, Mankin, it's you!  You're <stet>!  My former editor at LA
Reader.
      You were never aware of my contribution?????  You were
responding to my question to Ratso.  I'm interlocuting this discussion,
in essence interviewing Ratso and opening up the questions for
discussion.
      But what is your reason for being continually snide?  What is
your point?  You're misreading the points being made and reacting in a
nasty manner.  If you don't like the discussion, go somewhere else. 
We're not going for a doctoral thesis here, we're just a bunch of Dylan
fans rapping.  If it's too lowbrow for you, then perhaps you're in the
wrong discussion.
  

    
How about we take the interpersonal dialogue to private email and return to
the subject of Bob Dylan here.
  

    
Before we do, I just want to say as an editor how much more 
interesting any audience would have found actual information regarding
Dylan or other redmeat music celebrity's life than <michaelsimmons>
speculations. Given that the former were not obtainable, sometimes
economic considerations dictated printing the latter, though I don't
remember specific contributions form <michaelsimmons> in this vein, nor
would I have regarded same as a high point of redectorial achievement.
I've worked for People-type magazines, and I didn' like it, and I'm
glad I don't. But thank  you, Michael,for personalizing this. It was,
literally, the farthest thing from my mind. If it's still on yours,
it's your problem, not mine.
  

    

So, Larry, what would you change if you could write it again?  Kill
Kemp before he left New York?
  

    
      Truly weird digression.
      Thank you Dan and Ratso for redirecting the conversation to the
topic at hand.
      Of course if Kemp and Imhoff hadn't been such sadists, it
would've been a different story.  And if Baez hadn't been snide, we'd
be calling you Larry, not Ratso.  
  

    
Michael,

Let me sleep on that.  I just got back from hockey and I'm bushed. 
Off the top of my head?  I probably would be harder on Rolling Stone. 
And asked for more per diem.
  

    <scribbled by mitchell Fri 31 Jan 03 04:42>
  

    
All drama is conflict, and the Kemp stuff is what gave this book
something like a story arc to hang everything on.
  

    
i think most of us looking back on life would have asked for more moneyh at
times!
  

    

Let's talk a little more about the Kemp business.  I was a rock journalist
for ten years, and I went on the road with bands a number of times.  My
favorite was the ride from Salt Lake to Boulder over night with Ozzy
Osbourne.  He and his bandmates regaled me with tales of the stuff they
pulled on some wimpy keyboardist, e.g. shaving his eyebrows while he slept.
I managed to get some sleep that night, and no one shaved my eyebrows.

I rode out to the Hollywood Sportatorium in one of the limos with the Doobie
Brothers (who were old friends from San Jose; I ran into them at their hotel
in Ft Lauderdale and came along as a friend that night) -- this was right
around the time "Minute By Minute" was coming out.  They had a huge band
meeting after the show that night, and their tour manager sent me into the
bathroom with a Swiss Army knife and an immense baggie full of coke to keep
mee occupied.  The ride back was tense.

More typical of tour-handler bahevior was the time I interviewed Rod Stewart
(circa "Tonight I'm Yours") in his hotel room.  The handler, Russell Shaw
(about whom I heard many hilarious stories from band members later) kept
coming into the room, fussing over one thing or another, but mostly looking
for cues from Rod to get rid of me.

Then there was the time, in Houston, when the Rubinoos were opening for Elvis
Costello.  My sister was married to Tommy Dunbar's brother, so I went as
Tommy's guest.  When I went backstage to say hello, a scrawny troothless Brit
charged up to me and screamed, "I TOLD YOU To GET THE FUCK OUT OF HERE!" as
he ripped the sticky pass off my pant leg.  of course, I had never seen this
guy before  in my life.

So many stories.  The reality distortion fields around these people can be
very, very weird.

Ratso, tell us a Kemp story that didn't make the book, maybe?
  

    

I used to have stories but all of a sudden I looked and they were gone.
  

    

The inkwell.vue spotlight moves on to the next interview, but there is no
reason for this discussion to stop now.

Ratso and Michael, thank you for being here.  I hope you'll stay with us!
  

    
Dang I didn't even know about the inkvue interview with Ratso until 
today. That was a fun interview/conversation. Sorry I missed it.

Having spent 16 years on the road lugging things and flipping levers
and little knobs, it brought back a ton of memories.

I had a road manager we called Swampthing, so named by an alto player 
who caught a whiff of ST's unwashed humanity as he skulked across 
the stage trying to be invisible while going to fix a bloggered 
hi-hat stand, mid-performance. Ray the sax player took his lips off 
his sax and said in an offhand manner (think Charlie Musselwhite
muttering out the side of his mouth, "look, it's Swampthing," and 
the sobriquet followed my road manager for 10 years. 

Gawd, I miss the road sometimes. 
My road name was, Maximum Bob. Those of you that know me in this
current 21st century manifestation can draw your own conclusions.
  

    

Not Elmore Leonard's Maximum Bob????
  

    <scribbled by watadoo Fri 31 Jan 03 14:42>
  

    
Nope. The judge that put Tammy Faye's hubby Jim B. into the slam. THAT
Matximum Bob.
  

    

U.S. District Judge Robert D. Potter, Western District of North Carolina!

Know him well.  The Constitution waits at the door to his courtroom, begging
quarters, shuffling its feet and clutching its raggedy hat in its hand.
  

    
I have hero's to fit every occation. Judge Potter is one of them.
  

    

Honored to meetcha!
  

    
      I don't if anyone's still on this thread, but one can read my
review of both the Dylan Rolling Thunder Bootleg Series set and Ratso's
book on the High Times website.  The URL is
http://www.hightimes.com/htsite/buzz/content.php?page=buzz_03012720&tpage=
1


      Many thanks to my pals Ratso and David Gans as well as Barry
Smolin, Dan Levy, Gary Lambert and all other contributors to the fun.
  

    
      And love and thanks to my oldest friend, Counsellor George Jack
King, a/k/a Cadillac Jack!