Down the Highway: The Life of Bob Dylan

An excellent book on Bob Dylan the man, his music, intelligence, and quirks. Easy to read and well researched. I highly recommend it.

I recommend this book to the serious Dylan fan. In Down the Highway: The Life of Bob Dylan, Howard Sounes manages to capture Bob Dylan’s poetic and musical genius, from unknown singer imitating Woodie Guthrie to multimillionaire recluse while leaving one wondering who the man is. Even with all the research, this reader feels he's standing outside looking in. Perhaps we have to chalk that up to the nature of a subject who strove from the early sixties on to obfuscate his background and motivations. In addition, it’s no wonder a man who’s running from fans and even colleagues becomes to a large extent “the man who wasn’t there”—isolated, with few friends or confidants. Described many times as shy and withdrawn, even at the height of his fame, one wonders how he could have stood up in front of a hundred thousand people to perform.The author spends a surprising amount of time on Robert Zimmerman’s early years in Hibbing and at the University of Minnesota; these pages detailed his family life, friends, and early musical influences, not to mention his strong ambition to become a famous musician. No question he was driven.Though this is not a “hit piece,” Sounes does not spare Dylan; he was known for using and then discarding more established performers in his early days, and then forcing out or firing his musicians and other staff after he became a powerful force on the music scene.Of course, Sounes thoroughly covers Dylan’s lack of interest in left-wing politics as well as the changes in his music from pure folk to electrified rock, country, and blues and to what extent friends and fans hated him for that evolution. To this reader it was also informative to what extent his evangelical conversion devastated his career in terms of the quality of several of his recordings and his ability to draw the crowds--they wanted to hear “greatest hits” concerts and so stayed away to avoid being proselytized.Oh, and the women. There were obviously far too many to mention so the author tries to concentrate on fifteen or so, many of whom he stayed in contact with over multiple decades—an interesting insight into Dylan’s character.The author pierces the veil of mystery Dylan tried to maintain and thus Sounes exposes in detail the artist's ethnic and religious backgrounds, and in several places one gets the feeling the author may have made deals with some of his sources so he could get their viewpoints and information in return for keeping them in the background—in two-dimensional roles.Sounes recounts each recording session and tour in a straight chronological catalogue, in formulaic fashion. He might have emphasized some of these depending on their importance. However, I suppose his approach is perfect for someone interested in a blow-by-blow of Dylan’s entire canon and how it came to be as well as Bob’s need to continually tour to financially support his failed marriages.I did find fascinating Dylan's idiosyncratic style of recording and performing—wanting it to seem fresh and “live” by keeping the set list a mystery from his backing bands and the number of takes and rehearsals to a minimum. Many of the musicians who worked with him could only guess which songs he would play, what key he might play in, and when the chord breaks might occur.

Book arrived double packaged and in perfect condition.

A detailed biography on a very talented man who was influenced by the American Folk Music movement of the 50's and 60's. His gift is immense and he was driven to make music at any cost, to not conform to the music industries parameters. Performing how he wanted, not giving in to the corporate expectations makes him unique, which makes for a very interesting read. He is not afraid to perform his way and give his audience the inspiration of the moment, does not feel compelled to perform the same music in the same old way, truly an artist. He doesn't care what others think and has tried to be true to himself, rejecting accolades given to him from those who try to categorize his music and political leanings.

My husband and I both read this book. Both of us were astonished that: 1. Bob Dylan had such a profound impact on a large swathe of Américan and world-wide music; 2. that at the time the book was published, Mr. Dylan was still doing 100 or more concerts a year. Number 2 just shows how poorly we are informed regarding world events and happenings by our mainstream news, which is so influenced by their advertisers. This was a very interesting and, it seems, honest potrayal of the tempestouslife of this American icon . We recommend the book to those interested in Bob Dylan, the music scene of the late 1950's and eàrly 1960's.

I bought a used copy but this book has been updated several times so it’s best to buy it new or else you may miss out on the last 10-20 years. I did buy the book new and am very glad I did.

I think writing a biography on Bob Dylan is an impossibility. Notoriously cryptic, unearthing concrete personal information is nearly impossible. Sounes does his best, but in the end this is a very surface biography. Not a bad read by any means - there are interesting anecdotes about Dylan’s recording process and personal life, but in the end, anyone that knows anything about Dylan already knows a lot of these facts. Still, Dylan might be the greatest musician and rock star on the 60s and 70s and like I said, this is an enjoyable beach read. But the best insight into Dylan is still the music. Go to the records. Listen to them over and over. Dissect them. And then create your own biographical narrative. I think that’s the way Bob Dylan would want it.

I liked this book because it includes the whole life of Bob Dylan. I rate it 5 star because of some news never knew before and because of the amount of work the author must have done to put it together. For me is missing a little feeling at the end as the author rushed to finish the book.

There are way too many books and biographies of Bob Dylan and most of them say little or offer nothing new, or worse...analyse song lyrics and try to intellectualize him like he's Shakespeare. Too many also focus on his 1961-1966 years. The book market now is absolutely saturated with Bob books all of them just repeating what everyone else has already written.It was with some trepidation i got this updated edition of Howard Sounes Biography as I'd heard it was fairly unkind to Bob Dylan. Nothing could be further from the truth. Its respectful and honest and far from sensationalist or critical. I've got two bookshelves of Bob Dylan books and yet i learnt a few things i wasn't aware of in this biography. I felt it was written by a man who likes the music of Bob but doesn't put him on a pedestal, yet its certaily far from a character assassination. Its REAL! Too many authors try to second guess who or what Dylan is and even worse, try to explain him or what his songs mean. I prefer to make up my own mind and this author gives an unbiased and objective portrait of a fascianting human being. I would say this is just about as good as biography of Dylan as we are likely to get, though lacks the detail of Clinton Heylin's Behind The Shades. Truly worth buying.

Impressive curation of facts. One of the best biographies I have ever read.

Unconditional Dylan fan

As a BOOMER many of the artist and songs are familiar . An interesting insight to his life style and eccentric behavior.However I found it rather the novel rather long

Easy to read, gossipy, overview of Dylan's career which suffers in the end, from being more a summary of what he did than an attempt to analyse or examine it. The problem for any biographer is that Dylan has lived more than one life; he's more than one person, someone making life up as he goes along, and that means anything other than what Sounes has done here is going to be subjective and limited.Revelations, as trumpeted in the book by the author himself, come in the shape of Bob's second wife and marriage - which is as gossipy and tabloidy as it gets. There's nothing revealing or new in any of what for me are the most interesting aspects of the Dylan story - his relationship with Robert Zimmerman, his Woodstock-era rejection of what he'd become, his conversion and his eighties-life, but I guess everyone who's interested in the story has their own favourite parts.In the end, this reads like a good, long article summarising Dylan's life and career. End of.