"One of the most enlightening of the 115 titles currently weighing
down my groaning Zim bookshelf ... Readers are lucky that an expert
fellow fan has applied his specialist insight to create an
original, compelling explanation of the 'Bob Dylan' phenomenon. And
that he?s done so with such an accessible and stylishly
written book."
Dylan Daily
"A rich, highly readable cultural history of popular music from
the early 1960s to the present, read through and around Dylan's
remarkable public career."
Times Higher Education Supplement
"Marshall has an excellent grasp of what rock music has meant
within popular culture and how it has changed over time, and gives
in this book the clearest explanation I have ever come across of
rock?s (and therefore Dylan?s) place within
post-modernism. Moreover, he really knows his Dylan."
Isis
"A landmark new study of the star's career."
Bristol Evening Post
"As Lee Marshall shows us, plenty is left to say about Dylan and
his many personas ... An inventive and captivating study of Dylan
that not only looks at his folk years but also examines his current
face."
Electric Review
"Finally, a Bob Dylan book that is refreshingly bereft of 1960s
nostalgia: Lee Marshall challenges much received wisdom by arguing
that Dylan?s touring and performances since the late 1980s
are central to his music. This is an important book. It represents
a major contribution to studies of stardom and a provocative
intervention into debates about the art and identity of Bob
Dylan."
Keith Negus, Goldsmiths, University of London
"This is a remarkable book, one of the few truly original ways
of looking at Bob Dylan that I've seen in recent years. What
Marshall gives you is not so much fresh interpretations of
individual Dylan songs, but rather a completely rethought context
for understanding the whole of Dylan's career, analysing the social
and cultural structures which both constrained and enabled Dylan's
creativity. By concentrating on the phenomenon of Dylan as a
"star," Marshall opens up many fascinating approaches, not least
(in the strongest passages of the book) in his brilliant discussion
of the Never Ending Tour. This book will be a critical benchmark
for Dylan scholars, as well as a provocative delight for fans of
rock's definitive star."
Stephen Scobie, author of Alias Bob Dylan
Revisited