Bob Dylan: An Intimate Biography - Part II

Out in front of one bar they came across a young while street singer who was busking — playing for the coins of passersby — his guitar work and singing style a fusion of Leadbelly and Guthrie. "Hey," Dylan said. "Can I borrow your guitar?" The singer handed it over and Dylan began to sing a couple of things off his first album. "Man," the kid exclaimed, "you sound just like Bob Dylan." Bob's face was impassive. "Saw Dylan once," he said. "A place in the Village. He's all right, I guess."

They returned to their motel room and Dylan was talking in elliptic, flashing images: "No one's free, even the birds are chained to the sky." And saying: "Rimbaud's where it's at. That's the kind of stuff means something. That's the kind of writing I'm gonna do."

The guy's freaky, Karman thought. He asked: "You moving away from social protest stuff?" His voice sounded disapproving, and disappointed.

"You becoming a critic?" Dylan snapped.

"Hell, I only know your protest songs mean something to a lot of people..."

"Hell with 'em," Dylan said. He went to the typewriter and banged out a few lines, then turned to Karman. "Even the birds are chained to the sky," he repeated.

"You're only saying that 'cause you're stoned," Karman said, and walked out.

They had to race out of town after a couple of days, racing through Louisiana toward Denver, where Dylan had a concert that he would miss if they didn't hurry. "Drive, Pablo, drive," he shouted at Clayton from the back of the wagon where he sat with his typewriter, working on "Chimes of Freedom" again.

But on entering Dallas, Dylan had an urge: "Let's go see where Kennedy was killed." They drove around, looking for the Texas Book Depository and Dealey Plaza, four months after the murder, lost in downtown Dallas. "Where's Dealey Plaza?" Dylan asked, leaning out the window, and no one knew, four people, and five, and six, and none of them knew the place. At least, that's what they said. The seventh man they asked answered: "You mean where they shot that bastard Kennedy?" Dylan didn't answer, and the Texas gave them directions. For about a half hour they wandered around the murder scene, Dylan grim and silent, and then back in the car and on their way, and all of them shouting out the windows, condemning all Texans as assassins.

They made it to the Denver Folk Lore Center, the local freak haven, with several hours to spare. Harry Tuft, the young operator of the place, apologetically told Dylan the concert had not sold too well, only about half the tickets gone. Dylan didn't react at first. He hung around, enjoying the hang-loose feel of the place and the kids. Then: "Hey, tell you what. Let's cancel the concert in the big hall and do it right here. I'd rather a small place, anyway." Empty seats: the performer's nightmare.

But the concert was a success, Dylan getting it on and living up to the audience's expectations. For weeks there had been rumors that he would not come, that he had been killed, or gone insane, destroyed by a System-conspiracy. On stage his appearance seemed to justify these fears, his fragile body, his wounded voice. James Dean's death, now Kennedy's, had done that to this generation; they were certain their leaders, their heroes, would be taken from them. Dylan — because he was like a broken-winged sparrow — appeared the most defenseless, the most vulnerable.

Karman had some straight friends in Denver and he went to visit them for a couple of hours and they blew his mind, he says. They were so warmly normal and average and stable, white Dylan and his group seemed on the edge of some dark cataclysm, totally unreal, always stoned, speaking in unintelligible parables. Karman felt as if Dylan was backing him into a padded cell.