“It was a strange, fucking surreal day.” This was former Sex Pistols guitarist ' verdict on his one-time-only studio session with folk legend and 's Paul Simonon in the spring of 1987. For reasons he never elected to explain, the folk legend had decided that his 25th studio album, , would benefit from some outside input, and so, over the course of six years and numerous studio sessions, an extraordinary range of guest musicians - , Ronnie Wood, Jerry Garcia, Mick Taylor, Mark Knopfler, and, er, among them - were invited to add light, shade and texture to the scattershot ten-song collection Dylan was assembling as the follow-up to 1986's critically savaged album.
Exactly what motivated Dylan to place a call to Steve Jones and ask him to put together a band of his choosing for a March '87 session at Sunset Sound studios - “maybe he was a secret Professionals fan,” the guitarist mused, with tongue firmly in cheek, in his highly readable 2016 memoir - we shall likely never know, but to his credit, Jones took the assignment seriously, roping in the services of ex-Clash bassist Simonon, Pat Benatar's drummer Myron Grombacher and longtime Rod Stewart collaborator Kevin Savigar, none of whom had the slightest idea what exactly Dylan expected of them. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the ensuing session in Studio 3 was a stilted, awkward affair, not least because Dylan himself seemed unprepared, and unsure of what the common goal was, beyond directionless jamming. “There was a bit of a clash of cultures,” Jones admitted in .
"He must've started about twenty different songs, then he'd cut them off just as we were getting going.” Dylan-ologists believe that the make-shift group cut a total of six songs over the course of the evening, but only one, a cover of R&B tune , originally recorded by June Alexander in 1960, would be deemed worthy of inclusion on . Steve Jones couldn't even remember what else may have been taped.
His main recollection of the night, in fact, revolved around the arrival of some random uninvited guests, led by actor Mickey Rourke. “Mickey Rourke turned up at the studio with a big gang of our biker mates,” Jones noted in . “I was facing the glass window of the control room and Dylan was facing me, with his back to the entrance.
While he's talking away to me, i notice Mickey and about 30 of these other biker geezers come swaggering in. Then Bob turns round to see them all, and does a massive double take. I wish someone had been filming it, because his face was a picture.
” “I wouldn't say he was intimidated, but it wasn't long before he made his excuses and left.” Listen to the collective's take on below: For all its additional star power, got even worse reviews than its predecessor when it emerged on May 30, 1988, with stating: “Dylan fans will forever argue about the precise moment when [Dylan's] career hit rock-bottom but most pin it somewhere around the time that landed with a thud in record stores.” You win some, you lose some.
The latest news, features and interviews direct to your inbox, from the global home of alternative music. A music writer since 1993, formerly Editor of Kerrang! and Planet Rock magazine (RIP), Paul Brannigan is a Contributing Editor to Louder. Having previously written books on Lemmy, Dave Grohl (the Sunday Times best-seller and Metallica ( , co-authored with Ian Winwood), his Eddie Van Halen biography ( in the UK, in the US) emerged in 2021.
He has written for Rolling Stone, Mojo and Q, hung out with Fugazi at Dischord House, flown on Ozzy Osbourne's private jet, played Angus Young's Gibson SG, and interviewed everyone from Aerosmith and Beastie Boys to Young Gods and ZZ Top. Born in the North of Ireland, Brannigan lives in North London and supports The Arsenal. Not just No Life and Only One.
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