TL;DR:
- Bob Dylan doesn’t look at himself as a “cult figure” and he explained why.
- People at circuses influenced him and taught him dignity.
- Dylan went on to sell over 125 million records.
Bob Dylan could be understood as a cult figure since his music has a significant cult following. Despite this, Dylan said he doesn’t look at himself in those terms. Subsequently, the “Like a Rolling Stone” singer discussed some of his unorthodox influences as an artist.
Bob Dylan said he’s more countercultural than Paul McCartney, The Beach Boys, and other stars from the same era
During a 2009 interview with HuffPost, Dylan said he didn’t fit into mainstream culture when he started his career. He noted the likes of Andy Williams, The Sound of Music, Perry Como, and Frank Sinatra dominated popular culture at that time. Dylan felt he didn’t fit into mainstream culture when he started or afterward.
Dylan contrasted himself with other 1960s and 1970s rockers. He said Paul McCartney, The Beach Boys, Billy Joel, Elton John, and The Who’s Roger Daltrey and Pete Townshend started out as countercultural figures before becoming part of the establishment. He felt they made music for fancy dinner parties whereas he made music that’s more “desperate.” Dylan said he’s not mainstream.
Bob Dylan feels the term ‘cult figure’ has ‘religious connotations’
Dylan was asked if he was a “cult figure” who made “outsider art.” For context, outsider art is art made by people who are untrained and aren’t connected to the art world. “A cult figure, that’s got religious connotations,” he opined. “It sounds cliquish and clannish. People have different emotional levels. Especially when you’re young.”
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Dylan discussed his youth. “Back then I guess most of my influences could be thought of as eccentric,” he recalled. “Mass media had no overwhelming reach so I was drawn to the traveling performers passing through. The sideshow performers — bluegrass singers, the Black cowboy with chaps and a lariat doing rope tricks. Miss Europe, Quasimodo, the Bearded Lady, the half-man half-woman, the deformed and the bent, Atlas the Dwarf, the fire-eaters, the teachers and preachers, the blues singers. I remember it like it was yesterday.”
The ‘Blowin’ in the Wind’ singer hates ‘giddiness’ and ‘artificiality’ but he still managed to become a major force in the music world
Dylan revealed how circus performers inspired him. “I got close to some of these people,” he added. “I learned about dignity from them. Freedom too. Civil rights, human rights. How to stay within yourself. Most others were into the rides like the tilt-a-whirl and the rollercoaster. To me that was the nightmare. All the giddiness. The artificiality of it.”
Dylan was shocked that he went on to sell millions of records. According to a 2022 report from NBC News, he’s sold over 125 million records worldwide. It’s interesting he still considers himself an outsider considering how much his music penetrated the mainstream.
Dylan doesn’t consider himself a cult figure but that hasn’t stopped him from finding an audience.
