The most profoundly influential singer-songwriter of the rock era, Bob Dylan (b. Robert Allen Zimmerman, May 24, 1941, Duluth, Minnesota) has released over 45 albums since his 1962 debut and remains today as vital an artist, and as imposing a figure, as he was in his '60s heyday. The changes he wrought in all of pop music have been the subject of countless essays, articles, books, films and documentaries, as have the changes he himself has undergone, musical or otherwise. There are literally no major artists in popular music who have not been affected by Dylan on one level or another: He was a major catalyst in the careers of the Beatles and Rolling Stones in the '60s; his song "All Along the Watchtower" was the sole hit single by the Jimi Hendrix Experience; he was the figure to whom distinguished singer-songwriters such as Bruce Springsteen, John Prine, Loudon Wainwright III were compared upon their debuts; he was the subject of a song by David Bowie and the central inspiration of "new wave" up-and-comer Elvis Costello in the '70s; his "Mr. Tambourine Man" sparked the Byrds' success and thus spawned R.E.M. and the entire genre of folk-rock; and his many songs have been covered by literally hundreds of artists of nearly every musical genre. Dylan's memorable 30th Anniversary Concert, held at Madison Square Garden October 16, 1992, gave just an inkling of the number of superstar artists who consider themselves indebted to the singer-songwriter; among those performing were Neil Young, George Harrison, Eric Clapton, Lou Reed, Johnny & June Carter Cash, Roger McGuinn, Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers, Willie Nelson, Stevie Wonder, John Mellencamp, the Band, the O'Jays, Chrissie Hynde, Sinead O'Connor, Kris Kristofferson, and even Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam.
Dylan has said that he listened most to rock 'n' roll artists such as Little Richard, Carl Perkins, and Jerry Lee Lewis before hearing Leadbelly and turning toward folk music, then burgeoning in the late '50s. He read and was moved by Woody Guthrie's Bound For Glory, and began performing in coffeehouses near the University of Minnesota, where he enrolled briefly in 1959. By 1961, he had moved to New York, where he visited the hospitalized Guthrie in New Jersey and began performing in Greenwich Village folk clubs such as Gerde's Folk City. Finding early session work as a harmonica player, Dylan met legendary Columbia Records producer and talent scout John Hammond at a Carolyn Hester recording session; Hammond invited Dylan to make a demo tape. A rave review by New York Times critic Robert Shelton of a Dylan Gerde's appearance further drew attention to the singer, and by October, Hammond had signed Dylan to Columbia.
Dylan's earliest records were very much folk music in the tradition of Guthrie and Pete Seeger. Though his 1962 Bob Dylan bore only two original tunes ("Talkin' New York" and "Song To Woody," both talking blues), by the next year's The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan, the singer had produced enough original material to base an entire career upon. Among the best known songs were "Blowin' In The Wind" and "Don't Think Twice, It's Alright" (both top 10 hits for Peter, Paul & Mary in 1963), "Masters Of War," and the uniquely wordy "A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall." Written during the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, the latter track was "a desperate kind of song," Dylan said at the time. "Every line in it is actually the start of a whole song. But when I wrote it, I thought I wouldn't have enough time alive to write all those songs so I put all I could into this one."
Though Dylan would not "go electric" until 1965, his earlier albums still found a wide audience: Freewheelin' had reached No. 22 on the charts, and 1964's The Times They Are A-Changin' peaked at No. 20. And while 1965's follow-up Another Side Of Bob Dylan only reached No. 43, the songs it contained were among Dylan's best-known due to cover versions by other artists: "My Back Pages" and "All I Really Want To Do" were
