Fact #118119

“A lot of people tell me they enjoy that album,” said Dylan shortly after its release. “It’s hard for me to relate to that. I mean, people enjoying that type of pain, you know?” Much of Dylan’s 70’s high water mark was an agonising evocation of disintegrating relationships with lovers and friends which, after five years of below-par efforts, re-established him as a creative force who could outlive changing musical tastes. Musically, he had returned to the simple virtues of the Nashville Skyline era, but lyrically he was conjuring again the magic of the mid-sixties, in the spitting rage of Idiot Wind, the classic story-telling of Lily, Rosemary And The Jack Of Hearts and, best of all, the tender confusion of Tangled Up In Blue.