TORONTO — Bob Dylan says he’s not worried about whether people pay for his new album or not.
“I sure hope it sells, and I would like people to listen to it,” the iconic singer said in a new interview. “But the way people listen to music has changed, and I hope they get a chance to hear all the songs in one way or another.”
Dylan, 73, told AARP Magazine he doesn’t concern himself with the business end of putting out a record.
“If it was up to me I’d give you the records for nothing,” he said.
Dylan’s new release is Shadows in the Night, a collection of cover versions of standards made famous by Frank Sinatra. It comes out Feb. 3.
Was it risky to put his spin on beloved Sinatra melodies?
“Risky? Like walking across a field laced with land mines? Or working in a poison gas factory? There’s nothing risky about making records,” he told AARP.
“Comparing me to Frank Sinatra? You must be joking. To be mentioned in the same breath as him must be some sort of high compliment. As far as touching him goes, nobody touches him. Not me or anyone else.”
Dylan bristled at the suggestion that some fans might find the songs on the album dated and corny.
“These songs are songs of great virtue. That’s what they are,” he explained. “People’s lives today are filled with vice and the trappings of it. Ambition, greed and selfishness all have to do with vice. Sooner or later, you have to see through it or you don’t survive.
“We don’t see the people that vice destroys. We just see the glamour of it — everywhere we look, from billboard signs to movies, to newspapers, to magazines. We see the destruction of human life. These songs are anything but that.”
Dylan also said America’s billionaires are key to solving some of the problems in urban neighbourhoods.
“We see crime and inner cities exploding with people who have nothing to do, turning to drink and drugs. They could all have work created for them by all these hotshot billionaires,” opined Dylan. “I’m not saying they have to — I’m not talking about communism — but what do they do with their money? Do they use it in virtuous ways?”
Dylan said wealthy entrepreneurs should be investing more in communities at home.
“There are a lot of things that are wrong in America, and especially in the inner cities, that they could solve,” he said. “Those are dangerous grounds, and they don’t have to be. There are good people there, but they’ve been oppressed by lack of work. Those people can all be working at something. These multibillionaires can create industries right here in America.
“But no one can tell them what to do. God’s got to lead them.”
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