My thanks to NetGalley and Melville House Publishing for an advance copy of this book that looks at the myth, the talent and the life of an artist who changed music in many ways, and in many ways changed the life of the author writing this study.

I was late in my reading life, well past college, when I began to both appreciate and love poetry. Up until then I never felt an interest in the lives or lines of poets, most of them falling flat, or something that I would have to learn AB AB C styling or other ways poems were taught. Which was odd since I really enjoyed music. Supersounds of the 70's was always played in the family sedan on visits to the Grandparents, my brother and I singing along. As I grew older, my father gave me a pair of headphones, my own radio and an allowance to discover new music. I loved songs that told stories, more that Tra-la-la pop, though I still had a soft spot for it. Bob Dylan, however always escaped my interest. I liked the songs covered by others, but Bob, was too much for me. The cult of personality maybe, the long writings on single songs, the worship people had. I am not a joiner, and Bob just didn't seem for me. Until he was. And I had a lot to catch up on. I have read a lot of books, by Dylan, and about the Dylan-experience. I must say this is one the captures everything the man, the myth the music, and impact he had on one person, Ron Rosenbaum. Bob Dylan :Things Have Changed by Ron Rosenbaum is a book about music, Dylan, young Robert Zimmerman, Judaism, Christianity, war, peace, love, rock, roll movies, the past, the future that was too come, and what we have today.

The book is based on a series of interviews, stretching almost ten days during the 1970's for a few hours a day, told over cigarette smoke, Dylan, and tequila, Rosenbaum. Dylan was in flux in many ways. Music wasn't as important to him as his new project making a film about touring music, his life with his wife, and the love of his life. Dylan wanted to be a director, but the movie Renaldo & Clara was too long, too big, and too unmanageable as Dylan was finding his life was becoming. At the same time Dylan's marriage was breaking down, and he was only a short time away from leaving the Jewish faith and becoming a Christian of the hellfire and brimstone type. Rosenbaum spends a bit of the book explaining what he is looking for and trying to convey in the book, and finds himself using his own life as examples of how Dylan music and lyrics affected him in different. ways. As both men were close in age, Rosenbaum is five years younger, both shared many experiences. At one point Rosenbaum doubts he would have been the writer he was without Dylan.

A very different kind of music book, a biography of Dylan, a memoir of Rosenbaum, a discussion of music, Hitler, Shakespeare and other themes that Rosenbaum has written about. I have long enjoyed Rosenbaum's writing since I first discovered him in the late lamented New York Observer. Rosenbaum is an excellent writer, and here he writes about music, and its influences with a skill that many music critics would never think too. Looking to old poems, ideas in Judaism, even little bits of pop culture. This is not a conventional study, following Dylan from birth to Never-Ending Tour, but a book that looks at different topics, different eras, different loves, and different ways of thinking of songs.

Dylan fans will of course love this, but I think regular music fans will also. Rosenbaum has a lot of insight into the music and I leaned quite a bit, and also learned to look at songs that sound so familiar, in a different way. Another excellent book by a writer who has never let me down, an author who has taught me much about writing and how to take in art, media and people.

I always love reading about musicians and artists’ lives - the transformations, contradictions, and the stories behind the art. Bob Dylan is especially fascinating in that regard, and Ron Rosenbaum seems well informed on this subject.

It’s less a straightforward biography and more of a meditation, circling around Dylan’s ever-shifting identities.
I appreciated Rosenbaum’s depth of knowledge and the way he threads Dylan’s contradictions together, from his early folk days to his religious transformations and beyond - there are some fascinating insights here, especially if you’re interested in Dylan’s lyrics.

That being said, the format wasn’t exactly for me. Instead of a clear narrative, the book leans into reflection, speculation, and repetition, which at times made it feel heavy and meandering. I found myself wishing for a bit more structure and a bit less circling around the same questions.
Overall, this is a thoughtful and personal take on Dylan, but not quite the style of biography I usually connect with.

While the author says outright that his work is not a narrative -- while hoping people who saw "A Complete Unknown" will flock to this as well -- "Things Have Changed" is more of a tirade over something that happened over 45 years ago that he just cannot let go.

The author spends the first 100 pages of this extended blog post stating over and over what he hopes his book will accomplish, as though repeating his claims will support his theories. His claim to fame, if he has any, was that he conducted the interview wherein Dylan described the music of his mid-1960s peak as "that thin... wild mercury sound". He goes on to pose that it was his interview that sent Dylan further into crisis, directly resulting in his so-called born-again period, which the author repeatedly calls a brainwashing by a cult. He repeatedly decries other so-called Dylanologists, without realizing that he comes off as one himself, as backhanded as Heylin and as obsessed as Weberman. (He states that he couldn't find a way to access YouTube because his computer wouldn't let him; he couldn't have borrowed somebody else's? Used one at a library?)

For someone who's supposedly a lifelong scholar of Dylan's music and life, he gets a lot of basic facts wrong, misattributes lyrics to songs, spends way too much time taking credit for things, and doesn't once consider that maybe Dylan was putting him on too.

This will hopefully get another editing pass because there is some deep insight here, but the repetitions about Dylan being taken over by a Christian cult, the 5x repeat of the author's dislike of the phrase Dylanologists and other recurring bits start to grate. The author is still defining what this book will be about more than half way through the book. That said, it remains readable and a unique take on some aspects of Dylan's career and persona.

It is always interesting to read about Bob Dylan. In this book, Ron Rosenbaum dives into looking at Dylan through his lyrics. This book is a glimpse into Dylan. Well written and creative lens!

I received a free advanced copy of this book through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.