When Greil Marcus’ book Invisible Republic: Bob Dylan’s Basement Tapes (later reissued as The Old, Weird America) came out in 1997, I invited the author to appear on Dead to the World to talk and play records. Our mutual friend, San Francisco columnist Jon Carroll, got his advance copy and emailed me just to say he thought the book was wonderful. The light bulb went off over my head and I asked Jon if he would like to interview Greil for DTTW. Both men liked the idea, and the resulting conversation – recorded on May 3, 1997 in my living room and broadcast on KPFA on May 7 – was magnificent. The musical examples are terrific, too.
Prompted by a conversation in the WELL, I ripped the interview and posted it. You can download the 22 segments (totaling an hour and 56 minutes) here.
(If someone can teach me how to set it up so the files will stream in order, please email me and I’ll make it so.)
Thanks for sharing this! I heard it when it first aired, it was an amazing bit of radio!