The Wallflowers

Jakob Dylan

Jakob Dylan and his band the Wallflowers played to a sold out show at Denver’s Botanical Garden Tuesday night. Jakob played an excellent mix of songs from his more recent albums as well as the ubiquitous hit One Head Light. Standing mostly still in a fine black suit, tan fedora and his trusty Martin guitar Jakob presented a beautiful stoic, almost iconic figure for his adoring fans. To say there is a resemblance to his father is an understatement, his cold blue stare, his rigid stance on stage, his unique voice and excellent wordsmanship all combine to give those of us that are too young to have seen Bob Dylan in his prime a complete reincarnation experience. The current Wallflower line up includes Greg Richling on bass, Fred Eltringham on drums, guitarist Stuart Mathis and co-producer and keyboardist  Bill Appleberry.Before the show I wandered around the stage checking out his equipment layout and gear, Jakob plays a couple of beautiful Martin guitars and his guitar tech said he won’t let him change the strings, “They are completely black” he said in mock disgust. I replied “That’s how you get a signature tone” we both laughed. It was a great show until the road manager pulled my photo pass after only a couple songs saying that the Denver Post had not contacted him so no pro shots, bummer for sure.

Jakob Dylan is the youngest of four children born to singer-songwriter Bob Dylan and ex-wife Sara Dylan on December 8, 1969. He married his childhood sweetheart, Nicole Paige Denny (now former actress Paige Dylan),^[1] in a ceremony at Sara Dylan‘s house in 1992. Dylan and his family reside in Los Angeles. They have four sons. ^[2] Dylan is very private about his family to the extent that there are very few images of his children or wife available.

The Wallflowers

The Wallflowers started out playing alongside other aspiring rockers at Canter’s delicatessen in the Fairfax District of Los Angeles in 1989. The band signed to Virgin Records and made a self-titled album, the cover of which had a picture of all the band members’ feet, and drummer Peter Yanowitz‘s dog.

The debut sold poorly however, and after they were released from Virgin Records, the band regrouped. They toured with 10,000 Maniacs, Toad The Wet Sprocket, Cracker, and The Spin Doctors, and gained and lost several band members along the way. With the help of their manager Andrew Slater, the band secured a new major label record deal with Interscope Records.

Their 1996 album Bringing Down the Horse, recorded with producer T-Bone Burnett (and including collaborations with Michael Penn, Adam Duritz, Mike Campbell, Don Heffington of Lone Justice, and Sam Phillips), yielded several singles, including “6th Avenue Heartache” and “One Headlight“. The album sold over six million copies worldwide, three times as many as his father’s album Blood on the Tracks sold in over 20 years. Burnett stated at the time: “As far as Jakob is concerned, I can’t imagine having larger footsteps to follow in. But Jakob’s character is clearly defined and he handles success with grace, which also says a lot about Bob as a father.” Burnett went on to state that the success of Bringing Down the Horse had nothing to do with the family name: “I don’t think Jakob sold a single record because he is Bob’s son. I think he sold a lot of records because “One Headlight” is a very good song. I wonder how many Wallflowers fans even know who Bob Dylan is.”^[3] The Wallflowers won two Grammy Awards, for Best Rock Vocal Performance by a Duo or Group and Best Rock Song. “One Headlight” also won the VH-1 Video of the Year for 1997.

As of 2007, The Wallflowers have recorded five albums.

In the fall of 2007 The Wallflowers performed live for the first time in more than two years. They did a brief tour including dates on the East Coast in October and the midwest in November. This tour included Jakob Dylan (lead vocals, rhythm guitar), Stuart Mathis (lead guitar), Greg Richling (Bass), and Fred Eltringham (drums). In September 2007 the band announced on their official website^[4] that band member Rami Jaffee had left the group. The band played additional dates in southern California in February 2008, some east coast shows in April 2008, and several festival shows in the summer 2008 (OC Fair, South Carolina Balloon Festival, Deadwood Jam, among others). In some of these shows, they played as a three-some, in other shows multi-instrumentalist Ben Peeler joined The Wallflowers.

Solo career

On September 20, 2006 it was announced by Billboard that Dylan had signed a new recording contract with Columbia Records.^[5] The Wallflowers’ current situation has remained unknown since their recording contract with Interscope Records ended in 2005.

Dylan wrote and recorded “Here Comes Now” as the theme song for the U.S. television show Six Degrees, which premiered on September 21, 2006. His song “Stardust Universe” premiered on Jericho on October 25, 2006.

A cover of The Band‘s “Whispering Pines” appears on the tribute CD Endless Highway  — The music of The Band, which was released late January 2007. Dylan also contributed backing vocals to the track, “Black Haired Girl,” on Jesse Malin‘s 2007 album, Glitter in the Gutter.

Dylan collaborated with Dhani Harrison on the John Lennon song, “Gimme Some Truth,” for the Lennon’s tribute album, “Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur“, which was released on June 12, 2007.^[6] As of early 2007, Jakob Dylan had performed with his father only once, at a corporate gig for semiconductor company Applied Materials on November 14, 1997,^[7][8] although they played the same show, they did not play together.

In early September 2007, The New York Times reported Dylan was working on his first solo album in a house in Hollywood Hills owned by famed record producer Rick Rubin.^[9] Rubin is also listed as the producer of the album. The album is called Seeing Things and was released on June 10, 2008. The mostly acoustic album contains 10 tracks.

In the spring of 2008 a series of tour announcements were made that Dylan would be performing with his touring band The Gold Mountain Rebels at Bonnaroo, at the new Rothbury Music Festival, in Rothbury, Michigan, Summerfest in Milwaukee, the Newport Folk Festival, and the Austin City Limits Festival. A number of tour dates in the south, east, and midwest were also confirmed. He played on the Letterman show in June 2008, Leno in July 2008, The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson in August 2008, and Late Night with Conan O’Brien in September 2008, and taped performances for a number of folk radio programs that aired throughout the summer. On the Conan performance, Dylan performed “War Is Kind” with Norah Jones. Jakob Dylan and the Gold Mountain Rebels did a 10-day tour in Europe opening for Eric Clapton in mid-August, and some shows in August and September opening for Willie Nelson at FarmAid in the U.S. In October he did a ten day tour in Europe playing shows in Germany and the U.K.^[10] On October 21, he appeared in the UK on BBC2‘s Later… with Jools Holland. During the show he sang “Evil Is Alive And Well” and “Something Good This Way Comes”. This was the first time that Dylan performed solo on television. During the week of October 25, Dylan appeared with the Gold Mountain Rebels on PBS’ Austin City Limits.^[11]

On the show NCIS Jakob does a song called “No Matter What”! It’s featured on NCIS: The Official TV Soundtrack

In June 2009 Vanity Fair included Jakob in their poll asking readers to choose The Most Handsome Man in the World. Jakob was one of eighteen men selected including George Clooney, Brad Pitt and Johnny Depp.

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 21st, 2009 at 7:00 pm. It is filed under Live music reviews, Past shows and tagged with Denver Botanical Gardens, Jakob Dylan, The Wallflowers. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.