MALIBU, Calif. — Legendary singer-songwriter Bob Dylan, the genius behind albums like “Highway 61 Revisited,” “Time Out of Mind” and “Blood on the Tracks” is considering trying to fulfill a career-long aspiration of recording a genre-defining ska album, sources close to the aging musician confirmed.
“A lotta people asked me why I refused my Nobel prize a few years back,” said a somehow still-alive Dylan. “It’s because my work is not complete. I always thought I could bring peace to the generations through moshing and skanking. Nobody knows this, but ‘Blowin’ in the Wind’ originally had a rocksteady beat and ‘The Ballad of Hollis Brown’ was essentially reggae. He was supposed to be living on a failing Mary Jane farm.”
One of Dylan’s close friends, the legendary Joan Baez, was surprisingly calm about his announcement.
“This isn’t news to me. He used to have me listen to his strange unreleased songs,” said Baez. “He had tracks called ‘Like a Rolling Skank’ and ‘Hey Mr. Rude Boy Man’ and ‘From a Scooter 6.’ Really odd stuff,” said Baez. “I used to say to him, ‘Bobby, I don’t know if you can get away with this. I don’t know what any of this means.’ He’d just turn to me and say: ‘To Ramona’ needs a real walking bass-line.’ I didn’t think he was well.”
Dylan scholars such as Charlie Ducktrow have been surprisingly receptive to the proposed change of sound.
“I know it seems baffling to have a bunch of skin-head rude-boys playing along with ‘Visions of Johanna.’ I certainly find it a little off-putting,” said Ducktrow. “But think about it this way: the Gaslight Anthem’s already covered some of his songs. And even if it’s terrible, it can’t be any worse than some of his 80s output. As long as there’s no bone-heads in the mix, I think it’ll all be fine.”
At press time, Dylan was meeting with record producers to see about “finding some bootboys with trumpets to really fuck up ‘Peggy Day.’”