The Wallflowers
by Nicole Sandler
Album Network Magazine, June 27, 1997


Bringing Down the Horse, the second album from the Wallflowers, has been out just over a year; it's already Double Platinum, with its third single, "The Difference," following the paths forged by its predecessors at the top of the chart; the CD still has lots of life left in it, with "Invisible City," "Three Marlenas," "Laughing Out Loud," and any other number of hits ripe for the picking. On July 2, The Wallflowers will embark on a co-headlining tour with the Counting Crows, running through August 9. And this week marks a triumphant homecoming, of sorts, as they headline their hometown LA Universal Amphitheatre for the first time.

It's been a long road to this point. The Wallflowers debut album was released by Virgin in 1992 to critical acclaim but commercial doom. Rather than focus on the songs, the spotlight at that time seemed to be on frontman Jakob Dylan, and his heritage as the son of one of the most revered figures in popular culture. Jakob, though, chose to keep his personal life personal.

In the years between label homes, Jakob continued writing and The Wallflowers, with a few personnel changes, sharpened their performing chops. They signed with Interscope and recorded the album which would make Dylan a household name to a new generation, based on his talent alone.

I spoke with Jakob shortly after he returned from their first European tour, as his face graced the cover of the Rolling Stone, accompanying an article in which he, for the first time, spoke candidly about his life and his famous father. In our conversation he was equally as open and honest, and shared with us his wonderful sense of humor, as well.


I'll get the dumb question out of the way first, ok? It's been just over a year since the album came out, it's double-platinum, showing no signs of slowing down... how does it feel now?

"I feel tired. It obviously feels good, I mean it's been a lot of work...I've been home very little so I don't know. I have to have my manager give me the updates all the time 'cause I really have no idea what's going on half the time."

You're doing really well.

"That's what they tell me."

I just got back from New York where I saw your face all over bus kiosks in New York. Everywhere I went, there you were.

"I'm sorry."

It's ok. It's a nice, familiar face.

"Well I hear there's a billboard of it out here somewhere."

I haven't seen that yet.

"I haven't either. I'm horrified to leave the house. When I was asked about it, they said it was gonna be maybe in some bus stops in New York--I thought, well, I won't be there for a while, so I guess that's fine. And then I find out they actually used it for billboards out here somewhere, so I'm staying in the house...."

Don't want to come face to face with them huh?

"No, my face is big enough as it is. Don't need to see it three stories tall."

Before this record came out did you take a moment and think about what you wanted to accomplish in terms of success?

"No not at all. I never thought that far ahead, I just wanted to make the record that was right for us to make, I wanted to make sure the songs were right. I never really considered what it was gonna do, or what it might do, or what I wanted it to do. You know, I just wanted to get the record right and get back on the road."

You didn't think about seeing your face in giant billboards on Sunset Boulevard?

"Did not really imagine that would happen to me."

Rami Jaffee, the only other original member of the Wallflowers besides you, is about to become a dad.

"Yeah, in August...he's gonna take some time off from touring, most of August I believe. We've got a friend who's gonna fill in."

How weird will that be--looking over and not seeing Rami?

"It's probably gonna be pretty strange. He's the only one who I've always seen on my left, you know. That faces have come and gone, but it's always felt like a group 'cause Rami--visually and his personality--has always been a big part of the group, so it's probably gonna be a bit odd for a few minutes, I'm sure."

Speaking of dads, how's yours doing?

"He's fine. It got blown way out of proportion. I was over in Europe and doing like, five interviews a day, and every journalist had to ask me, and after a while it was getting a bit tedious. All I could really say was, 'I promise you that if there was a problem, I would not be sitting here in Copenhagen in an awful coffee bar talking to you.'"

So there was this giant media frenzy 'cause nobody knew anything.

"He doesn't speak to the press at all, so it didn't really help the situation. People were genuinely concerned, and his camp wasn't really commenting one way or the other [about] what was going on. And since I don't really talk about him either, when I was in Europe they assumed he was in a really bad way, they assumed that if I wasn't going home, we weren't talking. I would go through the airport and I'd see his picture everywhere and I obviously couldn't understand the language but I thought it was kind of [a] drag in the USA Today, they had a thing on him and the last paragraph said, 'Jakob Dylan, his son, is not expected to cancel his European tour to go home and be with him.' The whole article was set up like he was sick and I wouldn't cancel my European tour."

Meanwhile, if it was something really serious, you would have been there in a second.

"In a second, yeah. I mean, even if it was remotely serious I would have come home. I can't tell you how unserious it actually was."

In the Rolling Stone interview, you finally dealt with a subject that you haven't previously been very open about. Why did you finally decide to do it?

"I do understand that when people are interested in any artist, their past and their history and how they grew up and who they are is interesting at a certain point. I mean, I have the same interest in the people I admire--I want to know a little bit about them--and I just kind of felt that if I was going to accept doing the cover story for Rolling Stone that I couldn't pull that anymore--and I did think that it had a genuine place in the article. I still only gave up about 15% of the information I actually have, but up until that point I had only given up 3%--which was acknowledging that yes, it's true, I am related."

Now that you've come this far, it feels right to give in to people's curiousity about something that's a part of you?

"Right, it is exactly that, it is a part of me...and the truth is I'm proud of who I am, it's just always been a distraction which kind of gets me into hot water. Like I was saying before about the illness he had, by having not talked about him for so long, it gives people the impression that we're not close--which isn't true, but I just thought it was all right at this point to do it."

It definitely was and the article came out great.

"I was really happy with it. I spent a lot of time with the Gerri Hirshey, the writer. At one point I was kind of concerned that she wasn't really badgering me enough, because it's not easy to get me to talk about those things...but I was prepared to go a little bit of distance with her and then, halfway through, I was getting kind of concerned like she's not asking anything, she's not pushing me. And then, when the article came out, I realized that was actually part of her interview, you know, the information that I would talk about and what I wouldn't talk about--it became part of her whole interview."

Obviously privacy is something that you grew up with, that you were taught since you could walk. So do you ever grapple with the fact that as a songwriter you're sharing your deepest emotions? I would think that all comes out in your writing.

"Yeah, of course it does, but it just depends on what kind of writer you want to be. I mean some songs I have probably just seem like they're pure entertainment, when actually they're a lot more than that. You know that songwriters have small ways of entertaining themselves to get those ideas across without feeling they're being too obvious. I think I speak about everything I want to speak about. It's important to say the things...I don't think it's necessarily important that people understand what you're saying."

Was there a conscious decision not to print your lyrics?

"Yeah, partly because I think what people get out of songs is the most important thing, not to get what you write. And the other thing is, I write songs and lyrics...to go together. So if you get the CD pullout and it's got lyrics printed in it, that's like looking at a painting in black and white; it's only half of it. Those words are meant to go with the melody and a certain cadence, and if you don't have the melody and the tempos they're totally taken out of context."

But you don't look at it as poetry on its own? Not to bring up your dad again, but his songs were/are the poetry of my generation.

"Right, well I certainly think a lot of it is but you know, it's very simple...I just made a choice like 'Yes, no, yes, no, no I'm not gonna print them; maybe on the next one.' And you know, I don't like quoting him myself, but when he got asked one time why he doesn't print his lyrics (which he does sometimes now), he said, 'I don't want my fans to get them for free. So then you can put out a book, they can buy more stuff.' [laughter] My book is very small at this point."



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