Sometime this month Bob Dylan--the Sixties' most celebrated songwriter and cultural icon--turns 50. His liner notes to Biograph, Dylan's musical auto-anthology, say he was born Robert Zimmerman on May 24, 1941. But what appears to be Dylan's passport inside his recently released Bootleg Series--Volumes 1-3 suggests otherwise: The blue-eyed Robert Dylan's birthdate is listed as May 11, 1941.
So go figure. Dylan always was, as the saying goes, a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma.
Whatever the true date, Steve Twist, Arizona's most unlikely Dylan fan, will be celebrating Mr. Tambourine Man's birthday. And for anyone who knows anything about either Twist or Dylan, that makes the foggy ruins of time even foggier.
Twist, 41, spent the 1980s as the attorney general's right-hand man, drafting Arizona's draconian drug laws and plotting powergrabs for prosecutors. In the 1970s, Twist turned the state's criminal code into a stage from which only the most starry-eyed prisoner could sing "I shall be released."
The last few years have not been kind to Twist. In 1988 he headed the prosecutorial team that failed to win a conviction against Governor Evan Mecham on charges of perjury and concealment. And last year he lost his long-expected bid to succeed Bob Corbin as attorney general. Who knows, maybe Twist can sing the "Subterranean Homesick Blues."
On an unseasonably cool, idiot-windy day last week, New Times sent aspiring music writer David J. Bodney to stare into the vacuum of Twist's eyes.
Twist now practices law atop the Phelps Dodge building with his former boss Bob Corbin. Still running from pillar to post, Twist darts into one of his firm's empty offices, ever eager to show his inexplicable love of Dylan.
Proofers: production is doing headline on Macintosh.
Pullquotes and captions are the same, per Bodney.
Parenthetical expressions are italicized.
Style break: 50/50th birthday.
Thanks, cj
May 3
5 p.m.
MDRVTWIST: Is it rolling, Bob?
MDRVNEW TIMES: (Laughter) Let's face it: Your appreciation of Bob Dylan is a complete mystery to anyone who knows anthing about either you or Dylan. How did you become a Dylan fan?
MDRVTWIST: Oh, it was easy. I was drawn into the music by the lyrics--thoughtful, iconoclastic, pushing the edge. And I think any thoughtful person, if they reflected for a moment or two about it, couldn't help but be drawn into it.
MDRVNEW TIMES: Well, when were you first drawn to Dylan?
MDRVTWIST: Oh, high school. Yeah, I graduated from Camelback High School here in Phoenix in, uh, 1967. So, during his developing years, I became an instant fan.
MDRVNEW TIMES: Dylan's career is marked by a variety of distinct phases--the folkie period, electric folkie, motorcycle- accident recluse, Blood on the Tracks, Rolling Thunder Revue, Born-Again Christian, Hassidic Jew. Which period is your favorite, and why?
MDRVTWIST: Well (laughter), actually . . . Dylan has gone through a variety of passages and really the country has followed him through those different transformations. And I think in every life there are the same passages and the same transformation, and I have no particular favorite because I've seen my life go through passages just as his music has.
MDRVNEW TIMES: What's your favorite Dylan lyric?
MDRVTWIST: I have to think about that for a second. In fact, I have to, I have to resort to the book, and I will tell you. (Twist charges down the hall, returns with a book of Dylan's lyrics and sits reverently silent as he scans its pages.) "Blame it on a simple twist of fate."
MDRVNEW TIMES: Any runner-up or runners-up?
MDRVTWIST: There are so many. I can't think of a song that I don't find in some way compelling me to expand my perspective on things.
MDRVNEW TIMES: Dylan's played with some terrific back-up bands of late--Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Mark Knopfler of Dire Straits, G.E. Smith of the Saturday Night Live Band fame. What's your favorite Dylan back-up band, and why?
MDRVTWIST: The Traveling Wilburys, which I consider to be all back-up to Bob Dylan.
MDRVNEW TIMES: Given your background as a hard-nosed prosecutor, you must admit that your enjoyment of Bob Dylan--the Sixties' most celebrated poet-troubadour--comes as a suprise. Drugs, civil rights, gangsters, due process: I mean, you hate all Dylan stands for. How do you explain it?
MDRVTWIST: Absolutely not! He, um, uh . . . There is a lot about Bob Dylan that simply pushes you to not accept things about our society the way they are. And there are a lot of things that I am unwilling to accept about the status quo. And among those certainly are lots of issues in the criminal justice system. And so, as Dylan has pushed the music of this country into new phases and the country has followed him, it's an encouragement to push other social issues to change. And it just so happened that I reached maturity during the period of time when the changes in the country that I thought were the most needed were changes away from the liberal agenda.
MDRVNEW TIMES: I'd like to get your reaction to some famous Dylan tunes, and ask you specifically how they square with your right-of-center political views, okay?
From "Rainy Day Woman," [the line] "Everybody must get stoned"?
MDRVTWIST: Well, obviously he's not talking about, in my view, drunks. There are . . . . It is a general statement about not accepting, again, uh, the way things are--breaking out of the mold.
MDRVNEW TIMES: "Blowin' in the Wind," the Sixties' civil rights anthem--any reaction?
MDRVTWIST: [There's] nothing inconsistent about the extension of civil rights to--nothing inconsistent with the conservative movement and civil rights being fully embraced.
MDRVNEW TIMES: Do you feel the Corbin/Twist years were as responsive to the civil rights movement as Grant Woods' administration suggests it will be--or promises to be?
MDRVTWIST: I think that it's important for the work that was started over the last decade to be carried on, and I compliment Grant for that. But our office was very active in civil rights enforcement, both on the enforcement side and also on the legislative reform side. I mean, we worked for handicapped rights legislation, for age discrimination legislation that was enacted during that period, so I'm pretty proud of the record.
MDRVNEW TIMES: "Joey," the ode to gangster Joey Gallo--any reaction?
MDRVTWIST: Even William Buckley at times publicly supported people who were in prison who[m] he later regretted having supported.
MDRVNEW TIMES: "Hurricane," the homage to the New Jersey fighter Hurricane Carter, who was wrongly accused--any thoughts?
MDRVTWIST: Well, that specifically was never the issue, you know, that Buckley supported. And probably in that case, he was right.
MDRVNEW TIMES: What would you say to Bob Dylan if you met him today?
MDRVTWIST: I'd be, uh, speechless.
MDRVNEW TIMES: With much fanfare, Sony recently released Dylan's Bootleg Series. What would your bootleg series--that is, Steve Twist's outtakes--consist of?
MDRVTWIST: From Dylan, you mean, or . . . MDRVNEW TIMES: Your own outtakes. Just as Dylan has his Bootleg Series--or tunes otherwise unknown to the public--what would your bootleg series consist of?
MDRVTWIST: Uh, well, I guess that would be this expose of my admiration for Bob Dylan.
MDRVNEW TIMES: Where do you usually listen to Dylan?
MDRVTWIST: Either in the car or at home.
MDRVNEW TIMES: Have you ever seen Dylan perform "live"?
MDRVTWIST: Yes. What, three times?
MDRVNEW TIMES: Where did you see Dylan?
MDRVTWIST: The Coliseum was, I think, the last time--when he was here with Tom Petty. No, it was the time before last, when he was here with Tom Petty. I didn't catch the last one.
MDRVNEW TIMES: Some readers might be interested to know whether you were ever passed a joint at a Dylan concert.
MDRVTWIST: (Laughter) I was not! And I was so offended by the official acceptance of the use of drugs at that particular Bob Dylan concert, which I think must have been in the summer of 1986, that that was part of the motivation that I had when I began in that same summer of 1986 working on the revision of the drug laws in Arizona that passed in 1987. And specifically, one of the things included in those laws was a harsher penalty for casual use.
MDRVNEW TIMES: So, ironically enough, Dylan encouraged you to work toward harsher drug laws?
MDRVTWIST: Yes.
MDRVNEW TIMES: What's your Dylan . . . MDRVTWIST: (Interrupts) [It was] the experience of being there [at a Dylan concert that led to Twist's work toward harsher drug laws]!
MDRVNEW TIMES: Right. What's your Dylan epiphany, your most profound mystical moment hearing Dylan?
MDRVTWIST: Well, maybe I've just described it. Although I don't know that that really responds to your question.
MDRVNEW TIMES: Rolling down the open road somewhere, a lazy afternoon on a couch someplace--anything like that?
MDRVTWIST: No. (Chuckle)
MDRVNEW TIMES: Dylan's appeared in an odd assortment of films--Renaldo and Clara, Don't Look Back, Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid. What's your favorite?
MDRVTWIST: Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid, no question about it.
MDRVNEW TIMES: Why is that?
MDRVTWIST: Well, because as a--How did you describe me?--"right-of-center" guy, I have a natural affinity to Westerns.
MDRVNEW TIMES: Steve, have you--quoting Dylan--"put your guns in the ground"?
MDRVTWIST: (Laughter) No!
MDRVNEW TIMES: When Jimmy Carter was elected president, he quoted Bob Dylan at his inauguration. Had you been elected attorney general, would you have quoted Dylan at your inaugural, and if so, what lyrics would you have chosen?
MDRVTWIST: Um . . . back to the book. (Twist peruses some Dylan lyrics.) I might, the thought might have come to me, and if I had had the thought, I would have enjoyed it and pursued it. Let's see, let me . . . (more reverential silence) I think probably the--it, it would have had to do with some issue or attitude about crime, and I probably would have--my thought would have turned to "The Neighborhood Bully." All of the lyrics from the song are pretty good, but he says:
Well, he's surrounded by pacifists
who all want peace.
They pray for it nightly that
the bloodshed must cease.
Now they wouldn't hurt a fly.
To hurt one they would weep.
They lay and they wait for this bully
to fall asleep.
Of course, the comparison would be to Israel and the Middle East and how it's necessary for Israel to take forceful action to defend itself and protect itself, and being called the bully in doing that. It's necessary for us here at home to take actions to protect ourselves, and some may call us a bully, but we know that that's not right.
MDRVNEW TIMES: From the same album, Dylan wrote a song called "Jokerman," and he emphasizes the importance of "staying one step ahead of the persecutor within." Who's your "persecutor within," and how do you stay one step ahead?
MDRVTWIST: (Long pause) I think probably we're all our harshest critics. And that's probably enough form of persecution for most people to have to deal with. And if you can reconcile yourself with that every night, you're going to be okay.
MDRVNEW TIMES: Off-the-wall question: Rumor has it you acquired your taste for Dylan simply as a way back in the Sixties to get laid. True or false?
MDRVTWIST: False! Who thought of that question?
MDRVNEW TIMES: That was the rumor. You're in private practice now. Has this left you with the "Memphis Blues" again, Steve? How do you like it?
MDRVTWIST: Well, you know, all of these professional changes are essentially superficial. What remains constant in your life is the, uh, many, uh, good pieces of literature that stay with you, among many other things. And I consider the lyrics of Bob Dylan's poetry and music to be among those that stay with me a constant.
MDRVNEW TIMES: Does that mean you're enjoying the private practice of law?
MDRVTWIST: Oh, absolutely.
MDRVNEW TIMES: Okay, great, that's it.
MDRVTWIST: Are you going to do this verbatim?
MDRVNEW TIMES: Well . . . Steve, any final thoughts on the significance of Bob Dylan turning 50 this month?
MDRVTWIST: You know, my thought is that he led and the country followed through all of its stages since I was old enough to remember that the country had stages. Recently and in an entirely different connection, I came across one of the parables from Soren Kierkegaard, the guy who wrote in 1846 "The Parable of the Jewel on Thin Ice." And the story was of, uh . . . Imagine a lake where out in the very middle the ice was thin and dangerous. And there was a jewel protected only by the danger of death. And in a passionate age, a person would venture out to the thin ice and would try to capture the jewel. And if he drowned, people would make a hero of him, and if he succeeded . . . . People would mourn him if he drowned, make a hero and then martyr him. And if he succeeded, they'd make a god of him.
But in an age of reflection, crowds would come around the edge of the lake. And they'd build some stands, and skaters would show how adept they were at skating out to the ice where it was still safe. And they would hail the person, applaud for the person who could go out to the edge of where it was safe. But of course, the jewel would still be, would be elusive.
And Bob Dylan was willing to go out to the thin ice.
MDRVNEW TIMES: Did he cross the edge?
MDRVTWIST: Well, there may have been times in his life when he plunged in the water but, somehow or another, others rescued him and he returned to some more traditional values.
MDRVNEW TIMES: In the liner notes to Dylan's recent Bootleg Series, Dylan says he will keep on moving, that he will keep creating and moving ahead. How about you? Another run for political office anytime in the future?
MDRVTWIST: Well, only if Bob decided to be my campaign manager.
"I was drawn into the music, uh, by the lyrics--uh, thoughtful, iconoclastic, uh, pushing the, uh, the edge."
"Dylan has gone through a variety of passages and really the country has followed him through those different transformations."
"There is a lot about Bob Dylan that simply pushes you to not accept things about our society the way they are."
"I would not feel so all alone/Everybody must get stoned."
"Even William Buckley at times publically supported people who were in prison who[m] he later regretted having supported.
