The Bob Dylan Archives of Tony Glover to be Up for Auction Beginning November 12

The Minnesota music scene has produced some sensational talent through the years. Rock, folk, jazz, blues, bluegrass and even gospel music circles have developed exceptional performers and recording artists. One of these was David Curtis Glover, better known as Tony "Little Sun" Glover. A harmonica player with the folk group Koerner, Ray and Glover (inducted into the MN Music Academy Hall of Fame in 1983) he was also a notable rock critic who wrote for many of the best-known music mags including Crawdaddy, Sing Out, Creem and Rolling Stone.

When young Bobby Zimmerman left Hibbing to "attend" college in the Twin Cities, Tony Glover's friendship there in the Dinkytown music scene made an impression on the kid from the North Country, so much so that Dylan dedicated a prose poem to Glover at the 1963 Newport Folk Festival, calling Glover "a best friend in the highest form." 40 years later Dylan made note of Glover's importance in his life by referencing him in Chronicles: Volume One. ‘I couldn’t play like Glover or anything and I didn’t try to. I played mostly like Woody Guthrie and that was about it. Glover’s playing was well known and talked about around town, but nobody commented on mine.’ 

All this to say that the late Tony Glover (1939-2019) had a real connection to Dylan, as can be seen in the kind of material that is going up for auction on November 12 at the RR Auction House in Boston.

Rolling Stone, on October 21, published a story about Tony Glover and this collection to be auctioned off. The article is designed to whet the appetites of collectors while simultaneously giving Dylan fans a glimpse of still another side of Bob Dylan. The article, by Douglas Brinkley, begins like this:

On March 18th, 1971, Bob Dylan sat down in his Manhattan office, put his feet up on a table, strummed a guitar, and opened up like he rarely, if ever, had before. He was talking to his old friend Tony Glover, the first of four interviews they conducted that year. At various moments Dylan reacts to being booed at Newport in 1965 (“It was a strange night”), recalls writing “Subterranean Homesick Blues” (“story of a mad kid”), remarks on his craft (“My work is a moving thing”), and dismisses his honorary doctorate from Princeton (“a strange type of degree — you can’t really use it for anything”). Feeling unfairly dissected by dimwitted critics who milked his lyrics for autobiographical information, he fired back. “Do you think Johnny Cash shot a man in Reno?”

The actual title of this auction is Marvels of Modern Music. 169 of the items fall under the sub-category Tony Glover Archives. Posters, original photos, hand written and typed/autographed documents, and reel-to-reel tape recordings of interviews and various other valuables. 

It was especially fun to see all these Scotch reel-to-reel tapes because I had an old Estey tape recorder that my father went to Manhattan to buy for me on my 12th birthday. He saw an ad in Pop Mechanics and driving into the City after supper we managed to locate this little electronics store. I recorded all kinds of music on these 7-inch reels and forty years later made a CD of the mid-60s hits I'd recorded from the radio. All this to say that seeing Glover's tapes brought back warm memories. 

Tony Glover's tapes have more value than mine, obviously. He has recorded interviews with Dylan and other contemporaries, including a Jimi Hendrix concert and aftermath. But for most collectors it's my understanding that original documents have the greater value.

Glover's interests and connections were vast, so the collection offers a nice cross-section of what was happening in the 60s music scene. Rolling Stones memorabilia, Allman Brothers, the Doors (whom he shared the stage with at one time), Bowie, Robbie Robertson, and so on. 

The 12th is when they open things up for bidding; November 19 is the culmination. 

Most of what we see her is affordably priced, unless you get into a bidding war with someone who's "gotta have it." We're not talking about the original lyrics to Like A Rolling Stone, for example, which went for a cool two million.

To give you an idea, here are some examples.

1998 Western Union telegram from Bob to Tony Glover. Starting bid: $200. 

21 original photos of The Doors by Mike Barich. Starting bid: $200.

I would share more examples, but then I'd be drawing attention to them and collectors like Bill Pagel would prefer to have less competition. I have my eye on something, too, so let's do some misdirection at this point. 

OK, here's the description for one more: Desirable 1/4-inch reel-to-reel tape marked on the box, "Hendrix Interview + Concert / Noel Redding Int. - Nov. 2, 1968," containing audio of Tony Glover's backstage interview with Hendrix plus a recording of the concert at the Minneapolis Auditorium on November 2, 1968. Includes Glover's five-page transcript of the interview, in which he and Hendrix discuss audiences in America and Europe ("They're the same, once you get into it"), the production of Electric Ladyland.  $400-$600 

I may have to hawk my silver dimes from my childhood paper route days. 

For sure it's a veritable stew of memories here. Post cards from Greil Marcus, Rolling Stone archives, a letter to Tony from Donovan, letters from Joan Baez, a Jimmy Reed 45... There's even one lot of 20 Marlon Brando photos and booklets that someone is sure to snatch.

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The recent article in Rolling Stone focuses on Dylan's "lost letters" among other things. You can rummage through the listing here, though, simply for the personal nostalgic value, as you lift the lid and peer into your past.

HERE's the link: https://rrauction.com/preview_gallery.cfm?Category=629&SortOrder=HP&SearchCrit=&ByItem=

And finally, Tony Glover's Obit from the NY Times last year. 

Like His Hero Woody Guthrie, Dylan Spoke the Language of the Disenfranchised

My eyes collide head-on with stuffed
Graveyards, false gods, I scuff
At pettiness which plays so rough
Walk upside-down inside handcuffs
Kick my legs to crash it off
Say okay, I have had enough, what else can you show me?
--"It's Alright, Ma (I'm Only Bleeding)"

In the Old Testament story of David, there came a time when the young giant-slayer's reputation and honor was such that he became a threat to King Saul, who was a symbol of the established order. (See I Samuel 17-19.) After slaying Goliath David became part of the king's household, as armor bearer and poet/musician. Eventually Saul put him in command of a small army. David's achievements were heroic and greatly celebrated by the masses, public adulation that tormented Saul to the point that David's life was endangered, and ultimately David had to flee.

The young poet/musician took refuge in the wilderness, hiding in caves and moving about the surrounding hills. As word got around (even without social media or news corporations the buzz travelled fast) it is written that "everyone who was in distress, everyone who was in debt, and everyone who was discontented gathered to him." (I Samuel 22:2 KJV) The New Century translation of this verse states, "Everyone who was in trouble, or who owed money, or who was unsatisfied gathered around David, and he became their leader."

What comes to mind when I think of Dylan's early songs is how they resonated with the disenfranchised. In fact, Dylan used to cite this story of David while introducing his song "When the Ship Comes In." Longtime Dylan fans are familiar with the early live recording where he stated, "Nowadays there are crueler Goliaths who do crueler and crueler things, but one day they're going to be slain, too." It's a familiar story and a metaphor that captured something of Dylan's appeal in the Sixties.

Where did this attitude and sensibility come from?

It's well-known that young Bob Dylan identified with the folk roots of his hero Woody Guthrie. Guthrie's story goes like this:

"At the age of just 14, Guthrie and his siblings were left to fend for themselves while their father worked in Texas to repay his debts. As a teenager, Guthrie turned to busking in the streets for food or money, honing his skills as a musician while developing the keen social conscience that would later be so integral to his legendary music.

"Guthrie left his family in 1935 to join the thousands of "Okies" who were migrating West in search of work. Like many other "Dust Bowl refugees," Guthrie spent his time hitchhiking, riding freight trains, and when he could, quite literally singing for his supper.

"In 1937, Guthrie arrived in California, where he landed a job with partner Maxine "Lefty Lou" Crissman as a radio performer of traditional folk music on KFVD in Los Angeles. The duo soon garnered a loyal following from the disenfranchised "Okies" living in migrant camps across California and it wasn't long before Guthrie's populist sentiments found their way into his songs."*

Four times in the 1940s American author John Steinbeck was nominated for a Nobel Prize in Literature before achieving it in 1962 "for his realistic and imaginative writings, combining as they do sympathetic humour and keen social perception." His novel The Grapes of Wrath poignantly tells the story of the disenfranchised for whom Woody Guthrie labored.

This mix of ingredients along with lessons learned growing up on the Iron Range permeated Dylan's early sensibilities. I think here of Hollis Brown, who "lived on the outside of town."

Even though a majority of the Boomer generation grew up in suburbia, which was supposed to be "the good life," many of the youth of that time felt an emptiness and confusion about the times they inhabited.

Early on Dylan keyed in to this generational angst in songs like "Hard Rain" and "The Times They Are A-Changin'," at a time with others were singing "He's So Fine" and "I Wanna Hold Your Hand." His music performed a role similar to the icebreakers on the great Northern Lake that was hugged by the port city where he was born. Carrying a torch that had been lit by his hero Woody Guthrie, his songs lit many other torches and in a few years we had "For What It's Worth" (Buffalo Springfield), "Ball of Confusion" (The Temptations), "Eve of Destruction" (Barry Maguire),  "Fortunate Son" (CCR) and more. By the early 1970s everyone was wondering "What's Goin' On?"

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Longtime fans and followers of Dylan's music and performances have commented to me that they're seeing a resurgence of interest in Dylan by growing numbers of young people attending his concerts in recent years. Some have wondered if it's simply a response to his "celebrity status," especially now having won the Nobel Prize. But there are others who have suggested that it's not that at all, rather that having grown up in homes where their parents listened to Dylan, they've now themselves begun to understand what he was singing about, and the lyrics are beginning to connect.

After a lifetime of hearing about the massive growth of our national debt, there's an unreality about it all for most Boomers. But there's no unreality for our young people about the high cost of health care, dental care, housing, taxes and even death (for those left behind) And then there's all that unpaid college debt, while being perpetually reminded that you're never too young to start saving for retirement.

The themes in It's Alright, Ma are as relevant to today's young people as when they were penned more than 50 years ago.

So don’t fear if you hear
A foreign sound to your ear
It’s alright, Ma, I’m only sighing

And so it goes.

*Biography