Dylan cover/major feature make new MOJO a must-buy

The new (“January 2007”) issue of MOJO, the beautifully designed grandadrock monthly, has a cover and main feature devoted to Dylan, the magazine’s “Man of the Year 2006”.

The cover pic is a classic black and white big hair/shades portrait from c1965. The feature aims to be a guide to the Top 50 Dylan albums. (I was surprised, too, at the total, but the releases do add up to 50, if you include 10 live CDs and 7 compilations). MOJO doesn’t say how the ranking of the albums was decided.

The “top 10 albums” are treated to “why I love it” articles by a mixture of journalists and music biz names, with capsule reviews of the rest of the catalogue. I enjoyed Johnny Black on Blonde On Blonde, and Phil Sutcliffe’s two pieces, on Highway 61 Revisited, and on the compilations (slightly tarnished by someone dropping in the wrong cover artwork for the first two hits albums).

But quite why anyone would be interested in reading the thoughts of Billy Bragg, Cat Power and Norah Jones on Dylan escapes me - when mags like MOJO play the show biz celeb card, I normally shelve the stuff, unread. Life’s far too short.

The new MOJO has loads of nice, if familiar, Dylan pics, too - a must-buy, even if not really a must-read.

The mag’s cover-mount CD, a tribute to the Beach Boys, is already providing sterling service as a fancy desktop coffee coaster.

www.mojo4music.com



Gerry Smith