I have been contemplating for some time writing a book about Bob Dylan's John Wesley Harding album, as a follow-up to the worldwide publishing sensation that is Saint Dominic's Flashback.
I have some doubts: there is, of course, a lot more stuff about Dylan and his music out there already than there is about Van; and there are not many of the very few people involved in making JWH who are still alive to ask about it.
But I do feel that it is a relatively neglected album. There has been a great deal attention paid to the wild mercury sound of 1965-66, to the Basement Tapes, and now (with the release of The Bootleg Series Volume 10) to the fascinating but rather lesser work of Self Portrait and New Morning. Meanwhile, John Wesley Harding sits there enigmatically in its own space, refusing to draw attention to itself...
A book about the album would need to take a very close look at its contents, given that there is less to say about how it was made. I thought I'd have a test run by writing about one of the best songs on it, 'I Dreamed I Saw St Augustine' and you can see 4000 or so words on the subject here.
I'd be very glad of any comments - worth pursuing?