The unquiet american

The grand parade of lifeless packaging? Far from it, as this much-delayed blockbuster reissue of one of prog’s most fascinating and frustrating albums finally proves.

IF ONLY HALF the rumors about him are true, Ozzy Osbourne should be dead. Yet, after 21 years of twisted public behavior, the man who brought you songs like “Paranoid,” “Bark at the Moon” and “Childre

BOB DYLAN ’ S 18th BOOTLEG SERIES INSTALMENT – THROUGH THE OPEN WINDOW – IS AN AUDIO ANALOGUE TO A COMPLETE UNKNOWN: AN UNFURLING DOCUMENT OF A SEARING YOUNG TALENT IN THE ACT OF BECOMING. BUT BECOMING WHAT? ROCKER? FOLKIE? LOVER? POET? POLITICIAN? DIGGING INTO PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED MUSIC FROM 1956 TO ’63, MOJO MARVELS AT DYLAN’S FIRST GREAT PHASE ALONG WITH ITS STILL-STUNNED EYEWITNESSES. “IT WAS EARTH-SHAKING,” THEY TELL DORIAN LYNSKEY .

Every month we get inside the mind of one of the biggest names in music. This issue: Roy Harper . Since the mid-60s, the progressive folk singer-songwriter has enjoyed a successful solo career that’s also found him collaborating with everyone from Pink Floyd and Peter Gabriel to Kate Bush and Ian Anderson. But he’s never quite reached the commercial heights of his peers. As his Final Tour: Part Two fast approaches, he looks back over highlights from his career so far and teases a brand-new album.

Fifty years ago, WILLIE NELSON up-ended the tyranny of the Nashville Sound with a record like nothing before or, perhaps, since. The road to Red Headed Stranger was long and uphill: strewn with broken marriages, record label wrangles and acts of God, but it transformed his fortunes, and his image. "It got to be a cool thing to like Willie," discovers SYLVIE SIMMONS.

IT was a fine, windy day in September, and Rosalind Aston had an odd feeling that she was in love. The emotion was new, and she could not be sure, but she luxuriated in it as she walked towards the ha