Jacob Dylan helps put glitter in Gallo Center's gala night

By MARIJKE ROWLAND
mrowland@modbee.com

last updated: August 15, 2008 09:29:28 AM

The burden of following in a famous father's footsteps might understandably turn anyone into a wallflower.

But after breaking out of his dad's shadow in the '90s with his hit-making, Grammy-winning band, The Wallflowers, Jakob Dylan now is breaking away even more with his first solo album, "Seeing Things," released this summer.

He'll bring his music to the Foster Theater to help kick off the Gallo Center for Arts' second season Aug. 22.

While on break from The Wallflowers, the 38-year-old father of four has put out a sparse, 10-song acoustic album featuring only his acoustic guitar, bass and voice. The son of music icon Bob Dylan has told interviewers he knows the obvious, reverse parallels that will be drawn between his new work and his father's past.

In June, he told Newsweek magazine, "The article's going to say, 'Dylan goes acoustic.' I can give you 20 references of what the (writers) will say to be witty."

The reference is to his father's then-scandalous decision to go from acoustic folk performer to plugged-in electric rocker at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival.

Earlier this year, the younger Dylan told NPR he had wanted to work on an acoustic album for a long time. He said writing such spare songs was a welcome challenge.

"I was aware that there weren't going to be an other distractions," he said on NPR's World Cafe. "A lot of times, you write lines to get you to the next line. And you are aware that the song is probably going to do an organ fill right there anyway. (Now) you are just more aware that things are going to be more exposed and you just can't really let anything go unless you're confident that that is what you want to say."

Dylan worked with veteran record producer Rick Rubin, who famously produced critically acclaimed, stripped-down albums for the likes of Johnny Cash and Neil Diamond. The result is a release that touches on the personal and political, with songs like "Everybody Pays As They Go," War is Kind" and "Evil is Alive and Well."

"Seeing Things" was released jointly by his dad's label, Columbia Records, and java giant Starbucks Entertainment, putting his music directly in the ears of coffee drinkers everywhere.

Still, Dylan's departure into an minimalistic landscape shouldn't be seen as the death knell of The Wallflowers.

The group is just on hiatus, and Dylan joked that the departure is only because his bandmates were sick of seeing him. Fans still can expect to hear some of their favorite Wallflowers hits like "6th Avenue Heartache" and "One Headlight" at solo shows like the one in Modesto.

"I can play those songs in my sleep," he told NPR.

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