Time Out of Mind

The album has an atmospheric sound, the work of producer (and past Dylan collaborator) Daniel Lanois, whose innovative work with carefully placed microphones and strategic mixing was detailed by Dylan in his memoir, Chronicles: Volume One.

Shortly after completing the album, Dylan became seriously ill with near-fatal histoplasmosis. His forthcoming tour was canceled, and he spent most of June 1997 in excruciating pain. A potentially serious condition (caused by the fungal infection Histoplasma capsulatum), it makes breathing very difficult. “It was something called histoplasmosis that came from just accidentally inhaling a bunch of stuff that was out on one of the rivers by where I live”, said Dylan. “Maybe one month, or two to three days out of the year, the banks around the river get all mucky, and then the wind blows and a bunch of swirling mess is in the air. I happened to inhale a bunch of that. That’s what made me sick. It went into my heart area, but it wasn’t anything really attacking my heart”, Dylan told Guitar World magazine.

In light of Dylan’s May 1997 health scare, a number of columnists, including Dylanologist A. J. Weberman, speculated that the songs on Time Out of Mind were inspired by an increased awareness of his own mortality. This was despite the fact that all of the songs were completed, recorded, and even mixed before he was hospitalized. In interviews following its release, Dylan dismissed these speculations.

The record was regarded by Robert Christgau as “one of those nearness-of-death albums”, along with Mississippi John Hurt’s Last Sessions (1972), Bob Dylan’s Time Out of Mind (1997), Warren Zevon’s The Wind (2003), and Johnny Cash’s American VI: Ain’t No Grave (2010).

“My recollection of that record is that it was a struggle. A struggle every inch of the way. Ask Daniel Lanois, who was trying to produce the songs. Ask anyone involved in it. They all would say the same….As a result, though it held together as a collection of songs, that album sounds to me a little off. There’s a sense of some wheels going this way some wheels going that, but hey, we’re just about getting there.” – Bob Dylan

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