Bob Dylan’s rapping teenage grandson is back. More than three years after releasing his debut mixtape, Pablo Dylan is again trying to break out of obscurity and create what he calls a “cultural movement”.
“If this is what I want to do with my life, I’m going to set out to be the best who’s ever done it,” Pablo Dylan declared to Rolling Stone. Now 19, the rapper concedes that his 10 Minutes mixtape didn’t have the lasting impact he had hoped it would.
But after years of refining his music, working “16 hours a day”, Dylan is ready for the next step: “I mean this in the least arrogant way possible: What Rick Rubin did with Def Jam, that’s my vision. I want to create a real cultural movement.”
He has previewed the LP with Midnight, a track he produced himself,, playing piano and drums, writing lyrics about his adolescence. He has also warned listeners that Midnight “[does not] really [represent] what my album is going to sound like”.
Bob Dylan will not appear on the record – “that’s a conversation that’s never happened and probably never will happen,” said Pablo - the world’s most acclaimed songwriting grandpa has given him “a lot of advice”.
“There’s not an individual I love more,” Pablo said. . “I can’t say that I’m ever going to reach [his] level,” he went on, “but I’m going to give it my everything to try and make music that’s that impactful.”
Dylan senior, 73, has revealed that his 36th studio album, Shadows in the Night, will also be released in 2015. Billboard reports that it “consists entirely of Frank Sinatra covers”.
