DO LOOK BACK

Imagine being present when a movement starts to take hold, when the world begins to take notice of something that would eventually change everything. Like when the Sex Pistols played Manchester in June 1976—a legendary show with only a few dozen in attendance but often referred to as “the gig that changed the world." Among those present was a murderers’ row of attendees who all left the gig inspired to start their own bands, including Howard Devoto and Pete Shelley (who formed Buzzcocks); Ian Curtis, Bernard Sumner, and Peter Hook (who formed Joy Division, and eventually New Order after the death of Curtis); Mark E. Smith (the Fall); Morrissey (the Smiths); and Tony Wilson (founder of Factory Records and the Hacienda nightclub). History in the making.

That’s like what happened with photographer Daniel Kramer, after seeing a clip of a wild-haired brunet kid of average height playing guitar on television. What drew him to this young man wasn’t the music; it was his poetry, and how it weaved through the songs. Kramer felt compelled to shoot this young Bob Dylan right away. After six months of contacting Dylan’s manager with a request for an hour shoot and being repeatedly rejected, Kramer finally was given the green light. He headed up to Woodstock, N.Y., and “the hour became five or six hours, and I made about two dozen 11x14 prints,” as Kramer remembers in a 2017 interview with Fahey/Klein Gallery. “I laid my prints out across the conference room table and he and his manager walked around the table, looked at the pictures, and then Bob stopped next to me and said, ‘I’m going to Philadelphia next week. Do you want to come?”’