John Wesley Harding

"Can one – should one – attempt to re-record, reinterpret, a forty-year old, somewhat legendary piece of work, a piece of work which could be argued to be inseparable from its author? Probably not." It seems that Thea Gilmore is not in the habit of listening to her own advice, because next month she releases a track-for-track reimagining of one of her favourite Bob Dylan albums – a process that began way back in 2002 when she recorded a version of ‘I Dreamed I Saw St Augustine' for a Uncut magazine covermount (it later appeared on her covers/rarities album, Songs From The Gutter). Thea's take on the song was well received, and spread far and wide. Indeed, when Thea met Bruce Springsteen for the first time in 2008, he hurried to praise her recording, calling it "one of the great Dylan covers"; "I may have blushed, I can't remember…" writes Thea. Reuniting with guitarist Robbie McIntosh and drummer Paul Beavis, who had both played on the ‘Augustine' cover, Thea and husband/bassist/producer Nigel Stonier went back into the studio in February to record the rest of the album tracks. "I've always thought that, whilst clearly other Dylan albums may have more ‘famous' and ‘iconic' songs, and more of those moments that are alleged to have changed music forever, [John Wesley Harding] is his most sustained, satisfying record," says Thea. "It runs beautifully from start to finish, songs bounce off each other, characters seemed unfathomably but implicitly linked, and the sense of earthiness and economy in Bob's lyrics is startling."