Taking Bob Dylan

I’ve been going through my garage recently, doing some spring cleaning (I realize that it’s summer, but better late than never . Ironically, I’ve found a lot of old merch and promo items from my "American Garage" days. American Garage was the first incarnation of my label, before I changed it to Fosterchild Records. The label was a bigger entity back then and we produced some cool promo items for my first official CD release, "Everybody’s Girl". I found these huge posters, for example, of me sitting on my guitar player’s Marshall amp, and I had to both laugh (because these are ridiculously massive posters of ME), and cry (because I was a size 6 back then, and I’ve gone up a few sizes ). I also found some "She Means Everything To Me" t-shirts, and other things like table-toppers, a few "broken…beautiful" hats, etc….

I also found stuff from the "Underdogs" era, such as a special promo cd we did for our radio single, "Taking Bob Dylan". Ah, memories . I remember wanting the lyrics to the song to be on that cd cover, as opposed to a picture of me (for once !). I felt like that song, in particular, was strong enough to speak for itself. I met a little bit of resistance about that from the people I was working with, but ultimately, I stuck to my guns and we produced the cd single with just the lyrics on the cover. We took it to radio and got some great support at the Triple A level. Dave Hall at WRLT, Lightning 100, in Nashville, was a big champion of the song, and his support was undeniably pivotal in getting lots of other stations across the country on board to support it. The song went on to win some international songwriting awards, and it remains a fan favorite at my live shows.

So…I was talking about all these discoveries at last week’s Fosterchild meeting, and we decided that we would re-release some of what will be called "Vintage Jen" items. We won’t do it all at once, though, as we’ve gotta keep things interesting . But I wanted to let you know that this coming week, we are going to put up the "Taking Bob Dylan" single for sale (autographed, if you like), along with some bundles from that period. Here’s a video of me singing "Taking Bob Dylan" at my recent Tin Pan South show at The Rutledge in Nashville.

This is one way in which we thought we could introduce new members of Jen Foster’s Army to some of these songs. It’s also a fun way to reminisce with those of you who have been part of the journey since the beginning. Go get your own piece of “Taking Bob Dylan.”