The Folk Act That Outsold Bob Dylan in the Swinging Sixties

For decades, the cultural narrative has insisted that Bob Dylan single-handedly rewrote the rules of popular music the moment he arrived in New York. Yet the commercial reality of the 1960s tells a rather different story, one that British readers with a fondness for fair play might find rather satisfying. While Dylan's artistic influence remains beyond dispute, the sales figures reveal that he was comfortably outsold by a duo who briefly quit the industry in despair before being rescued by an act of studio wizardry.

The retrospective throughline peddled by music journalists is that Dylan changed everything overnight. The Beatles conquered the charts with hysteria and record sales that embarrass their peers, but their success carries an asterisk: Dylan was entitled to a chunk of those sales. His second record, The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan, released in 1963, brought untold depth to the decade and inspired every artist who followed. Yet the album reached a disappointing 22nd place in the US charts upon release, only taking the top spot in the UK a year later.

Was Bob Dylan the best-selling US folk artist of the 1960s?

In fact, the 'Jokerman' singer was outsold by a fellow folk act on the US decade-end sales report. Simon and Garfunkel, who briefly quit the music industry after the failure of their debut album, surpassed him. Dylan was responsible for his own second-place finish, having hoisted himself by his own petard.

Their dainty folk debut, Wednesday Morning, 3 AM, proved a huge flop, released amid the hubbub of the British invasion. The Rolling Stones' debut topped the UK charts and came in at an impressive 11th in America. It was clear that rock 'n' roll was illuminating a different future than the folkies congregated in Greenwich Village had planned.

Dylan detected this from afar and thought about ditching his figurative gingham. At the Newport Folk Festival in 1965, he plugged in, and folk rock was born. His defining statement was 'Like a Rolling Stone', a folk track as heavy as anything in the world of rock.

Sitting behind the mixing desk of this masterful effort was Tom Wilson. He had also been around for the recording of 'Sounds of Silence', a sweet little masterpiece that lacked the muscle to stand up to the boisterous boys from Britain. It slumped out of the charts, prompting its progenitors to go their separate ways. Wilson knew a good track when he heard one, and he felt certain that the fate of such a masterpiece was not the ash heap of history. The solution he concocted was simple: give it the 'Like a Rolling Stone' treatment.

Without Simon and Garfunkel's knowledge, Wilson asked drummer Bobby Gregg and guitarist Al Gorgoni to stay behind during his recording sessions with Dylan. He welcomed Vinnie Bell and Bob Bushnell into the mix, and an impromptu rock band formed. The dual frontmen were untold miles away, apart and depressed. Wilson still had the master tape, and in potentially the earliest example of remote working, the band simply played electric instrumentation over the top of the original acoustic recording, and the two were later spliced.

Paul Simon only learned about the results of this experiment when he picked up the paper and saw 'Sounds of Silence' heading towards an overtake of The Beatles' chart-topping hit, 'We Can Work It Out'. The song remained the same in terms of its core, just rendered a little flashier for an era where standing out had suddenly become more important.

Just how successful were Simon and Garfunkel?

Suddenly, the band were no longer a flop. And Dylan was no longer laughing at them, as he, unfortunately, had a few months earlier. A handful of days before Simon and Garfunkel were set to play their first scheduled show at Gerde's Folk City in Greenwich Village, Dylan met Simon for the first time, and the duo famously had nothing much to say to each other in an awkward and cagey encounter.

When the Gerde show came about, Dylan slunk to the end of the bar with the critic Robert Shelton; as a hush descended and their set began, Dylan started guffawing at what was supposed to be a spiritual moment. The duo kept playing, cutting a vicious glance in the original vagabond's direction, but the laughter didn't abate. While Shelton said the giggles were merely bad timing, he did confirm that the meeting the week before was frosty enough to open up the potential that Dylan was scoffing intentionally at his new rivals on the scene.

So, it almost seems like payback on all fronts that he would later do them a favour with 'Like a Rolling Stone' and that they would then go on to surpass his sales with the song that it inspired. Much of their success would come at the tail end of the decade, just about eclipsing Dylan by a matter of tens. However, they would then accelerate into the 1970s at great pace.

While Dylan had longevity and consistency on his side, S&G also proved that the frenzy of one massive success is more profitable in music than a stream of solid returns. In the 1970s, they would even outsell the Stones despite breaking up at the very beginning of the decade. 'I always was well aware of the fact that Simon and Garfunkel was a much bigger phenomenon in general, to the general public than The Rolling Stones,' Paul Simon commented in 1972.

At the time, Bridge Over Troubled Water was romping through the charts, pushing the duo towards a new global pinnacle despite the fact that they had just called it quits. It soon became the best-selling album of all time, and at the close of the 1970s, it remained in the top spot with 25 million sales recorded. From hard rockers to your auntie Norma, every house had a copy.

The Stones' best was less than half that at the time, so you can retract any scoffs you might've made over Simon's statement. Dylan's best-selling record to this day remains Highway 61 Revisited, and that has only notched around 4 million units. So, while Simon might have bemoaned, 'I usually come in second (to Dylan), and I don't like coming in second,' there's at least one aspect where he just about came out on top. Although the race isn't over yet.