I am an unabashed Steve Earle fan. One of the first things I do just about every Sunday morning is fire up my Sirius XM app and listen to the replay of Earle’s Hardcore Troubadour show, an hour of him telling stories and playing songs.

See, Steve Earle is a really, really good song writer. And yet he is an even better story teller and self-made music historian.

The Moment in 1965… is built around a premise Earle has, that I have heard from him before, that Bob Dylan wanted to be John Lennon, and John Lennon wanted to be Bob Dylan. And that convergence is what elevated music to pure art. It popped up the folk and folked up the pop.

This audiobook is 80 minutes of Earle explaining, somewhat, how he arrived at this theory. It is mostly autobiographical about how he came to know the scene that was built by, as he believes it, these two men trying to be like the other. He does not really support this hypotheses in the book. I was hoping for me evidence in that regard.

But, I got an 80-minute condensed version of Earle telling stories I’ve mostly all heard before, because I am a habitual listener to his show. So, I would recommend this production to either the super fan, or the completely unaware. Someone with little knowledge of Earle or his influences. It’s probably not for the middle road folk. Other than we do get some fun cover songs sprinkled in.

Steve Earle is a natural born storyteller, and I’m gonna listen to about any story he tells.