Bob Dylan's Times They Are A-Changin' lyrics for sale for US$2.2m

Los Angeles

BOB Dylan's handwritten lyrics to his 1960s classic The Times They Are A-Changin' are going up for sale with a US$2.2 million asking price in what could mark a world record for rock lyrics.

Gary Zimet, owner of Los Angeles-based autograph dealers Moments in Time, said on Sunday that the one-page sheet of lyrics, written in a notebook and with changes and scribbles, was originally owned by Dylan's current manager, Jeff Rosen, and was now being sold by an anonymous private collector.

"It's not an auction. It's a private sale. First come, first served," Zimet said.

Dylan's handwritten lyrics to Like a Rolling Stone fetched a world-record US$2 million when they were sold at auction by Sotheby's in New York in 2014.

The Times They Are A-Changin', written by Dylan back in 1963 and released on his 1964 album of the same name, is regarded as one of the most iconic protest songs of the 1960s.

Zimet said he was also selling the lyrics of two other Dylan songs - his 1965 track Subterranean Homesick Blues for US$1.2 million and 1969 ballad Lay Lady Lay for US$650,000.

"They are not quite as important, as iconic," said Zimet, explaining the lower prices. Subterranean Homesick Blues' is certainly a major, major song but not in the same league as The Times They Are A-Changin'.

The lyrics to popular songs, especially when handwritten and with scratched-out ideas or doodles, have become some of the most sought-after items for collectors of celebrity memorabilia. Don McLean's 16-page draft for American Pie fetched US$1.2 million in 2015, while Paul McCartney's scribbled partial lyrics for a recording of Hey Jude sold for US$910,000 at an online auction earlier this month.

Dylan, 78, last month released his first original music in eight years with a 17-minute song called Murder Most Foul that was inspired by the 1963 assassination of then-US president John F Kennedy. In 2016, Dylan became the only singer-songwriter to win the Nobel Prize for Literature. REUTERS