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Q: Thankfully, Bob Dylan survived his health crisis. In 1986, the Heartbreakers began a stint as his backing band. What do you remember about that time?

A: I knew we came away from that a better band than we went into it. In the rehearsals, Bob had a really extensive library of songs in his head: pop songs, folk songs, sea shanties. We opened in Tel Aviv with "Go Down Moses." We really got a confident feeling that "we can pull off whatever we've got to pull off here."

Q: Speaking of touring, you are coming off one of your top tours this year, and you seemed to be playing with such verve and zest. Were there times when it has not been fun for you to be onstage?

A: It's always been great to be onstage. In 30 years you go through periods that maybe you remember some more fondly than others, and maybe there's times when you feel more beat up than others. When Ron Blair came back, something clicked. Ron, without him even knowing it, brought something really needed back into the band. He clicked with [Steve] Ferrone in a way that Howie hadn't. It's really effortless up there. It's not a lot of work.

Q: You have always stressed that you really like being in a band as opposed to being a solo artist.

A: Oh, yeah. I probably wouldn't do it if I wasn't in the Heartbreakers. Not at this point in my life. Maybe it sounds egotistical, but they are one of the best rock'n'roll bands that ever played the music.

Q: While you were on break from touring with Dylan, an arsonist torched your house with you, your wife and one of your daughters in it in 1987. How did that affect your outlook?

A: I think I came out of that not wanting to touch anything that was remotely angry. I think people who have been involved in some sort of violent act come out of it the same way, you know. I've seen it, where I can't watch that movie or I can't go there because I've seen the real thing and it's just not funny. So, when someone tries to kill you, you kind of have to reevaluate everything, like, "What the hell did I do?" Then you think, "I didn't do anything, I just became a mark for someone."

Q: It seems that as a result of the fire, you did some of your lightest work.

A: Absolutely. I came so close to being dead, and I was just so happy that me and my family and everybody lived through that. I think I was a little giddy, just really happy.

Q: Shortly thereafter, you and Jeff Lynne started working on your first solo record, "Full Moon Fever." Is it true that you turned it in and MCA hated it?

A: It's the only time in my life that a record's been rejected. And I was stunned. And I was so high on the record, and I tried to think, "What did I do wrong?" They said they didn't hear any hits, and there turned out to be, like, four or five hits on the record, some of the biggest ones I ever had.

Q: Were you concerned that the album would be permanently shelved?

A: I just thought, "It's just stupid. I made this really good record and they don't want it." But I didn't, like, go to work on another one. I just joined the Wilburys, and this just sat on the back burner. That was actually when I signed to Warner Bros. We were at Mo Ostin's house, [and] the Wilburys played "Free Fallin' " that night. Lenny Waronker was there and said, "That song's amazing," and I said, "Yeah, it just got refused at my label." Mo said, "I'll sign you up and put that out buddy, I'll sign you up right now," and I said, "You got a deal, Mo."

Q: But "Full Moon Fever" still came out on MCA.

A: We signed with Warner Bros. for when this deal ran out and just didn't say anything about it, but then a different bunch of bosses came in and they took the same record back and were like, "That's more like it, that's it, we'll put it out."

Q: So while you were in limbo with MCA over "Full Moon Fever," you went and worked on the Traveling Wilburys' first album, which came out in 1988. Were those two Wilbury albums as much fun to make as they seemed to be?

A: They absolutely were. That was a really good, good place for me to be at that time in my life. I really kind of felt like friends took me in.

The nicest thing about the Wilburys for all of us was that not any one of us had to carry the load. I think it freed us all a great deal. George had wanted a band for a long time; he hated being a solo artist. It was George's dream. And I'm just glad it got to come true for him. We were proud being Wilburys and it was a lot of fun, but the greatest thing to me was there were some really long-lasting friendships made, and that's a kind of gift that you just don't get all the time.

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