From Miles Davis to Jay-Z, the artfully selected secrets of Barack's iPod

When the US Secret Service agents protecting Barack Obama whisper "renegade" into their earpieces, they are using a "secret" codename that is meant to reflect something of the man. When the latest issue of Rolling Stone hits newsstands tomorrow, his rebel appeal will receive another boost, just as the presidential election campaign moves into top gear.

What jumps off the page in a wide-ranging interview with Mr Obama are not his policies but his early musical influences and favourite books, along with his iPod playlist. The article, by the magazine's editor Jann Wenner, is part of a strategy to add colour and detail to the hazy portrait of Mr Obama that many Americans carry around in their heads.

Like any politician, Mr Obama wants to appeal to as wide an audience as possible, but whether he is talking music, movies or economic policy, he has plenty to say. "I have pretty eclectic tastes," he tells readers, adding that he probably has 30 Bob Dylan songs on his iPod, including the Blood On The Tracks album. "Actually, one of my favourites during the political season is [Dylan's] 'Maggie's Farm'," he says. "It speaks to me as I listen to some of the political rhetoric."

In what is Mr Obama's second Rolling Stone interview, he tries to dispel claims put about by his political opponents that he is a "coolly arrogant" elitist.

The Obama musical playlist effortlessly straddles generations and tastes, taking in the jazz of John Coltrane, the rock of Bruce Springsteen and the Rolling Stones and finally coming bang up to date with the rappers Jay-Z and Ludacris, with a nod to the cellist Yo-Yo Ma along the way. Mr Obama says he loved the Stones, Elton John and Earth, Wind & Fire while growing up in the 1970s but, if he has to pick one musical hero, it is Stevie Wonder.

"When I was just at that point where you start getting involved with music, Stevie had that run with Music Of My Mind, Talking Book, Fulfillingness' First Finale and Innervisions, and then Songs In The Key Of Life. Those are as brilliant a set of five albums as we've ever seen."

When asked "What is on your iPod?", Mr Obama plunges ahead with a description of the jazz he learned to love while a somewhat disconnected high school student in Hawaii. "I started getting into jazz," he explains, "so I've got a lot of Coltrane, a lot of Miles Davis, a lot of Charlie Parker. I've got all the artists we've already talked about, but I've got everything from Howlin' Wolf to Yo-Yo Ma to Sheryl Crow to Jay-Z."

Mr Obama's advisers insist there is nothing artificial or forced about his public image, although his access to journalists is carefully controlled. But when his spokeswoman, Linda Douglas, tempted fate recently by revealing that the Democratic candidate was a serious movie and television buff, the Time magazine interviewer Mark Halperin tried to catch him off-guard by asking him who betrayed Michael Corleone in The Godfather by setting up the meeting with Barzini: Clemenza or Tessio?

Mr Obama rolled his eyes and replied "Tessio, of course", adding that the role was played by Abe Vigoda, who he also pointed out was in the popular comedy cop show Barney Miller. That response prompted Ms Douglas to call Mr Obama "the most normal person I've ever met running for President".

Andy Gill's verdict on Obama's playlist

The Rolling Stones, Gimme Shelter

Taken from their Let It Bleed album, the gospel-rock groove and Merry Clayton's impassioned vocal have an exultant fervour that obviously strikes a chord with the churchgoing politico; though one suspects the ambivalent lyric – equally applicable to heroin as to social concern – might have slipped by his radar.

Bob Dylan, Maggie's Farm

Capturing Dylan on the cusp of folk and rock, "Maggie's Farm" is his absurdist refraction of "Penny's Farm", a folk song criticising a mean landlord. In Dylan's hands, the farm expands to take in the entire system of labour relations, ridiculed in a series of vignettes of petty officialdom and nepotism. Some might even think it socialist.

Bruce Springsteen, The Rising

The title track of his first post-9/11 album has a strong religious undertow. The protagonist, a fireman struggling up a World Trade Centre stairwell, realises he's not going to survive the day, and throws himself upon the mercy of his God: the themes of healing and inclusivity have obvious resonance with Mr Obama's political attitudes.

Boyd Tonkin's verdict on Obama's books

William Shakespeare, The Complete Works

Mr Obama's trio of literary favourites is a masterclass in covering your bases in style. First, the future global statesman needs to embrace the classics of the Western canon. So why mess around with fancy choices? Head for the Bard and you won't go wrong. It says: I'm relaxed at the top table, at ease with the greats – present and past.

Toni Morrison, Song of Solomon

Morrison's 1977 novel bows to the black world that got Mr Obama this far, but smartly so. Song of Solomon is the connoisseur's choice, a richer – and angrier – work than the better-known Beloved, and with firmer roots in recent African American history. It traces a journey back to the South: electorally, and psychologically, crucial to his cause.

Ernest Hemingway, For Whom the Bell Tolls

Hemingway brings in the jock vote, but Mr Obama chooses not some buddy-buddy parable like The Old Man and the Sea but Papa's Spanish Civil War epic, a left-wing tragedy rooted in the revolutionary dreams and dramas of the time. What a clever, clever man.

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