By Tony Attwood
A short while ago I wrote an article “Return to the Basement Tapes” in which I reflected upon the possibility that around 20 songs had “central themes” which basically “concern disasters, life just being a mess and everyone being trapped within that mess.”
And that made me contemplate further, if elsewhere in the Basement Tapes there are similar runs of songs which were recorded (as far as we can tell) one after another, and which all deal with the same topic. Not necessarily disasters, of course, but still the same topic for one song after the next. And I came up with this selection from the first part of the Basement Tapes collection to which I have done is added the central theme (as it appears to me) in relation to each piece.
- I’m Your Teenage Prayer (Young man and old man try to pick up a teenage girl) Lust
- One’s Man’s Loss (What is good for me, can hurt you, and vice versa) Relationships
- Baby won’t you be my baby (The world is awful, so stick with me) Love
- Try me little girl (Be my lover, I will liberate you from an awful life) Love
- I can’t make it alone (You’re not treating me right but I love you) Love
- Don’t you try me now (Don’t mess around with my delicate heart) Love
I find the notion of an old man trying to pick up a teenager very disturbing and I have to assume that this was not written in any seriousness (and if it was, I just hope both the old man and the teenager survived the experience). And yet it was written – Bob is clearly not improvising the lyrics, although the music follows two riffs that will be well known to all musicians familiar with pop and rock from the 1950s.
The first part of each verse will be instantly recogisable: it will be written as C, Am, F, G and has been used in thousands of songs.
Similarly the second part of each verse . Ultimate Guitar has given us the chords which I reproduce below – everyone who has ever played in a pop band will have played this sequence. And I would stress that I am aware that there is a strong element of pathos amidst the humour. I am just not sure that an old man without a sense of humour might get that it is not meant to be taken seriously…
D Bm G A D Take a look at me Babe, I'm your teenage prayer Bm G A D Take a look at me Babe, I'm your teenage prayer Bm G A D Take a look at me Babe, I'm your teenage prayer
There is as you can hear a variant middle 8 section too to the lyrics “When it’s cloudy all the time, all you gotta do is say you’re mine, I’ll come running anywhere,” which then return to the central “Take a look at me, Babe” theme.
The fact that the music is itself a copy of such a commonplace popular music approach (musicians will often write it I, VI, IV, V, I) indicating the chords that are formed on these notes of the scale – this allowing the musicians to transpose the song into a different key depending on the range of the singer.
It is of course a parody of popular songs and really doesn’t need too much explaining and I would suggest that the suggestion by the Song Lyrics website that “Beneath the surface lies a complex dynamic of worship and need, where the speaker’s identity becomes entirely defined by his ability to serve another’s emotional requirements,” really isn’t necessary. It seems a bit over the top. For to me a parody, and the commentary on that website seems to take the song seriously.
The fact is that, in my experience, when competent musicians get together they can often engage in playing an established and well-known chord sequence (in this case D, Bm, G, A) and then start inventing some lyrics around them. Of course few musicians are as good as Dylan at the instant lyric-invention part of the process, but all musicians who have spent a while playing pop and rock will pick up on the chord sequence within seconds.
The joke therefore is that the man offering himself as the answer to the teenage prayer is an old timer, who has been around the block more times than he should have been, and really doesn’t have much to offer. What he wants in return from the teenager who is taken in by him however, is not something I wish to go into here – but of course we all know what Bob is implying.
In my experience of playing in bands, it is not uncommon for such well known sequences to be played over and over by one member of the band during a break in rehearsals, and then for the others to join in – it is an time of relaxation where mistakes don’t matter, and the strong focus on getting everything right for the recording can be set aside for a few moments.
Playing the repeated framework in D also makes life easy for guitarists also since the four chords can all sit neatly together without much need to move the left hand around.
Now of course in writing these comments I am simply drawing on my years as a musician, but I thought it might be interesting to see what AI makes of this – not least as in England, where I live, the influence and impact of AI is a regular feature on the news. Indeed we seem to be at the stage where the ten minute news broadcasts each morning have to have an AI story in there, somewhere.
So here is what AI says…. (and it points out that Bm actually represents the chord of B minor, but I’ve cut that bit just to make this read a little more easily…)
- “With or Without You” by U2 uses the related sequence D – A – Bm – G (I – V – vi – IV) as its core loop.
- “Hey There Delilah” by Plain White T’s uses D – A – Bm – G.
- “Photograph” by Ed Sheeran uses D – Bm – A – G.
- “Young and Beautiful” by Lana Del Rey features G – A – Bm – D.
They also mention what they call “Classic 1950s Doo Wop” progressions and refer to songs like Stand by Me.
Now it seems to me there is an interesting point here, because Bob generally uses mainstream (by which I mean, well known and regularly used) chords in the accompaniment to most of this songs. Inded “Desolation Row”, which lyrically, I would argue, is one of his most complex set of lyrics, has the simplest chordal accompaniment even missing out the minor chord…
D
They're selling postcards of the hanging
G D
They're painting the passports brown
A7
The beauty parlour is filled with sailors
G D
The circus is in town
D
Here comes the blind commissioner
G D
They've got him in a trance
A7
One hand is tied to the tightrope walker
G D
The other is in his pants
G
And the riot squad they're restless
D G
They need some where to go
D A7
As lady and I look out tonight
G D
On Desolation Row
There is a list of hundreds of songs that use the I VI IV V sequence but none of them seem to be by Dylan. I wonder what Bob had against that sequence.