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By Tony Attwood
If only there had been a Nobel Prize for Music
- 1: We might have noted the musical innovations more
- 2: From Hattie Carroll to the incoming ship
- 3: From Times to Percy’s song
- 4: Combining musical traditions in unique ways
- 5: Using music to take us to a world of hope
- 6: Chimes of Freedom and Tambourine Man
In 1964 Dylan seemed keen to keep changing the subject matter of his songs. The opening song of the year in terms of compositions was Guess I’m doing fine (which basically says the opposite in the lyrics). This was followed by a protest song Chimes of Freedom and then what can perhaps be described as a surreal way of seeing the world with Mr Tambourine Man.
Musically Dylan was also exploring where he could take his songs. In Chimes of Freedom for example we have chords introduced that were certainly unusual – a chord which can only be described as a C9 turns up for example on the word “broken” in the line “midnight’s broken toll”.
In Tambourine Man we have eight-beat and four-beat phrases within the verses and a rhyme scheme is pushed beyond its natural limits where “wandering” is an implied rhyme of “under it.” And as if that is not enough, in the final verse the number of lines is expanded, while the rhyming scheme is kept and then abandoned. And although the rhyme scheme is itself a literary device its abandonment has a significant effect on how we feel the music.
But the listener is bound up in the music and simply feels the extension of the verse and the lack of certainty about where everything is going, which is of course in keeping with the opening concept in the lyrics that the singer doesn’t know where he is going, except that in the “jingle jangle morning,” he is following wherever he is led.
My point therefore is that here both the lyrics and the music are taking us in a new direction and that the changing rhyme scheme and changing number of lines in a verse reflect the uncertainty of where we are going.
The uncertainty of who or what the Tambourine Man is continued in the next song Dylan composed, “I don’t believe you” which has the subtitle “She acts like we never have met”. This of course gives us a sense of confusion before the music begins in that the main title line (“I don’t believe you”) doesn’t appear in the song at all – an approach Dylan returned to later.
At the same time, Dylan uses rotating unusual chords which are clearly explained on the Dylan chords website which includes details of the variant approach in the Rolling Thunder performances. Here, musically Dylan is using a mix of the C and G chords played on the top three strings of the guitar and adding in a range of rhymes to the lyrics
I can’t understand She let go of my hand [internal rhyme] An’ left me here facing the wall [rhyme with line 4] I’d sure like t’ know Why she did go [internal rhyme] But I can’t get close t’ her at all [rhyme with line 2] Though we kissed through the wild blazing nighttime She said she would never forget [rhyme with line 4] But now mornin’s clear It’s like I ain’t here [internal rhyme] She just acts like we never have met [rhyme with line 2]
This is in essence a strophic composition in which we have a series of verses; the classic form of story-telling folk songs. The experimentation therefore is left to the music which of course we can hear with those rotating opening chords in each line.
But in the next composition Bob really does begin to explore the possibilities of the music, for here he introduces the notion of starting the singing after the first beat of the bar so we have the effect of
[Beat]Gypsy gal, the / hands of Harlem / [Beat] Cannot hold you / To its heat
And this really is a song where Bob is experimenting with the music, for more of an oddity pops up in the penultimate line where Bob sings “Let me know, babe, all about my fortune” which in fact occupies three bars rather than the two bars occupied musically by every other line. That this doesn’t sound singularly odd is in part because in this song Bob doesn’t sing on the first beat of every line, so we get the effect of
[Beat] Gypsy gal, the / hands of Harlem [Beat[ cannot hold you / to its heat / [Beat] Your temperature is too / hot for tamin' / [Beat] Your flaming feet are burnin'/ up the street / Pause (2 beats) [Beat] I am homeless, / come and take me [Beat] To the reach of your / rattlin' drums [Beat] Let me know, babe, / [Beat] all about my / fortune, [Beat] Down a-long my restless / palms
There are actually other ways of writing this out musically, but it is very hard to explain this as anything other than by introducing an unusual number of lines in a verse. In short, whichever way we explain what Bob is doing musically, the result is, it’s very unusual, and it gives us a feeling of edginess. (Or oddness).
The lyrics written out on the official site give no clue to this rhythmic oddity, but it is certainly there in the song and does again show Bob’s interest in experimentation within the form of what might otherwise just be another folk song. A good and interesting folk song, but still, a standard folk song.
Indeed this is further emphasised further by the fact that after this love song to a wonderful gypsy gal, what we get next in terms of the order in which Bob wrote songs is Motorpsycho Nightmare which is nothing less than nine verses of 12-bar talking blues insanity involving the farmer’s daughter who looks like Tony Perkins, (who played Norman Bates in the Hitchcock movie Psycho).
Thus clearly what we have is Bob flitting from style to style – but why he was doing this (and do remember I am dealing with the songs in the order that they were written) – we can only guess. The answer “because he could” is a possible answer. But I prefer the notion that he wanted to see just how far the form could be taken with one man and a guitar. Folk songs until this point had been strophic (verse, verse, verse) or binary (verse, chorus, verse, chorus). But Bob was inquisitive and an explorer and wanted to go further.
But we must also note that this inquisitiveness is not only reflected in different styles of music but also in terms of the move from lighthearted the serious subject matter, which of course also required a move in terms of the musical style and form. Thus next he wrote It ain’t me babe, a plaintive song of farewell, needing a very different musical approach.
Now here the irregularities are set aside. It is a song of 12 lines, each of two bars of music, and with line two rhyming with line four, line six rhyming with line eight, in the classic song style.
But even then there is one oddity, which is that in the chorus of four lines (that fits perfectly with the rhythmic scheme of the whole song,) there is no rhyme – three lines end with “babe” and one stands alone with the word “door” at its conclusion (as in “someone to open each and every door”). This feels ok because the “babe” in the final line is paused, allowing us to feel that “door” rhymes with “for” (as in “It ain’t me you’re looking for…. babe)
And yet if that is what we feel, it is still out of sync with the rest of the song where it is lines two and four that rhyme, not line one and four…
Go away from my windowLeave at your own chosen speedI'm not the one you want, babeI'm not the one you need You say you're lookin' for someoneWho's never weak but always strongTo protect you and defend youWhether you are right or wrong Someone to open each and every doorBut it ain't me, babeNo, no, no, it ain't me, babeIt ain't me you're lookin' for, babe
My point here is that musically, even when Bob sounds as if he is following a standard format of four-line verses he isn’t doing that at all. For the third section above is not a chorus in the normal sense of the word, in that the first of those final four lines varies and the other three lines all end with the word “babe” and thus cannot be said to rhyme.
In short what Bob is so often doing is varying, developing and evolving the musical forms that he is using, often taking them to their limits. It can sound on occasion, that he is using a standard form of songwriting, but as we come to look at each song in detail, there is some musical variation within, which, even if we don’t recognise it musically, often can take us a-back somewhat, and hold those lines in our memory in a way that would not happen if the song were conventionally written.
In short, even at this early time in his songwriting career Bob was playing with the form of the song, stretching it, varying, and in essence, seeing just how far it could be pushed without the songs either breaking apart or becoming incomprehensible.