Untold Dylan

By Larry Fyffe

(Interview conducted by Larry Fyffe)

Untold: So, Bob, tell our readers about your visit to Canada in the winter of ’64.

Bob: Well, I was visitin’ my home town in Minnesota when I get this call from the CBC invitin’ me up to record some of my songs for them … so I hitchhike over to Kittson County, on the border – to Hallock, a small town on Two Rivers. … to join up with a Canadian friend of mine.

Untold: What’s his name?

Bob: Joe … Joe Two Rivers … an Ojibway-French guy …Metis, they call them; he’s from the Red River Valley, just across the border in Manitoba … works for the Canadian Forest Service with a bunch of forest rangers.

Untold: You ever mention Joe in any of your songs?

Bob: Kinda …made a joke about Joe in “Bob Dylan’s Blues”:

Well, the Lone Ranger and Tonto
They were walkin’ down the line
Fixin’ everybody’s troubles except mine

Untold: How about in any other songs?

Bob: “Red River Shore” tells the whole tale …. Two Rivers was with me up in
Red River Valley country in a log cabin where the songs were recorded for CBC-TV:

Pretty maids all in a row lined up
Outside my cabin door
I’ve never wanted any of them wantin’ me
‘Cept the girl from the Red River Shore

Untold: The gal from the Red River shore?

Bob: It’s a long story … Joe, he puts on this jacket given him by Chief Floating Cloud … mixes up some Indian herbs in a pipe, and we smoke it … the next thing I know I’m in some strange land.

Untold: Strange land?

Bob: Strange time, too … Joe later informs me that we travelled back to the old Red River Colony in Manitoba, and it’s 1869 all over again – I write about all about that long strange trip in the song:

Well, I sat down by her side
And for a while I tried
To make that girl my wife
She gave me her best advice
She said, ‘Go home, and lead a quiet life’

Unold: You’re kiddin’ … You meet some gal from the North Country … back a century and a half ago?!

Bob: Yeah, I tried mixin’ up some herbs myself after I returned to the present so that I could go back to her, but it didn’t work out:

Well, I went back to see about her once
Went back to straighten it out
Everybody that I talked to had seen us there
Said they didn’t know who I was talkin’ about

Untold: What was her name?

Bob: ‘Rose Marie’ …Metis she was …so Joe tells me … she said ‘adieu’ all the time:

Well, the dream dried up a long time ago
Don’t know where it is anymore
True to life, true to me
Was the girl from the Red River Shore

Untold: So you still miss her?

Bob: You might say that … Even more than Edgar Poe misses his lost Lenore:

Well, I can’t escape from these memories
Of the one that I’ll always adore
All those nights, when I lay in the arms
Of the girl from the Red River Shore

Untold: Did you meet anyone else … back then?

Bob: No, but I was kinda hopin’ Jesus comes along, and brings Rose back to life for me:

Well, I don’t know what kind of language that He used
Or if they do that kind of thing anymore
Sometimes I think nobody ever saw me here at all
‘Cept the girl from the Red River Shore

Untold: What about Joe Two Rivers?

Bob: That’s the funny part ….Turns out his name’s ‘Mike’ …. from the Ukraine.

Untold: Oh …. Anyway, it’s a very beautiful song.

Bob: Yeah, the hills have a way of doin’ that to ya.

(End Of Interview)

Meanwhile…

You might also enjoy Untold’s earlier exclusive interview with Bob on the roof of the St James Hotel.

And our enquiry: “What did Bob Dylan die of?”

What else is on the site?

You’ll find an index to our latest posts arranged by themes and subjects on the home page.  You can also see details of our main sections on this site at the top of this page under the picture.

The index to the 500+ songs reviewed is now on a new page of its own.  You will find it here.  It contains links to reviews of every Dylan composition that we can find a recording of – if you know of anything we have missed please do write in.

We also now have a discussion group “Untold Dylan” on Facebook.  Just type the phrase “Untold Dylan” in, on your Facebook page or follow this link 

And please do note   The Bob Dylan Project, which lists every Dylan song in alphabetical order, and has links to licensed recordings and performances by Dylan and by other artists, is starting to link back to our reviews.

by Tony Attwood

As I noted earlier there are two Dylan songs called “On a Rainy Afternoon”.  One comes from 1966 in the the Glasgow hotel rooms series of recordings, and the other from the Basement Tapes – it appears on disc six of the complete set.  Dylan’s official site only acknowledges the Basement Tape version.

The quality of the Basement Tape recording, although far from perfect, is a lot better than many of the recordings on disc six, and listening to the band play it does seem as if everyone had been given a briefing of the chord changes, and there is a good mix of the instruments playing.

The only problem is that the lyrics are really hard to work out as the song bounces along in its jolly way.  The recording of Dylan’s verse is not perfect, but not that bad, so I suspect he was making quite a bit of it up as he went along.

No one that I can find has had a bash at the lyrics so it is down to me to make a total idiot of myself over such things, but that has happened so many times it doesn’t matter any more. Please improve and correct and let’s do the collective thing and try and get a decent set of words.

Here’s my version thus far.  If no one writes in, that’s where it will stand.

Don't imagine, her name or where she's from
High tension but she notes what she's on
I know things and I've told you why
What she wants about the folks they try
But I take now from my ??
I'm rolling on this lazy afternoon

Can't get on it but she's on her head
Well hard money comes by looking for her
Now she comes and oh she goes
But ??? and nobody knows
But if you want it you can only beware
Can't reward you on a lazy afternoon

Keep singing there's something on her mind
But I see you but she still is hard to find
As she goes oh why she hollers
Man oh man but its hard for   dollars
I take you again for a while
Kick the ballroom on a lazy afternoon

The Haiku 61 reads

It sounds like she’s gone,
Leaving Bob hanging around
On a rainy day.

That doesn’t really seem to relate to what I heard, and that’s probably my mistake but for once the Haiku creator didn’t add any lyrics, so I guess he found it hard going too.

But one thing is for sure, this is a lot easier listening than one or two of the recordings presented slightly earlier on disc 6.  Of course we’ve no idea if the order of presentation on the CD is the order of recording, but if it was, Bob seems to have brightened up a bit.

What else is on the site?

You’ll find an index to our latest posts arranged by themes and subjects on the home page.  You can also see details of our main sections on this site at the top of this page under the picture.

The index to the 500+ songs reviewed is now on a new page of its own.  You will find it here.  It contains links to reviews of every Dylan composition that we can find a recording of – if you know of anything we have missed please do write in.

We also now have a discussion group “Untold Dylan” on Facebook.  Just type the phrase “Untold Dylan” in, on your Facebook page or follow this link 

And please do note   The Bob Dylan Project, which lists every Dylan song in alphabetical order, and has links to licensed recordings and performances by Dylan and by other artists, is starting to link back to our reviews.

By Tony Attwood

The King of France, Track 9 of disc six on the Basement Complete is another song in which Bob has a roughly worked out chord sequence, and an idea for a song – the King of France goes to the USA and appears to have various misadventures.

It is very hard to work out the lyrics although the melody itself develops quite nicely over time as the Dylan on keyboards gets some accompaniment from his pals, but I think overall this is another approach to the nonsense story line of Bob Dylan’s 115th Dream but not at all as well worked out.

The French monarchy ended in 1792 as part of the French Revolution which began in 1789, although the line continues as pretenders to the throne and has reached Louis XX, who is Louis Alphonse, Duke of Anjou.

The chord sequence behind the song is nothing special – everything would come from the lyrics if the song were to be developed – as was the case with the 115th Dream.

Track 10 on the same CD is “She’s on my mind again.”  Again the recording is very poor, but this sounds more worked out.  It’s got a sad, regretful sound as you might expect.  The format is verse-verse-verse without any break.  The surprise at the end of each verse is the movement to the chord of the minor 6th (A minor if you were playing in C) which instantly transfers back into the start of the next verse without any pause.  It’s not a very common technique for Bob.

Rather unexpectedly there is a version sung in Japanese on YouTube

The lyrics in English could be something like this for the first few verses…

Morning rose and dangle me
I’m notified but she don’t cost me
She’s on my way she goes
Anyway she want to try

Don’t believe away too long 
Go make me from my head gone
She don’t mind at all the way she goes
Happen in a fall

Raining’s on my open way

Ah you tried to holler too hard
Tried to loosen its on my bail
Ending in the summertime

Molly loses all my pay
No babe don’t listen on every day 
She’s on my mind, she’s all
Ready for the morning time

It continues in a similar way for quite a few more verses but without a clue as to what the words really are or what the theme of the song is, I have found it beyond me to put in the lyrics.  If you can work it out please do submit and you’ll get a full recognition.

Although to tell you the truth, I don’t think it matters.  It is just the idea of the chords and the opening line and after that it is make it up as we go along.

What else is on the site?

You’ll find an index to our latest posts arranged by themes and subjects on the home page.  You can also see details of our main sections on this site at the top of this page under the picture.

The index to the 500+ songs reviewed is now on a new page of its own.  You will find it here.  It contains links to reviews of every Dylan composition that we can find a recording of – if you know of anything we have missed please do write in.

We also now have a discussion group “Untold Dylan” on Facebook.  Just type the phrase “Untold Dylan” in, on your Facebook page or follow this link 

And please do note   The Bob Dylan Project, which lists every Dylan song in alphabetical order, and has links to licensed recordings and performances by Dylan and by other artists, is starting to link back to our reviews

By Larry Fyffe

Quintessential to Americana be the issue of gun ownership. Of this fact, singer/songwriter Bob Dylan is well aware:

(Bob Dylan: It’s A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall)

Guns have their good points –  they come in handy when seeking revenge in a fictional narrative involving a love triangle:

(Bob Dylan: Lily, Rosemary,  And The Jack Of Hearts)

Likewise, guns are rumoured to be a useful tool with which to make money:

(Bob Dylan: Idiot Wind)

And the truth of the matter is that most outlaws of the old West were misunderstood rebels who were forced to carry guns for their own protection:

(Bob Dylan: John Wesley Harding)

Be warned, however, that  killing people with guns may bring on feelings of remorse when the gunman gets older:

(Bob Dylan: Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door)

Remember that it’s always wise to carry an extra gun when you’re on the run with your sweetheart in a tale of romance:

(Bob Dylan: Romance In Durango)

To express their anti-authoritarianism in modern times, gangsters carry guns and use them, though they too may later show remorse:

(Bob Dylan: Joey)

Most important of all, without guns there’d still be slavery in America:

(Bob Dylan: With God On Our Side)

Worry not – if there’s any racial injustice today when someone gets blasted away by a gun – the truth will out:

(Bob Dylan: Hurricane)

Funny though it may be, owning a gun is important for self-defence in America regardless of whether or not there is any reasonable apprehension of danger:

(Bob Dylan: Motor Psycho Nightmare)

Finally, a gun makes a good simile in reference to a lovers’ quarrel; whether the quarrel be real or imagined, a shot of love will settle things quite nicely:

(Bob Dylan: She’s Your Lover Now)

Next time around, we’ll take a look at the bad side of owning a gun.

What else is on the site?

You’ll find an index to our latest posts arranged by themes and subjects on the home page.  You can also see details of our main sections on this site at the top of this page under the picture.

The index to the 500+ songs reviewed is now on a new page of its own.  You will find it here.  It contains links to reviews of every Dylan composition that we can find a recording of – if you know of anything we have missed please do write in.

We also now have a discussion group “Untold Dylan” on Facebook.  Just type the phrase “Untold Dylan” in, on your Facebook page or follow this link 

And please do note   The Bob Dylan Project, which lists every Dylan song in alphabetical order, and has links to licensed recordings and performances by Dylan and by other artists, is starting to link back to our reviews

By Tony Attwood

“Pretty Mary” on disc six of the Complete Basement Tapes is credited as a song composed by Bob Dylan, and the passing comments I have read about the song on Rolling Stone and elsewhere no one question that.  Neither does the writer of the Haikus.

So I could be putting my head in a noose here, but it seems to me to be the same melody that Bob used for “Farewell Angelina” – although I have just noticed that I got so carried away promoting a particular version of the song that in my review I forgot to go back to the origins of that song.

In fact as far as I can see the basics of this song were written by Paul Stookey, the “Paul” of Peter, Paul and Mary in 1963; you can try this version of Pretty Mary by Peter Paul and Mary if you want to hear the comparison.    Farewell Angelina which was written two years later.  The Basement song came in 1967.

Of course there are differences, but in essence they are all using the same basic melody, and the fact that the PPM song is called “Pretty Mary”, exactly as Dylan’s song is, is a bit of a giveaway too.

Here are the lyrics to the PPM song – it really is rather beautiful

Your parents don’t like me, they say I’m too poor,
They say I’m not worthy to enter your door.

My horses ain’t hungry, they won’t eat your hay,
So fare thee well darlin’ I’m goin away.

It is of course quite possible that the melody goes back into the realm of early English folk music, but I can’t for the moment place a particular song that from earlier days that has this melody.

The lyrics on the Basement track are however completely new, and provide us with a real challenge.  I’ve done my best and then had a look at the Haiku writer’s version and corrected some of the more awful errors I’ve made.

Pretty Mary pretty Mary
With the pink, white and gold
Will you tell me pretty Mary
Where do you ? gold

But I’m coming with the midnight
And the cold winds in twilight
And then a dream of the world
Of Pretty Mary tonight

Pretty Mary, don’t be lonely
Pretty Mary, don’t be cruel
You’re my only destination
And I’m coming for you

I’m been from the devil
On my bed one year
She’ll call them and backwards 
But you know that your dear
Now the cold winds to the crossroads
To the valleys go southwards
And I think you’re good looking, pretty Mary

Pretty Mary, don’t be lonely
Pretty Mary, don’t be cruel
You’re my only destination
And I’m coming for you

I wish that my whole life
On the Bible  so real
How she come and get me down
With the world at my heel
But I know it’s all right
If I bring you home tonight
I’ll at least be with pretty Mary.

Pretty Mary, don’t be lonely
Pretty Mary, don’t be cool
You’re my only destination
And I’m coming for you

I can’t imagine it is a song anyone will want to play more than once – twice at the most – unless you are taking on the challenge of deciphering the lyrics.  Besides Bob himself took it as far as it could possibly go with Farewell Angelina.

And to be completely fair to Bob, he never intended that this track would be released, and I suspect when he wrote it and improvised the lyrics he’d probably completely forgotten about the original by Peter Paul and Mary.

What else is on the site?

You’ll find an index to our latest posts arranged by themes and subjects on the home page.  You can also see details of our main sections on this site at the top of this page under the picture.

The index to the 500+ songs reviewed is now on a new page of its own.  You will find it here.  It contains links to reviews of every Dylan composition that we can find a recording of – if you know of anything we have missed please do write in.

We also now have a discussion group “Untold Dylan” on Facebook.  Just type the phrase “Untold Dylan” in, on your Facebook page or follow this link 

And please do note   The Bob Dylan Project, which lists every Dylan song in alphabetical order, and has links to licensed recordings and performances by Dylan and by other artists, is starting to link back to our reviews

———————-

You might also enjoy

by Larry Fyffe

Not noticed other than by ‘Untold Dylan’, the song by Bob Dylan called ‘Handy Dandy’ is a lyrical broth in which the translated French poet Charles Baudelaire is stewing. Typical of his cooking style, Dylan mixes in a batch of other poetic medicines as well.

Baudelaire is a free-spending, whore-seeking, alcohol-drinking, drug-taking, ‘dandy’ who deplores boring bourgeois life. He pens ‘The Flowers Of Evil’, concerning the sorrows that accompany life, sex, and death; he even once tries suicide:

(Charles Baudelaire: The Mask)

Bob Dylan treads more lightly:

(Bob Dylan: Handy Dandy)

Like Baudelaire, Dylan alludes to nursery rhymes:

(Handy Spanky : nursery rhyme)

Charles Baudelaire spends loads of money on an Afro-Fench dancer; he calls her his ‘Black Venus’:

(Charles Baudelaire: The Dancing Serpent)

Baudelaire’s sinister images are not lost on the singer/songwriter:

(Bob Dylan: Handy Dandy)

Nor are lost the images from the romantic lyrics of a folk song:

(Wild Mountain Thyme)

A song influenced by the darker Symbolist poet Paul Verlaine contains similar imagery:

(Bob Dylan: Ain’t Talkin’)

Baudelaire’s ‘surrealistic’ water fountain be not so pure, clear, or cool:

(Charles Baudelaire: Fountain Of Blood)

Singer/songwriter Bob Dylan humourously repeats a phrase from another Symbolist poet who is influenced by Baudelaire:

(Bob Dylan: Handy Dandy)

To wit:

(Arthur Rimbaud: On The Subject Of Flowers)

(Bob Dylan: Summer Days)

(Bob Dylan: Handy Dandy)

The two other Symbolist poets mentioned catch Baudelaire’s melancholia:

(Paul Verlaine: After Three Years)

By Tony Attwood

There are around 22,000 pages listed on Google which have the phrase “That’s the Breaks” listed along with a mention of Bob Dylan.  Unfortunately, 21,998 simply consist of a list of tracks, or a notice that the lyrics will appear here, which they don’t.   Neither entry really helps any of us very much.

In the entire history of mankind (or at least the part of humanity that writes in English about Dylan) only two writers have attempted to travel further.  With this little piece I claim third spot.  And I’m happy to stay in third.

Rolling Stone says. “On ‘That’s the Breaks,’ the singing is hard, extreme, the Blue Sky Boys’ “The Sunny Side of Life” turned inside out – an old, common song that’s gone wrong, that took the wrong road: ‘That’s the breaks/On the other side of life.’ This might be the deepest mine here, where at the end of a tunnel John Henry finds the alchemist’s cave where folk songs are made and found.”

I am not sure I follow that completely, but as far as it goes I suspect that if I’d come up with that final sentence I’d have said this represents the end of the tunnel where John Henry finds the alchemist, old, decrepit, as without his powers endlessly throwing metal into the pot, hoping for gold, but not realising that the fire below the tub has long since gone out.

But if you can do better than me, or at least be more positive than me, please do write in.  To get you going here is the Sunny Side of Life by the Blue Sky Boys

And here is my version of the lyrics, which are pretty much the same as the writer of the Haikus.

I doubt that much if any of this was written down – Bob just had this mawkish sort of song and the idea of the title line and sang – at least that is my guess.

Quite honestly this song, and indeed this type of song, is very much not for me, and leaving it tucked away on disc six of the Complete Basement is probably the very best thing to do with it.

By Larry Fyffe

Revealed only by ‘Untold Dylan’, here’s a bunch of stuff overlooked by other examiners of Bob Dylan’s song lyrics.

Like his fellow Symbolist poets – Charles Baudelaire and Arthur Rimbaud, Paul Verlaine draws inspiration from the wishing wells of Charles Perrault’s reworking of old fairy tales:

(Paul Verlaine: Sleeping Beauty Dreams)

These dark fairy tales usually have happy endings – Sleeping Beauty awakes from her deep sleep after being discovered by a prince; a lost slipper, found by a prince, fits Cinderella; two brothers ride to rescue their sister from the murderous Blue Beard; Little Tom Thumb steals an ogre’s magic boots and escapes though a trail of bread crumbs left for his brothers gets eaten up by birds; a beautiful cook disguises herself in a donkey skin, but a prince, having looked through her keyhole (he’s been diagnosed by a doctor to be sick with love) is able to find out who she after she bakes an expensive ring in a cake, made with salt, butter, and eggs; ugly Prince Tuft is transformed into a handsome prince by a fairy after he helps a pretty girl become intelligent.

Numerous songs by Bob Dylan have a fairy tale-like quality where from dire situations a hero escapes. A reworked version it is, but there’s a clear reference to ‘Little Tom Thumb’ fairy tale in the following verse:

(Bob Dylan: Gates Of Eden)

Dylan mangles up fairy tales. In ‘Blue Beard’, Sister Anne stands in a tower to signal if she spots the two brothers approaching on horseback:

(Bob Dylan: All Along The Watchtower)

Anne’s brothers arrive just in time to save their other sister. The following lyrics make black-humoured reference to the ‘just in the nick of time’ endings of fairy tales read in order to frighten children –  like ‘Blue Beard’, ‘Little Tom Thumb’ and ‘Donkeyskin:

Now, if you see Saint Annie, please tell her, ‘Thanks a lot’

Bob Dylan tells a not-so-happy fairy tale about ‘Cinderella’:

(Bob Dylan: Desolation Row)

A variant on Charles Perrault’s ‘Donkeyskin’ is detectable in the following lyrics:

(Bob Dylan: She Belongs To Me)

And in the lyrics below as well – with a dash of Ricky Tuft thrown in for good luck:

(Bob Dylan: The Levee’s Gonna Break)

In the song lyrics that follow, there’s an inversion of the other theme present in ‘Prince Ricky Of The Tuft’:

You might also enjoy: The never ending story of becoming – Bob Dylan and Paul Verlaine

By Tony Attwood

Although disc six of the Basement Tapes complete is said to be the bonus disc, with the tracks put in this archive because of their poor quality, it is not until one gets to “Down by the Station” that this lack of quality becomes a total hindrance.

This is actually a very interesting ballad with a moving tune; Dylan playing the accompaniment on the electric piano.   But the quality here is so poor that it is impossible for me to work anything out from the lyrics.

The writer of the haiku has put this down

Young and ruthless man
Makes indeterminate plans
To meet his woman.

and he could well be right, I honestly can’t say.  We only get one verse and it stops, seemingly never to be picked up again.  If you would like to try the lyrics please do write in.

And I was about to leave this review at this point when I found a review on Magnet Magazine web site with the article “From the Desk of the Vulgar Boatman”.  I’m taking the liberty of quoting it in full since it has got far more in it than I can gather.

Here it is…

The track that really grabbed hold of me was “Down By The Station,” barely 90 seconds long, one verse and a chorus, distinguished by perhaps the worst sound quality of the entire six-disc set. It’s also the Basements‘ only solo track, just Dylan at an electric piano, no accompanying Hawks. The lyrics are half formed, buried, with a few making their way to the surface: “I was east,” “shadow,” “down by the station.” The melody rises and falls, sad, mysterious. The chords are simple but never go quite where you expect them to. Dylan’s singing is measured and resigned. It’s a haunted performance, “I’m Not There” in miniature. Even the track’s distortion creates the impression of a late-night radio signal, showing up out of nowhere for a minute.

What else is on the site?

You’ll find an index to our latest posts arranged by themes and subjects on the home page.  You can also see details of our main sections on this site at the top of this page under the picture.

The index to the 500+ songs reviewed is now on a new page of its own.  You will find it here.  It contains links to reviews of every Dylan composition that we can find a recording of – if you know of anything we have missed please do write in.

We also now have a discussion group “Untold Dylan” on Facebook.  Just type the phrase “Untold Dylan” in, on your Facebook page or follow this link 

And please do note   The Bob Dylan Project, which lists every Dylan song in alphabetical order, and has links to licensed recordings and performances by Dylan and by other artists, is starting to link back to our reviews

By Larry Fyffe

You might also enjoy

• Dylan and Rimbaud part I
• Dylan and Rimbaud part II
• Dylan and Rimbaud part III

From the poetry of Symbolist Arthur Rimbaud, the singer/songwriter Bob Dylan draws to express his cynical view concerning human nature, and with it the corrupt values of organized religion upon which hypocrisy feasts:

(Arthur Rimbaud: A Season In Hell)

With his music and lyrics, Dylan lightens up, just a bit, the dark outlook of Rimbaud:

(Bob Dylan: Things Have Changed)

Rimbaud roughs up the optimistic outlook of Percy Shelley, the Romantic poet of Spring:

(Rimbaud: A Season In Hell)

Dylan, too, turns Shelley’s regenerative spring into a death-like winter:

(Bob Dylan: Things Have Changed)

Painted black is much of Rimbaud’s poetry:

(Rimbaud: A Season In Hell)

Bob Dylan sprinkles some hope on his cornflakes:

(Bob Dylan: Idiot Wind)

Rimbaud’s art is filled with double-edged irony that rages at religion for its suppression of natural behaviour:

(Rimbaud: A Season In Hell)

The symbolic irony is not lost on Dylan:

(Bob Dylan: Angelina)

Rimbaud, as also does Dylan, gets some of this ‘end of an age’ outlook from Charles Baudelaire, who finds it in the poems of the American Gothic Romantic Edgar Allan Poe:

(Edgar Allan Poe: The Happiest Day, The Happiest Hour)

Dylan retains his pride, and snaps at the hypocrisy of evangelical religious leaders who tried to take advantage of him:

(Bob Dylan: Foot Of Pride)

You might also enjoy Things have changed or have they?

What else is on the site?

You’ll find an index to our latest posts arranged by themes and subjects on the home page.  You can also see details of our main sections on this site at the top of this page under the picture.

The index to the 500+ songs reviewed is now on a new page of its own.  You will find it here.  It contains links to reviews of every Dylan composition that we can find a recording of – if you know of anything we have missed please do write in.

We also now have a discussion group “Untold Dylan” on Facebook.  Just type the phrase “Untold Dylan” in, on your Facebook page or follow this link 

And please do note   The Bob Dylan Project, which lists every Dylan song in alphabetical order, and has links to licensed recordings and performances by Dylan and by other artists, is starting to link back to our reviews

By Tony Attwood

This to me sounds close to being one of those songs that Bob Dylan throws away and which most of the rest of the world would give up everything they own to be able to claim to have written.

The trouble is the electric piano part and vocal is so badly recorded as to make listening to the song really hard going.  And then as we are really getting into it, it just suddenly stops.

Maybe the tape ran out, but one thing is sure Bob’s ideas certainly didn’t.

Tragically we only have one version and this is it.  Someone, somewhere, needs to get hold of this, work it, complete it and release because it really is a terrific piece of work which tries out playing minor chords against the major that is expected to give a really odd effect.

Looked at written down the sequence is simple, but the way Dylan works the melody around it and then clashes those minors and majors makes it something else.  Try it on a piano; it is fun.

Ab, Gb Db Ab; Db E Ab

Middle section Db Ab Db Eb

As for the lyrics the writer of the haiku says

My conclusion is that the words that I yanked out of this after playing it a dozen times are about as deep as the song itself. That’s fine. It was meant to be a fun time, not a writer’s retreat.

The piece starts with an instrumental verse as the band pick up the idea and then the lyrics igo something like this…

Well any time at all

Why do I hate you?

I can use something anything at all

Anytime you want it to

Well any time baby time is not time at all

You want me to be your man

Any time at all like you yes you could

yes you know I can....

At the night time all I want is you honey you

Well what more can I say?

Now you can walk on the back of my shoes

Now anytime of day

Well each time you see that I'll be your man

Yes you can believe I want you too

Anytime at all that you understand

Anytime you'll know what to do

You know that you're mine

Yes I do I know all the time

You can whisper you

Now you might go by nobody's rhyme

But that's all right for you

Well anytime that you know that you know the rest

Honey but you know what's best

Anytime later I just want my time

But honey you know the rest

You know what I want to say

I don't know you're in my place

Anytime that you want me some

Now you come on me and you know what I say...

And that is it, it stops part way through a verse, and we have no more.

OK I realise that no one else at all has picked this is a proto masterpiece, but I suspect that is because of the quality of the recording and the mishmash of the start and the sudden end, but really, this song is something special and had Dylan remembered it we’d all be screaming like mad when he played it at a gig.

As the writer of the Haiku’s says, the Basement Tape time “was meant to be a fun time, not a writer’s retreat,” and yes this is fun time, but the guys happened to strike gold, probably without knowing it (given they didn’t come back to it.)

I can say that if I was still in a band, I’d make this part of the repertoire at once.  It is a great song, and of all the songs that I have found on the Basement which I didn’t know before, this is one of a small collection that really stand out to me.

Fortunately for me, although my memory of events, people’s names, people’s faces and everything like that is rubbish, my musical memory doesn’t falter and I can hear this in my head whenever I want, with all the awfulness of the recording cleared out.

What a find!  What a piece of bluesy rock n roll!

What else is on the site?

You’ll find an index to our latest posts arranged by themes and subjects on the home page.  You can also see details of our main sections on this site at the top of this page under the picture.

The index to the 500+ songs reviewed is now on a new page of its own.  You will find it here.  It contains links to reviews of every Dylan composition that we can find a recording of – if you know of anything we have missed please do write in.

We also now have a discussion group “Untold Dylan” on Facebook.  Just type the phrase “Untold Dylan” in, on your Facebook page or follow this link 

And please do note   The Bob Dylan Project, which lists every Dylan song in alphabetical order, and has links to licensed recordings and performances by Dylan and by other artists, is starting to link back to our reviews

Bob Dylan will go down as the greatest songwriter of the 20th century and has tantalised generations of music lovers with his intricate lyrics.

But while his songs may be well-known to millions, here are eight things you (probably) didn’t know about Bob Dylan…

Picture from Pixabay

 1) Like a Rolling Stone Had 20 Pages of Lyrics 

While hardly a short song at 6 minutes and 10 seconds long, the legendary 1965 track, Like A Rolling Stone, on Highway 61 Revisited album, initially had up to 20 pages of lyrics, before Dylan managed to shorten them down to under seven minutes.

2) Imagine a World Where Bob Dylan was “Elston Gunn”

Of course, The Bard wasn’t born as Bob Dylan, with his birth name given as Robert Allen Zimmerman. However, as he moved into performing he frequently flittered between stage names – briefly using the title of “Elston Gunn”, shortly before settling on Bob Dylan, which he then made officially by legally changing his name to Robert Dylan in 1962.

3) Bob Dylan NEVER Had a Number One Single

Remarkably, despite being one of the greatest songwriters of all-time, Bob Dylan has never had a number one single in the UK or US. The closest he came was with Like A Rolling Stone and the 1966 tune Rainy Day Women #12 & 35 which both peaked at number two on the American Billboard chart. In the UK, meanwhile, his biggest hit was also Like A Rolling Stone which reached number four.

Despite a relative lack of single success though, Dylan has enjoyed six number one studio albums in the UK, as well as five in the States – although it wasn’t until his 13th release, Planet Waves in 1974, that he secured his first American chart-topper.

4) He’s Not Played an Acoustic Song in Concert Since 1992

Despite making his name with a simple guitar and lyrics, Bob Dylan hasn’t performed a single acoustic track in concert since 1992, when he played “It’s Alright, Ma (I’m Only Bleeding)”. Regarding the song, Dylan said he wrote it with Johnny Cash’s “How High’s the Water, Mama?” reverberating in his head.

5) He Built a Giant Iron Gate for a Casino 

Dylan’s talent obviously stretches beyond song writing, with him also producing many works of art. And, you can also add metalworking to his array of talents now, with Dylan producing a giant 26 foot by 15-foot metal sculpture to the entrance of a new casino in 2016.

The Minnesota-born artist has been well-known to divulge in many of life’s pleasures and if he is partial to a wager from time to time, you can be sure it’s at the best casino websites – in particular, this casino promotion would fit even a king of the ilk of Dylan. Who knows, maybe we could still see him perform in front of his monument.

6) Bob Dylan Can Play 18 Instruments

Bob Dylan can play a remarkable 18 musical instruments. The list includes: the Autoharp, Bugle, Conga, Cowbell, Didgeridoo, Drums, Acoustic Guitar, Bass Guitar, Electric Guitar, Harmonica, Harmonium, Electric Keyboard, Mandolin, Piano, Flute, Saxophone, Trumpet, and Whistle. If only he had more hands, he wouldn’t even need the help of a band!

7) Bob Dylan Opened for Martin Luther King

Young musicians often open performances for big, better-known artists, but a 22-year-old Bob Dylan once opened Martin Luther King’s famous “I Have A Dream” speech in 1963 in front of more than 200,000 people in Washington. Dylan played two songs in a short set, “When the Ship Comes in” and the apt “Only A Pawn In Their Game”.

8) He Shunned His High School Graduation Party

Under his yearbook picture from school, Dylan (then Zimmerman) wrote his life goal was “to join Little Richard”. However, he had a sour end to his schooling experience, which resulted in him skipping his school graduation party after the school principal cut off his band’s performance of a Little Richard song during a 1956 school talent show.

Thus far on BOB DYLAN AND BAUDELAIRE

• Bob Dylan And Charles Baudelaire
• Bob Dylan And Charles Baudelaire (Part II): The Jack Of Arts
• Bob Dylan and Charles Baudelaire Part III
• Dylan And The Devil

By Larrry Fyffe

The songs of Bob Dylan hold out a little more hope than do the dark poems of Charles Baudelaire.

Charles Baudelaire speaks of individual despair:

(Charles Baudelaire: The Assassin’s Wine)

Bob Dylan speaks of a world in despair:

(Bob Dylan: Cat’s In The Well)

Poet Arthur Rimbaud, influenced by Baudelaire, inverts and darkens children’s fairy tales and nursery rhymes – such as Charles Perrault’s ‘Sleeping Beauty’:

(Arthur Rimbaud: Being Beautious)

Charles Perrault’s ‘Boots In Boots’ is about a poor fellow who gets to marry a princess; the singer/songwiter plays around with another fairy tale by Perrault – ‘Cinderella’:

(Bob Dylan: Desolation Row)

Baudelaire turns the biblical theme of Cain and Abel upside down:

(Baudelaire: Abel And Cain)

According to Baudelaire, the reasonable men of the Age Of The Enlightenment have shut God outside the Universe.

(Bob Dylan: Desolation Row)

The hunchback in the above verse alludes to a Victor Hugo story.

Arthur Rimbaud refers to Shakespeare’s dark play – ‘Hamlet’:

(Arthur Rimbaud: Ophelia)

Dylan sings of metaphorical death-in-life:

(Bob Dylan: Desolation Row)

The darkness in  Symbolist poetry runs through many of Bob Dylan’s song lyrics – tempered a bit by the light thrown by Romantic Transcendental poems, and Christian gospel songs.

What else is on the site?

You’ll find an index to our latest posts arranged by themes and subjects on the home page.  You can also see details of our main sections on this site at the top of this page under the picture.

The index to the 500+ songs reviewed is now on a new page of its own.  You will find it here.  It contains links to reviews of every Dylan composition that we can find a recording of – if you know of anything we have missed please do write in.

We also now have a discussion group “Untold Dylan” on Facebook.  Just type the phrase “Untold Dylan” in, on your Facebook page or follow this link 

And please do note   The Bob Dylan Project, which lists every Dylan song in alphabetical order, and has links to licensed recordings and performances by Dylan and by other artists, is starting to link back to our reviews

By Tony Attwood

The opening of “Jelly Bean” – the second track from disc six of the Complete Basement Tapes (the collection put together on one disc as they have inferior recording quality) has an opening to the melody line that has a strong feel of “Summertime Blues” although slower and meaner.

The meanness stays with the song although the melody changes quite a bit and the piece does speed up as it goes along.   Rolling Stone calls it a half formed song and yes it is just a sketch of an idea – so what we have here are the very first moments of a composition – moments that are normally lost because the composer goes back and changes the work and then changes it again and again.  Indeed in Dylan’s case the changes often continue long after recording.

In an overview of the whole of the Basement Tapes, the website Vulture.com has run an article that asks. “Is Bob Dylan’s The Basement Tapes Too Revered?” and continues by adding, “There’s also several CDs worth of much less compelling stuff….”

The article then goes through a series of compositions the writer does not like and ends dismissively with “odd jams like Jelly Bean and Any Time.”

I think that is unfair and incomplete.  “Jelly Bean” is not a jam in the sense of one man playing a sequence and everyone joining in, but rather something that has some basics worked out, including an interesting style and approach, and on top of which Dylan is adding more and more possibilities.  “Odd jam” seems to me to be far to dismissive and derisive for this piece, and lacking in any sort of insight into the song.

That is not to say that I believe my thoughts on the song are right, but rather that it is all too easy to dismiss these songs because they are not finished.  For many of them do contain in their proto state far more opportunities for evolution than the vast majority of completed pop, rock and blues songs.  That is Dylan’s skill.

The basic riff is hypnotic and what it makes it interesting is that we are led to thinking this is going to be another 12 bar blues in B flat, but it turns into something else.   Half an hour of work by Dylan and this could be evolved into something really worthwhile.

By the third verse the riff has become

Bb / Eb / Bb / Eb / Bb repeat

Eb / F….. Eb   F

With a descending melody line at the  Eb to F.  It is interesting and promising.

My point here is that Bob has taken Summertime Blues as a starting point, slowed it right down, and changed the accompaniment, and by the third verse turned it into something quite different.

A little more work, and then a few hours on the lyrics and we’d have a good song – but in fact it was just left never to be touched again.

And this really is the point of the Complete Basement Tapes.  Not for us to put on the dsc and sit down and consider as examples of fine music well recorded, but rather to appreciate the early sketches that led to the songs, and appreciate just how many potentially highly worthwhile works could have been produced from this sketch.

The tragedy of the Basement Tapes is indeed that it is repeatedly considered as if it is a complete work of art.  It is not.  It is a sketchbook of tantalisingly incomplete ideas, of huge value to anyone who wants to understand Dylan’s art at the time.  The tragedy of the Bootleg series is not that it was released but rather than we do not have sketches in this sort of depth for every single album and all the way through Bob’s life.

Maybe if he had cut ten days out of his touring each year and spent them just doing what he did on the Basement Tapes, we’d have dozens more gems.

We do of course have quite a few bits and pieces of songs left behind by Bob,  but it is these initial sketches without words that lead us into the workings of Dylan’s musical mind.

I can’t attempt the lyrics of this song, but here’s the Haiku

One in the morning
And Bob’s baby’s upside down,
And Bob is crying.

Haiku 61

There is also on the internet a video of “Dylan and Jelly Bean” but it is a film of a dog swimming in a swimming pool.  I rather suspect the owner of the dog must be rather bemused at the number of hits the You Tube video is getting.

What else is on the site?

You’ll find an index to our latest posts arranged by themes and subjects on the home page.  You can also see details of our main sections on this site at the top of this page under the picture.

The index to the 500+ songs reviewed is now on a new page of its own.  You will find it here.  It contains links to reviews of every Dylan composition that we can find a recording of – if you know of anything we have missed please do write in.

We also now have a discussion group “Untold Dylan” on Facebook.  Just type the phrase “Untold Dylan” in, on your Facebook page or follow this link 

And please do note   The Bob Dylan Project, which lists every Dylan song in alphabetical order, and has links to licensed recordings and performances by Dylan and by other artists, is starting to link back to our reviews

———–

You might also enjoy

By Larry Fyffe

The Gnostic-like themes and dark images (images be words that evoke the sensations of smell, sight, touch, taste, and hearing in the listener or reader’s mind) found in the  poems of Charles Baudelaire impact the songs of Bob Dylan:

(Baudelaire: A Voyage To Cythera)

The Greek island, to the Symbolist poet, is not the paradise it’s imagined to be –  there’s a gallows mistaken for a cypress tree. According to Dylan, nor is the cowboy vision of America as the Promised Land.

In the song lyrics below, the singer/ songwriter opts to lighten up the dark image above by throwing some bread crumbs in with the ‘arms’ and ‘sails’ – perhaps burlesque on the ‘sin’ of feeding pigeons:

(Bob Dylan: Gates Of Eden)

In any event, according to both Baudelaire and Dylan, the inhabitants of neither earthly site pass the tough test set down by Jesus, the Christian prophet:

(Luke 11:13)

The cypress tree, for both Dylan and Baudelaire, though somewhat less so than a stone church building, is a symbol, an objective co-relative, of the emotional search for an enduring world, a place where life and love lasts:

(Baudelaire: The Voyage)

Likewise Dylan – only an idiot imagines that there’s an eternal love a-waiting; why you might as well believe that a poster of Brigette Bardot up on the wall will come alive ….you’re gonna wait a long time:

(Bob Dylan: Idiot Wind)

In short, by death or other circumstance, relationships don’t last forever in the real world:

(Bob Dylan: The Man In The Long Black Coat)

A poet influenced by Baudelaire notes that not even concrete man-made objects of Art last:

(Paul Verlaine: After Three Years)

The singer/ songwriter goes hyperbolic over the matter:

(Bob Dylan: Everything Is Broken)

Bob Dylan knows an objective co-relative when he sees one:

Was that some kind of joke?

(Bob Dylan: Desolation Row)

What else is on the site?

You’ll find an index to our latest posts arranged by themes and subjects on the home page.  You can also see details of our main sections on this site at the top of this page under the picture.

The index to the 500+ songs reviewed is now on a new page of its own.  You will find it here.  It contains links to reviews of every Dylan composition that we can find a recording of – if you know of anything we have missed please do write in.

We also now have a discussion group “Untold Dylan” on Facebook.  Just type the phrase “Untold Dylan” in, on your Facebook page or follow this link 

And please do note   The Bob Dylan Project, which lists every Dylan song in alphabetical order, and has links to licensed recordings and performances by Dylan and by other artists, is starting to link back to our reviews

By Tony Attwood

This review marks the start of the final leg of our journey through reviewing every Dylan song of which we can find a recording.

These final reviews come from Disc Six of the Complete Basement Tapes collection – separated out into a disc of their own seemingly without much sense of a chronological order.  These songs are grouped together because of their perceived poor quality, not because of anything else although the style and approach makes me think they did all come from around the same period of maybe a couple of weeks.

The CD consists of 21 recordings of which three are credited as “traditional arranged by Bob Dylan” while one of the tracks is a “take 2”, thus leaving 17 Dylan originals to be reviewed.

Track one is “Two dollars and 99 cents”.   It’s a 12 bar blues with a very bar room blues feeling, a relentless “drink it up, get smashed, pick up a woman on the cheap” feel.   The lyrics are not sorted at all; I doubt that Dylan had any thoughts about them when he started. apart from the tag line of “Two dollars and 99 cents”, but that phrase made him want the pounding barroom feel of the track.

If it had been worked on it could easily have been used at any time in the coming years as a filler track had Dylan needed one, but then I doubt that he ever needed one, or that he ever thought about the idea after putting this track down.  It was recorded, and I imagine the guys thought, “yeah, ok, so what now?  Anyone can a bottle opener?”

This is as close as I can get to the lyrics – if you can improve on them please do so without laughing at my feeble efforts.  I know they make no sense as they stand.

Go bag a sun dial
Two dollars and 99 cents
All mine I go down
Four dollars and 99 cents
It’s tomorrow
for to go
Lord lord tomorrow people go.

Don’t want a two dollar bill
One dollar 99 cents
You got ten dollars want a two dollar bill
Ten dollars and 99 cents
Had a good night 
Had a night with me and a hope on the devil’s son
Ain’t got a bus we’ll keep it level
Do or die man comes along and 
Why but  why shouldn’t I ?
Two dollars and 99 cents two dollars and 99 cents

Well she walk in and asks how much is that  mister
Two dollars and 99 cents
Oh you better go back and ask your sister
For two dollars and 99 cents
oh I am ????
two dollars and 99 cents
but you keep my way with your 
???? 
do or die why its too much to cry
Why oh why oh why why shouldn’t I?

So not particularly informative I’m afraid.  I imagine someone somewhere has made a fulsome song out of this, but doesn’t want to publicise it beyond playing it with their band otherwise there would be royalties to pay to Mr D’s corporation.

What else is on the site?

You’ll find an index to our latest posts arranged by themes and subjects on the home page.  You can also see details of our main sections on this site at the top of this page under the picture.

The index to the 500+ songs reviewed is now on a new page of its own.  You will find it here.  It contains links to reviews of every Dylan composition that we can find a recording of – if you know of anything we have missed please do write in.

We also now have a discussion group “Untold Dylan” on Facebook.  Just type the phrase “Untold Dylan” in, on your Facebook page or follow this link 

And please do note   The Bob Dylan Project, which lists every Dylan song in alphabetical order, and has links to licensed recordings and performances by Dylan and by other artists, is starting to link back to our reviews

By Larry Fyffe

• Part 1 of the series appears here: Bob Dylan And Charles Baudelaire

Singer/songwriter Bob Dylan draws many of his images from the deck of Symbols placed before him by the French poet Charles Baudelaire. A symbol is a concise image with broad meaning:

(Baudelaire: Spleen I)

On one level, the following song lyrics are about the emotional struggle with love, compassion, and hate experienced by individuals in today’s society:

(Bob Dylan: Lily, Rosemary, And The Jack Of Hearts)

The Jack Of Hearts symbolizes love and sex; Lily, as does the Queen Of Spades, symbolizes Death.

Death – both literal and metaphorical:

(Baudelaire: To A Madonna)

The following fragmented song lyrics, peppered with updated Baudelairean imagery, could well refer to a poster of Brigette Bardot with a motorcycle; the grey flannel dwarf to an uptight businessman:

(Bob Dylan: Gates Of Eden)

According to many Romantic artists, the Reason of The Enlightenment casts God outside of the Universe, leaving Man, still locked outside of Eden, with only his physical body and it’s sensations – no Absolute moral authority to guide him or her, and no reward to look forward to in an ‘afterlife’. The Romantic Transcendentalists come up with the idea that the organic world of Nature is God’s Spirit imperfectly manifested – a hard sell when most people live in cities. Capitalist birds of prey swoop down to build their Edenic nests of concrete, plastered with  posters of Brigette Bardot on a motorcycle:

Expressed in black humour by the singer/songwriter:

(Bob Dylan: I Shall Be Free)

The Symbolists of their day champion Art as a replacement for the oh-so-boring capitalist gods who ride golden calves upon the platform of democracy. These  poets mount their silver steeds and ride off to rescue the Romanic damsel-in-distress.The Symbolists, even if ‘dandies’, explore the dark, desolate streets of the contemporary city in search of artistic inspiration.  Bob Dylan takes on a persona that emulates the art and lifestyle of the Symbolists – he drives a motorcycle, and the Queen of Spades jumps on, grabs him around the waist.

In the words of both Baudelaire and Dylan, Art is personified as a beautiful and unattainable woman that becomes a ‘thing in itself’ to worship:

(Baudelaire: The Living Torch)

Who among us would try to deny it?

(Bob Dylan: Sad-Eyed Lady Of The Lowlands)

The sound of the ticking clock, and pumping heart – the shortness of life – causes some Symbolist poets to scream at other-worldly religions, at flowery Romantic Transcendentalism …. and even at Art itself:

By Tony Attwood

I mentioned in my review of “Wild Wolf” (also on disc 5 of the Complete Basement Tapes collection) that the song reminded me of Tin Angel and Scarlet Town.

And here we are in Tin Angel country again, and I have begun to wonder if, when composing those songs from Tempest, Bob did indeed go back to the Basement Tapes and recall what he had been up to.

The factor that is a constant between Tin Angel and and Gonna Get You Now is nothing to do with the mood of the song or what’s in the lyrics but instead a lot to do with the structure, for both songs are based on one chord.

It is quite a hard trick to pull off, because changing the chord is one of the main ways of keeping the momentum going, especially in folk and popular music.   Take out the chords and we have left the lyrics and the melody as a way of taking the song forward, but there is always a sense of stasis. Nothing is really moving, all is the same.

Which is odd when the promise of the first line (and title) relates to what happens next, for this is a song whose prime message is “Gonna get you now”.

But not to worry because the words don’t make much sense anyway, and that message gets rather blurred as things progress.

Thanks as always in this series of songs to Haiku 61 for providing the lyrics.   I’ve made just the tiniest of adjustments, nothing more.

Gonna get you now
Word to your grandpa, come on home.
Well its sun in the  afternoon
Drama ain’t cold and brown.
Late last night on the top
She was heading to calling me ’round.
Gonna get you now.
Gonna get you now…
Word to your grandpa, come on home.
Well I was daydreaming on Sunday.
Monday came both ways.
Big storm, man,  it don’t bother me,
But I can’t seem to get it straight
Gonna get you now.
Going to your grandma, you’d better best come home

And just in case you go chasing off to hear this on Spotify, the fellas who run that show have been very misleading, for on the first page of Google at least when I was researching this song, is Gonna Get You Now, a song by Bob Dylan on Spotify but it leads to nothing of the kind, because the song isn’t even listed on Spotify, let alone providing us with a link to the recording.

Quite what the song is all about I don’t know, any more than I know why Bob was experimenting with a one chord song.  But if there was a set of linked thoughts in this piece maybe it was that the singer is tangled up in a mess and he really is stuck in this one single situation, and can’t get out.  Hence the single chord, symbolising being stuck.

It is hardly an advanced theory, but it is a theory.

The most famous of all the (almost) one chord songs was “I need your loving” although the composers cheated by having a brief moment of four ascending chords and then throwing in a sudden unexpected and brief “B” section.  It’s still a classic however.

What was so clever about that song was that not only did it only have one chord for the most part it also only had one line of lyrics for the most part.  And yet it needed two composers:  Bobby Robinson and Don Gardner.  That song was a hit in 1962 so maybe Bob remembered it, or maybe he hit on the one chord song quite separately.

So there we have it; quite an interesting sound built around one chord, a varying melody and a set of words that don’t seem to make any sense.  Post-modern Bob?

As it was, there was only one more Dylan original left in the Basement series – “All you have to do is dream” which goes in a completely different direction, with an utterly different feel, a complex set of chord changes, and a real melody.   And a theme in the first two lines that occupied Bob time and time again.

If the farmer has no silo
And his fuel cost runs up high
Well, that’s just how much I would love you
If you’d just only let me try.

If you are following these reviews in sequence, we’ll now move onto the final leg – the “bonus disc” of songs from the Basement series which were considered so badly recorded they couldn’t be included in the mainstream part of the show.  I’ll be working through the whole of that final disc in the coming weeks.

by Larry Fyffe

Poems of Charles Baudelaire shows the impact of Edgar Allan Poe; Bob Dylan’s song lyrics reveal the influence of Charles Baudelaire.

In one version thereof, Dylan sings:

(Bob Dylan: Tangled Up In Blue)

Dylan makes reference to a poem by Baudelaire (translated):

(Baudelaire: The Balcony)

Symbolist poet Beaudelaire admires the colourful Romantic paintings of Eugene Delacroix that deal with mankind’s pain and suffering. Bob Dylan studies the art of painting, and brings ‘Lady Liberty Leading The People’ by Delacroix to mind with a sly pun in the lyrics below:

(Bob Dylan: Tangled Up In Blue)

Eugene Delacroix paints ‘Tasso In The Madhouse’ – Torquato Tasso, an Italian poet from the sixteenth century, writes ‘Rinaldo’, a knightly romance that contains sexual imagery based on Sandro Botticelli’s ‘Birth Of Venus’:

(Baudelaire: On Eugene Delacroix’s Tasso In The Madhouse)

The singer/songwriter seeks out sexy Venus, his Muse:

(Bob Dylan: When I Paint My Masterpiece)

In the poem below, a cracked bell symbolizes a broken soul:

(Baudelaire: The Cracked Bell)

Not quite so dark are the song lyrics below:

(Bob Dylan: I Want You)

Other song lyrics draw a comparison with two French Symbolist poets influenced by Baudelaire:

(Bob Dylan: You’re Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go)

Rimbaud writes of Venus:

(Arthur Rimbaud: Sun And Flesh)

Likewise for the singer/songwriter – Venus’ water balances Mars’ fire, makes love pure. Black-robed priests over-water it:

(Bob Dylan: Watered-Down Love)

By Tony Attwood

The first time I heard “Wild Wolf” I was immediately reminded of songs such as “Tin Angel” and “Scarlet Town” from Tempest.

It is primarily atmosphere that draws these songs together for me, the sense of brooding darkness that I think Bob was trying to create in such songs – atmosphere above and beyond the importance of any story or the lyrics… just the darkness.

The song is obviously held together by the primary use of minor chords and the prominence given to the bass and the percussion without any use of cymbals.  Very broody.

Here are the lyrics from Expecting Rain as copyrighted in 1973

Now the ruins are barely rolling / And the animals cant agree
On all the bushes in the nations / But nobody feels sorry for me
If I lost everything of all the cities / Yeah, but I can’t help his smog
The day, I feel it / She sure is standing / But the holy book is written
Oh, what page / They are all there / And as for a natural warning
But nobody done yet understand / Just like Pharoah and his armies
They made of solid bread, yeah / That old bad wolf’s gonna howl his way to morning’s
Hold to some big cavern / I would sit and wait, calling my children out there
But I just don’t mean to hesitate / And if I was a missionary leader
I would attempt to laugh and rage / Yet the wild wolf he’s still bubblin’ under
And not a babe

And as quoted by Haiku 61, which I think he borrowed from another site

Now the ruins are barely rolling
And the nations can’t agree
On all that all the nations
But nobody feels very sorry for me
If I lost everything of all the saving grace
Yeah, but I can’t help this smog
The day I feel it
She sure is standing
Now the holy book is written
Oh, what page
All are there
And as for a natural warning
But nobody done yet understand
Just like Pharaoh and his armies
They were made of a solid breath, yeah, and
That old bad wolf’s gonna howl his way from morning
Holed in some big cavern
I would sit and wait, calling my children outside
But I just don’t mean to hesitate
And if I was a master leader
I would attempt to laugh and rage
Yet the wild wolf he’s big old bad 
And not a babe

The song has a series of moving chords, that are not particularly complex but for the band to get them right, but complex enough that they have obviously rehearsed the piece before playing on this recording.  But despite that amount of effort Bob doesn’t seem to have worked much on the lyrics apart from writing them in a stream of consciousness manner.

But none of that compares to Haiku 61 where the writer really has exceeded himself…

Wild wolf, holy books.
Pharaoh’s armies made of bread.
No one cares for me.

Oh for the wit to write like that.  I could live without this track, but utterly love the Haiku and will keep that with me forever.

As for the Basement Tapes Complete it is very strange how these songs come one after the other.   “Going to Acapulco” comes next which is very different, but then there is “Gonna get you now” which uses the same accompaniment techniques but to a very different effect.

What else is on the site?

You’ll find an index to our latest posts arranged by themes and subjects on the home page.  You can also see details of our main sections on this site at the top of this page under the picture.

The index to the 500+ songs reviewed is now on a new page of its own.  You will find it here.  It contains links to reviews of every Dylan composition that we can find a recording of – if you know of anything we have missed please do write in.

We also now have a discussion group “Untold Dylan” on Facebook.  Just type the phrase “Untold Dylan” in, on your Facebook page or follow this link 

And please do note   The Bob Dylan Project, which lists every Dylan song in alphabetical order, and has links to licensed recordings and performances by Dylan and by other artists, is starting to link back to our reviews.