Untold Dylan

By Tony Attwood

If you have been following the postings of reviews of the Dylan songs in the 1970s you will know that by mid March 2018 we have pretty well got the whole decade sorted.  You can see the complete list for the whole decade with links to each and every song review by clicking here.     Just scroll down – its a pretty big list.

Anyway, the very last song to be reviewed is a mystery that I can’t solve.  But I am sure that someone else can… so here is my appeal.

The song is listed as “Daddy’s gonna take one more ride” by Heylin, and he mentions a possible source as well as it being performed in the New Haven soundcheck of September 1978.

https://youtu.be/JJ2BfbrH4oM

Now we have been working through this video song by song (as you will either have seen from the reviews that preceded this or from the link to the songs of the 1970s.

We have one song left at the end of the sequence starting at around 16 minutes 22 seconds, and I can’t place this song.   The logical answer would be this is Heylin’s missing “Daddy’s gonna take one more ride.”   But I don’t hear those lyrics, nor do I recognise this as a song from anyone else (although of course my knowledge is only partial so it easily could be something I missed.

I have particularly looked around the work of Shel Siverstein whom Heylin particularly references but without any luck there.

So going further, to see if anyone else had trod this road before me I searched around some more and found that the person who writes the Dylan Haiku website hit exactly the same snag – looks like he really had reached the same dead end.

My next step was to ask Larry to see if he could disentangle the lyrics.   Larry commented that he found some “Mary Shelley / Poe-like possibilities and came up with…

It is an extremely frustrating end to the journey through this era of Dylan’s writing, and if you can identify the song, provide some lyrics or give any other clues that would be wonderful as I think that would pretty much wrap up the build up to Slow Train – although again if you know of any song written in this period we’ve missed and can direct me to a recording, then even better.

If we head towards a solution I’ll re-write this page and of course acknowledge those who contribute – using whatever name you want to acknowledge your contribution.  If no one knows anything this page just stays here – a monument to the song that defeated us.

By Tony Attwood and Larry Fyffe

Actually I have pondered whose name to put first on this review.  Larry did the work I couldn’t even start in making a stab at with the lyrics and should be first in line for that effort.  But I didn’t want anyone thinking that the rather desultory review that follows is anyone’s view but mine (Tony).

This song comes from the New Haven CT soundcheck on 17 September 1978, so my earlier comments in relation to the article “Take it or leave it”, the lost Dylan song from 1978   apply.  Dylan seemed to be toying with two ideas: “the world is stuck, there is nothing to be done, that’s all there is” in this song and “life goes on, so it goes” in “You don’t love me no more” which ultimately then collided and combusted into “there is change and its coming big time” with “Slow Train” which emerged just a short while later.

“This a-way that a-way” really does seem to be at the end of the line of uncertainty.  The music itself is ok, to my mind, but sounds awfully close to a lot of other pieces of the same type – although Heylin calls it a “gorgeous tune” and it seems from his account that Dylan continued to use it in sounds checks right up to the one in which the rather slow “Slow Train” emerged for the first time.

There’s a link to the recording of “This a-way” below so you can decide – although I am sorry the quality is rather poor – but it is in the only recording I could find.

And here are the lyrics Larry came up with…

which I think works as well as anything else.

To hear the piece you need to revisit the New Haven soundcheck  and then scoot along to 3 minutes 34 seconds or thereabouts and up comes the song.  If you want to change the words, or complete them, great – please send them in.   I have seen a version of the lyrics on line but I really couldn’t believe that this was what Dylan was singing – hence our new version.

Larry also added the comment that “Many a grade B western movie contains the line, with a finger pointing, ‘they went that a-way’ when  lawman  asks which way are the outlaws headed, and continued…

“As I noted with the first song on the recording, the vocals without printed lyrics are never quite clear. I don’t think Dylan varies as much as I initially thought on hearing that initial song. Better that I had stuck with lyrics, especially seemingly repeated ones, that I was relatively sure of than sticking my neck out on a possible but unclear variation in  wording that I thought I detected. Ears can play tricks on you too!

“And, of course, printed lyrics are often incorrect as well.”

But this is not to knock Dylan.   That he never completed the lyrics and never revised the song shows it was part of the process which all composers go through, writing songs or melodies or lyrics or anything else as a way of preparing for the main fare that was about to come.

The song is worth preserving not just for the sake of completeness but because it is part of such a clear journey that led to an explosion of insight with Slow Train.

Dylan created two more songs – “One more ride” and “Legionnaire’s Disease” before “Slow Train” and after that the show really was on the road once more.

Or maybe I should say, the train was on the tracks (although that would perhaps be a little too obvious).

Think there’s something missing or wrong with this review?

You are of course always welcome to write a comment below, but if you’d like to go further, you could write an alternative review – we’ve already published quite a few of these.  We try to avoid publishing reviews and comments that are rude or just criticisms of what is written elsewhere – but if you have a positive take on this song or any other Dylan song, and would like it considered for publication, please do email Tony@schools.co.uk

What else is on the site

1: 500+ reviews of Dylan songs.  There is an index to these in alphabetical order on the home page, and an index to the songs in the order they were written in the Chronology Pages.

2: The Chronology.  We’ve taken the songs we can find recordings of and put them in the order they were written (as far as possible) not in the order they appeared on albums.  The chronology is more or less complete and is now linked to all the reviews on the site.  We have also produced overviews of Dylan’s work year by year.     The index to the chronologies is here.

3: Bob Dylan’s themes.  We publish a wide range of articles about Bob Dylan and his compositions.  There is an index here.

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

5:  Bob Dylan’s creativity.   We’re fascinated in taking the study of Dylan’s creative approach further.  The index is in Dylan’s Creativity.

6: You might also like: A classification of Bob Dylan’s songs and partial Index to Dylan’s Best Opening Lines and our articles on various writers’ lists of Dylan’s ten greatest songs.

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

The lyrics of Bob Dylan’s gospels, according to Kees de Graaf, ultimately demonstrate that singer/songwriter Bob Dylan personally holds ‘The conviction that there’s only one road to salvation’ (de Graaf: Trouble No More). Bob Dylan, from a Jewish background, gives due respect to many of the teachings of Jesus, but it is folly to assert that, at the same time, he puts down the individualistic and goodly spiritual beliefs of others.

Whatever Dylan’s spiritual beliefs may be (who knows for sure?), the ‘one road’ assertion on the part of de Graaf is sheer conjecture. The oft double-edged meanings in so many of Dylan’s gospel lyrics de Graaf dismisses as nothing more than subterfuge used by the songwriter in order not to alienate fans who are not hard core Christian believers – that is to say, those in the know, the true Christian ones, are not fooled as to what Dylan’s really means.

According to de Graaf it would seem, Bob Dylan does not really intend to leave a message that is open to interpretation as regards to the extent of the unconditional love of Jesus:

(Bob Dylan: Tempest)

The lyrics above, apparently, do not present God as an Existentialist who lets the cards fall where they may. Nevertheless, this is a theme that appears in others work of Dylan as well – there’s a ‘God’, but He’s mysterious and dark, quite unknowable.  Where’s God when you need Him? Why did He forsake the passengers aboard the sinking Titanic? Where’s water-walking Jesus? Which side is He on?

Though there be widespread disagreement about the historical facts of Jesus’ life, Dylan represents Him in the lyrics of a number of gospel songs as a holy man, among holy men, who tries to bridge the Great Divide. However, the degradation by dogmatic church leaders of, say, the Inuit spiritual way of life by fur traders and by Christian missionaries, Dylan does not let go by the board unquestioned:

Referencing:

(Joel 3:7)

That religions pass out milk while they practice cultural genocide, and indeed worse, raises the numbered hairs on the back of Dylan’s head:

There are too many questionable things that are done for the benefit of organizations based on religion. In the name of religion, things are undertaken to accommodate the selfish wants of its leaders and followers – doings that actually oppose Christ’s teachings, that scare Dylan off:

(Bob Dylan: Pay In Blood)

Artistically compelled, Dylan is both dark and light in creative energy, filled with irony, antihypocrisy disdain, satire, and humour;  metaphorical, allegorical, and alliterative in style:

(Bob Dylan: Beyond Here Lies Nothing)

Going by his song lyrics, Bob Dylan or his persona is anything but a religious zealot; and an apocalyptic one, in the literal sense, he shows himself not to be.

There’s always a bit of light glowing somewhere.

Greedy capitalists too, but it’s self-serving religious leaders and opportunistic followers that Bob Dylan especially criticizes:

(Bob Dylan: Summer Days)

By Tony Attwood

This is another of the songs from the New Haven soundcheck which then never seemed to turn up again but which, in my view, was part of something much more important: the journey Dylan was making from hopelessness to a new hope.

Heylin actually casts doubt on whether this really is a Dylan original or not just the cover or a country song – noting that he was putting a lot of such songs into soundchecks around this time.   Heylin also notes that the song turned up later in another soundcheck, and indeed he is quite right: there were several other soundcheck songs of this type.

But even if this is a half remembered old “cowboy song” as Heylin has it, it is still part of the transition.  A performer like Dylan does not play (especially in sound checks) songs he profoundly feels apart from.

Dylan’s saying (I think) that this is me, and I see no way out, and if you don’t want me as I am then off you can go, because I can’t see what to do.  If you do want to see me like this, fine let’s carry on.

As a way of dealing with a problematic relationship – indeed as a way of dealing with any relationship, it doesn’t actually give out a very positive message.    But for me it was the preface to all that happened next.

Here’s the recording…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ad78KjHdU6M

Interestingly “You don’t love me no more” is dealing with the same sort of romantic troubles, but in a much more upbeat manner, and is being positive about the end of the affair – “Down the road I go”.   Take it or leave it has a form of hopelessness about the whole situation.

I’m not at all comfortable by the lyrics that appear as a commentary on the site that I have given as a source above, and I wonder if all the lyrics were written or remembered at the time of this run through for the New Haven sound check.  Dylan is certainly able to make them up as he goes along.

Now that notion of the half complete or half remembered song might seem odd, but the construction of the song is very standard and any musicians (and Dylan wasn’t just using “any musicians”) could readily play along with the chord structure which is fairly standard for this type of song.  As a guitarist or a keyboard player, once you hear it, you know it.

But this is not me criticising the commentator who wrote the lyrics out – I couldn’t possibly manage that at all – it is just that I can’t believe it starts “Got your head in the gardening.”  My problem is that I just imagine what else it can possibly be.  If you can help, please do.

The instrumental break at the end of the song concludes the run through, and I am sure if Dylan was getting it ready for performance he’d have had a proper ending in place.

But there is more to this, because I think what we also have to remember with all the songs from this soundcheck era is that they led up to up Slow Train which emerged six weeks later.   Dylan may even have been writing out the basics of Slow Train at this time.

There is actually a low grade recording of the first or one of the first rehearsals of Slow Train on the internet.

It is a poor quality recording – but still a million thanks to whoever was there ready to record it.  If you skip forward a minute into the recording you can get a feel of what is going on.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pUMS6TJ8hrA

Seen in the light of the emergence of Slow Train just a few weeks later “Take it or leave it” takes on a new context and meaning.   “Take it or leave it” is seemingly about the fact that it is all falling apart.   “Slow Train” is still about the inevitability of what is going to happen to him but now this is upgraded to the collapse of the whole of the United States of America.

Thus we get to the transformation of Dylan’s thought, from a shrug of the shoulders to his preparation to say something about it all.

I don’t care about ecology
I don’t care about astrology
But it sure do bother me to see my loved ones turning into puppets

The downbeat of “Take it or leave it” and the resignation of the style and approach contrasts so utterly with what he was doing within six weeks.

(Incidentally I know my version of those lyrics are different from the official ones, but that is how it sounds to me).

Dylan’s Slow Train is an absolute challenge to all those around, with lines such as

But the enemy I see
Wears a cloak of decency
All nonbelievers and men stealers talkin’ in the name of religion

and it all arose within that extraordinary six week period.   Quite something.

From “Take it or leave it” to “Actually guys you don’t have much choice”.

by Larry Fyffe

Often overlooked is the influence of the  ironic humour of pre-Beat scat-singer Lord Buckley on the song lyrics of Bob Dylan;

(Lord Buckley: Scrooge)

Dylan takes the above Mark Twain-tinged burlesque on Charles Dickens’ “Christmas Carol”, and gives it a just-a-minute Dylanesque twist:

(Bob Dylan: Mr. Tambourine Man)

Then Dylan picks up on Buckley’s critique of materialism unbound:

(Bob Dylan: Blowin’ In The Wind)

Lord Buckley records a version of Joseph Newman’s (Paul Newman’s uncle) anti-racist poem:

(Lord Buckley: Black Cross)

Dylan performs ‘Black Cross’ under the title  ‘Hezekiah Jones’ on the bootleg  “Ode For Barbara Allen” (1974).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U0x5x8lyON8

Below, a Buckley-like humourous snap at religion with a Dylanesque spin:

Bob Dylan : 115th Dream)

Quite serious at other times is Dylan at the hypocrisy of religious leaders and followers concerning the plight of the poor:

(Bob Dylan: Slow Train)

There are a couple of Dylan recordings of Barbara Allen on You Tube:

What else is on the site

1: 500+ reviews of Dylan songs.  There is an index to these in alphabetical order on the home page, and an index to the songs in the order they were written in the Chronology Pages.

2: The Chronology.  We’ve taken the songs we can find recordings of and put them in the order they were written (as far as possible) not in the order they appeared on albums.  The chronology is more or less complete and is now linked to all the reviews on the site.  We have also produced overviews of Dylan’s work year by year.     The index to the chronologies is here.

3: Bob Dylan’s themes.  We publish a wide range of articles about Bob Dylan and his compositions.  There is an index here.

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

5:  Bob Dylan’s creativity.   We’re fascinated in taking the study of Dylan’s creative approach further.  The index is in Dylan’s Creativity.

6: You might also like: A classification of Bob Dylan’s songs and partial Index to Dylan’s Best Opening Lines and our articles on various writers’ lists of Dylan’s ten greatest songs.

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 Gurang

One of the more vehement objections to Bob Dylan winning the Nobel Prize in literature is that he is “only” a pop singer.  We’ll examine this line of reasoning to its most logical conclusion.

Pervasive Pop

First it is obvious that many of the things we love are part of pop culture:  Blue jeans, café au lait, Game of Thrones, an online Vegas casino, baseball, the Heritage Trail, and so much more. All are part of pop culture and none deserves an award of the scale of a Nobel Prize however we may cherish them. 

Literature More Heartfelt than Mathematics

It is also true that the Nobel Prize in literature is far more subjective than the prize in chemistry or mathematics.  We can read the prize-winning literature; most of us can’t fathom the first page in the corpus of work that a Nobel Prize-winning chemist or mathematician produced over the course of several decades.

Has every Nobel Prize in literature been given to someone who was as eminently deserving of it as Toni Morrison?  Every literature winner has been roundly criticized by people who simply don’t like their creative compositions.  It’s hard to say that you “don’t like” new discoveries in chemistry.

What is Pop Culture?

Let us try to arrive at a definition of pop culture that will satisfy most people given that we can’t possibly hope to satisfy everyone.  Pop culture is fleeting; here today gone tomorrow.  When was the last time you saw someone in bell bottoms or a man with long sideburns?

By this definition, Dylan is not part of pop culture even if he is popular.

Pop culture is the bailiwick of young people, at least in the West.  It may be true that young people have set trends in the past but that was primarily when they were the biggest cohort in the society.  Today Baby Boomers may be ageing but they outnumber millennials.  So, while millennials are texting right and left, their parents and grandparents are curled up listening to Bob Dylan.

By this metric, Dylan is so far removed from pop culture as to make a mockery of the comparison.

Pop culture is characterized by doggerel.  You know what I’m saying?  I was like happy when the Cubs finally won the World Series.  No soup for you. Bazinga.  Let’s compare “Yummy yummy yummy I’ve got love in my tummy” with “the times they are a-changin”.

By any fair definition of doggerel, Dylan has never written a single line of doggerel in his career.  I might have said life but who knows what he wrote when he was seven?

Commonalities between Dylan and Pop

Here are some ways that Dylan and pop culture coincide: they are both commercial; they begin locally and expand to a worldwide reach; recognized by everyone; always evolving.

So here are four areas where Dylan and pop culture coincide but co-incidence does not necessarily mean tautology.  Cheap wine is popular; is Dylan’s writing comparable to a bottle of cheap wine?  A lot of slang terms begin in inner cities; are they as uplifting as “his clothes are dirty but his hands are clean”?  Lady Gaga and Bob Dylan are recognized by billions of people; does the comparison go beyond recognition?  True pop culture evolves because it loses its luster after a short time; Bob Dylan evolves to accommodate an ever-growing luster.

Samples of Dylan’s Work

Can anyone truthfully say at this point that Bob Dylan is part of popular culture?  The argument then must “evolve” to the objective quality of his work.  So, we’ll present some samples of his work to see if it measures up to the stature of a Nobel Prize.

• I saw ten thousand talkers whose tongues were all broken.
• Knock nock knockin’ on heaven’s door.
• Lord knows I’ve paid some dues getting through.
• You say you’re lookin’ for someone
  Who’s never weak but always strong.
  To protect you and defend you
  Whether you are right or wrong.
  Someone to open each and every door,
  But it ain’t me.
  No, no, no it ain’t me Babe.
  It ain’t me you’re lookin’ for, Babe
• How many deaths will it take ‘til he knows
  That too many people have died?

• And she takes just like a woman,
  And she aches just like a woman,
  And she wakes just like a woman,
  Yeah, but she breaks just like a little girl.

• Every man’s conscience is vile and depraved.
  You cannot depend on it to be your guide when it’s you who must keep it satisfied.

• You used to laugh about
  Everybody that was hangin’ out.
  Now you don’t talk so loud.
  Now you don’t seem so proud.
  About having to be scrounging for your next meal.
  How does it feel?

• May you grow up to be righteous,
  May you grow up to be true,
  May you always know the truth,
  And see the lights surrounding you.
  May you always be courageous,
  Stand upright and be strong,
  May you stay forever young,
  Forever young, forever young,
  May you stay forever young.

• The world is old,
  The world is grey,
  Lessons of life
  Can’t be learned in a day.
  I watch and I wait
  And I listen while I stand
  To the music that comes
  From a far better land.

What is the Muse?

We can never know what runs through a creative mind at work.  We see or hear the finished product but we cannot fathom how the artist got there.  It could very well be that the artist also doesn’t know how he or she got there. 

Often we hear of an artist or an athlete being “in a zone”.  Surely Khatia Buniatishvili must be in a zone when her fingers fly across the piano keys at jet airplane speed.  The creative genius of Bob Dylan is that he can get into a zone far more often than most other songwriters and far more often than most people during their own life’s work.

Someone who was knee deep in pop culture would have rhymed take, ache, break, and wake into an easily forgotten lyric.  Bob Dylan took the same common words and turned them into an eternal truth.

Turning everyday words into eternal truths is the most powerful ability of Nobel Prize Literature winners and is why Bob Dylan so richly deserves the award.

By Tony Attwood

Updated 11 March with song lyrics added by Larry

OK it is a bit cheeky of me saying it was found because I don’t know if it was lost, but there are only a few references to it around, and we do have a recording of Dylan performing the song.  So it was lost to me because until yesterday I’d never heard it before.

One site I looked at since finding “You don’t love me no more” suggests that Dylan is not necessarily the composer, but the official Dylan site says he is (although it has no copy of the lyrics) and it certainly sounds like one of his songs of the time.

Now I know from previous attempts that anything I might write down as a version of the lyrics is going to be met with derisive laughter, so, as with other unlisted sets of lyrics I throw the door open.  If you would like to contribute a full set, or even one verse, I’d be delighted to print them here.  (It could of course be in the official book of Dylan’s lyrics, but I am currently on the opposite side of the world from all my Dylan materials, so if it is, sorry, you’ll still have to help me out).

In the recording we have (there’s a link below) it is the opening track which is nice and handy.  The  official site says Dylan never played but it was certainly very well rehearsed and absolutely sounds ready to me, so why having gone to all that trouble to rehearse it perfectly, he let it be, I really don’t know.  But I guess that’s Bob.

It is particularly interesting because the song has a properly written ending which exists outside of the sung material – a fulsome coda no less (to use the correct Italian term).  Something rather rare for Bob – and indeed not that common in pop, rock and blues in general)

So here we have it from September 1978

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJ2BfbrH4oM

What makes the song work so well is that the chorus “You don’t love me no more” is based on three chords that make up thousands of pop songs (described in music as tonic, flattened 7th and 4th) while the intervening verse sections go into a series of minor chords, which I am not going to try and guess at without a piano to hand – something I inexcusably failed to bring with me to Australia).

What’s also so interesting is that no one seems to have written much about this.  Heylin gives it a mention to the level of calling it “Pretty Enjoyable” but that is it.

It really has got an interesting reggae derived rhythm at the start which returns throughout, and although I can’t really make it out it almost seems like a whistle playing along although it could be some clever work on an organ, or maybe a flute.

There’s no breakdown among the band or singer and from the recording it seems everyone knew exactly what they were up to throughout.

All I can say is “oh Bob, how could you throw away such a piece?”   Thank goodness for the guy with the tape recorder.

If you can supply any further information about the song I’ll then try and incorporate it within the whole review (with full acknowledgements of course) and an attempt at the chords once I get back to England.

Here’s Larry’s version of the lyrics added after my initial plea…

Think there’s something missing or wrong with this review?

You are of course always welcome to write a comment below, but if you’d like to go further, you could write an alternative review – we’ve already published quite a few of these.  We try to avoid publishing reviews and comments that are rude or just criticisms of what is written elsewhere – but if you have a positive take on this song or any other Dylan song, and would like it considered for publication, please do email Tony@schools.co.uk

What else is on the site

1: 500+ reviews of Dylan songs.  There is an index to these in alphabetical order on the home page, and an index to the songs in the order they were written in the Chronology Pages.

2: The Chronology.  We’ve taken the songs we can find recordings of and put them in the order they were written (as far as possible) not in the order they appeared on albums.  The chronology is more or less complete and is now linked to all the reviews on the site.  We have also produced overviews of Dylan’s work year by year.     The index to the chronologies is here.

3: Bob Dylan’s themes.  We publish a wide range of articles about Bob Dylan and his compositions.  There is an index here.

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

5:  Bob Dylan’s creativity.   We’re fascinated in taking the study of Dylan’s creative approach further.  The index is in Dylan’s Creativity.

6: You might also like: A classification of Bob Dylan’s songs and partial Index to Dylan’s Best Opening Lines and our articles on various writers’ lists of Dylan’s ten greatest songs.

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

Singer/songwriter Bob Dylan’s highly original artistic style springs in part from his having a peculiar physical affliction – a unique form of reading disability known as ‘Dylaxia’ that causes mixed-up visualizations of proper nouns in particular.

Symptons also include difficulty in discerning words that rhyme with one another – together with being unable to recognize letters and their order. Dylaxia-affected people confuse some letters for others, and imagine letters that are not even there. Aware of his condition, Dylan simplifies things for himself – he names himself ‘Bob’ – not wanting to see himself as a ‘boR’.

Below is an example of a dubious rhyme by Bob Dylan in a song that involves an affair that he claims to have had with a cow-headed Egyptian Goddess:

(Bob Dylan: Isis)

What follows is an example of Dylaxian backward-thinking regarding letter arrangement in  proper nouns. Bob Dylan messes up a song he initially intends to be about ‘God’ returning, and awkwardly turns it into a song about the mistreatment of a ‘doG’ – named ‘Jesus’ of all things:

(Bob Dylan: What Will You Do When Jesus Comes)

Not to dwell on the odd rhyme in the following lyrics, the song’s intended at first to be about Bob Dylan’s wife Sara Lownds (sure he is that Sara is fooling around with a bunch of lusty Kings from Tyre). Due to the effects of Dylaxia, the song gets transformed – the songwriter screws up the spelling of his wife’s last name by the insertion of a couple of letters that aren’t really there (‘Lowlands’ for ‘Lownds’).

In the ensuing confusion, Sara ends up not being herself, but a symbol of Hebrews awaiting the Messiah that the sad-eyed Ezekiel says is not coming to save them any time soon because of their wicked ways:

(Sad-Eyed Lady Of The Lowlands)

Jokneam is a city, with a view of the sea in (North) Israel, below Carmel – the mountain where prophet Elijah wins a ‘roast-off’ with the priests of Baal. King Ahab, prompted by Queen Jezebel (from Tyre), becomes angry at Elijah and chases him out of town in the driving rain. Taking Dylaxia into account (‘Jokneam’ seen by Dylan as ‘Jokeman’), the song, intended to be about a Joker, turns into a biblical story about a prophet.

Not unlike allegorical storylines in a number of other songs that do not involve the unintentional misreadings of proper nouns.

In ‘Lily, Rosemary, And The Jack Of Hearts’, Rosemary, featured in the story line, is easily recognized by listeners familiar with the Bible, as symbolizing North Israel, the land of the Rose of Sharon, while the Jack of Hearts represents the prophet Ezekiel.

Take what you gather from coincidence – in ‘Narrow Way’ Dylan mentions the War of 1812 in which Mohawks play a big part in driving the Americans out of the North Country, ie., Canada. The Mohawk mother of The Band’s Robbie Robertson is named ‘Rose Marie’. It’s little wonder things get mixed together by Dylan – without Dylaxia having anything to do with it!

In the following lyrics, Dylan imagines a time-warped eternally-recurring Universe with a faraway God. Styled in a Post Modernist fragmented format, prophet Elijah is presented by Dylan as a representative of a Messiah

yet-to-come, while Baal-worshipping Ahab, ruler over the city of Jokneam, is depicted as an early rendition of Satan himself, Mick Jagger. There’s no Jokeman, or Jokerman; only Jokneam:

(Bob Dylan: Jokerman)

A biblical allusion to spinning God’s somewhat-slow roulette wheel and taking your chances:

(Ecclesiastes 11:1)

And an allusion to a rebel against the establishment:

In ‘John Wesley Harding’  (note the Dylaxian ‘g’ added to the name), the letters that are used by those of the Jewish faith to signify the Lord God – YHWH -, Dylan sees as only JWH. He gets things a bit mixed up, and writes a song about a Jesus-like outlaw from the Old West:

(Bob Dylan: John Wesley Harding)

Other than the occasional problem caused by the physical condition known as Dylaxia, the singer/songwriter says that he’s just fine

In fact it’s a gas. The unintended consequences of suffering from Dylaxia is great art.

What else is on the site

1: 500+ reviews of Dylan songs.  There is an index to these in alphabetical order on the home page, and an index to the songs in the order they were written in the Chronology Pages.

2: The Chronology.  We’ve taken the songs we can find recordings of and put them in the order they were written (as far as possible) not in the order they appeared on albums.  The chronology is more or less complete and is now linked to all the reviews on the site.  We have also produced overviews of Dylan’s work year by year.     The index to the chronologies is here.

3: Bob Dylan’s themes.  We publish a wide range of articles about Bob Dylan and his compositions.  There is an index here.

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

5:  Bob Dylan’s creativity.   We’re fascinated in taking the study of Dylan’s creative approach further.  The index is in Dylan’s Creativity.

6: You might also like: A classification of Bob Dylan’s songs and partial Index to Dylan’s Best Opening Lines and our articles on various writers’ lists of Dylan’s ten greatest songs.

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 story that Dylan and Helena Springs on tour just jammed together with her singing and Bob making up the music is all very well, and could well explain the origin of the variant 12 bar blues with a few extra notes, and it could explain a very un-Dylan like melody, but it doesn’t explain what happens in the middle 8 which sees the introduction of chords that are quite different from the normal run of Dylan compositions.

To put it simply the verse give us lots of B, E, B, E chords – which is nice and straightforward.

But then in the middle 8 we get this, and even if you don’t know anything about guitar chords you might recognise this is pretty much un-Dylan

But then, maybe that was the only way he could make something to add to Ms Spring’s musical ideas.   Whatever happened my guess is it wasn’t composed all in one go, or at least if it was, they took quite a long coffee break in the middle to get that accompaniment sorted.

Helena Springs says that the piece was written in Brisbane, and Heylin suggests that Dylan must have thought he had found a collaborator along the lines of Levy.  And there are other versions of the story with Clapton noting particularly he had the only cassette of the Dylan/Springs version.  Going through the various reports I am not sure if anyone 100% remembers how it all came together.

Anyway, one way or another the song was given to Clapton and he recorded it along with “Walk Out in the Rain”

The version we’ve been left with is that from Eric Clapton, as Dylan never recorded it and has never performed it as far as I know…   Here is the Live version

And the studio version

Heylin also suggests that the piece has a relationship with “Friend of the Devil” written by Robert Hunter and Gerry Garcia and recorded by Grateful Dead.   As yes in terms of the lyrics he certainly has a point, but I must admit I didn’t think of this at all when listening to the Clapton recording.  I must be getting old; 1-0 to Heylin on this occasion.

Anyway you can, of course, decide what comes from where and how.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YuxhRPUPxcU

Here first are Dylan’s or Dylan and Springs lyrics

Blue sky upon the horizon,
Private eye on my trail,
And if I don’t be there by morning
She’ll know that I must’ve spent the night in jail.

I’ve been runnin’ from Memphis to L.A.,
Had an appointment set sometime for today
And if I don’t be there by morning
She’ll know that I must have gone the other way.

Finding my way home to you, girl, lonely and blue, mistreated too,
Sometimes I think about you, girl, is it true that you think of me too?

I got a woman living in L.A.,
I got a woman waiting for my pay,
And if I don’t be there by morning
Pack my clothes, get down on your knees and pray.

I left my woman with a twenty-dollar bill,
Left her waiting, hope she’s waiting for me still.
But if I don’t be there by morning
I guess that I never will.

Finding my way home to you, girl, lonely and blue, mistreated too,
Sometimes I think about you, girl, is it true that you think of me too?

I left my woman with a twenty-dollar bill,
Left her waiting, hope she’s waiting for me still.
Well, if I don’t be there by morning
I guess that I never will.

And the lyrics from the Dead…

I lit out from Reno, I was trailed by twenty hounds
Didn’t get to sleep last night till the morning came around

Set out runnin but I take my time
A friend of the devil is a friend of mine
If I get home before daylight, I just might get some sleep tonight

Ran into the devil, babe, he loaned me twenty bills
I spent the night in Utah in a cave up in the hills

Set out runnin but I take my time, a friend of the devil is a friend of mine
If I get home before daylight, I just might get some sleep tonight

I ran down to the levee but the devil caught me there
He took my twenty dollar bill and vanished in the air

Set out runnin but I take my time
A friend of the devil is a friend of mine
If I get home before daylight, I just might get some sleep tonight

Got two reasons why I cry away each lonely night:
The first one’s named sweet Anne Marie, and she’s my heart’s delight
The second one is prison, babe, the sheriff’s on my trail
And if he catches up with me, I’ll spend my life in jail

Got a wife in Chino, babe, and one in Cherokee
The first one says she’s got my child, but it don’t look like me

Set out runnin but I take my time
A friend of the devil is a friend of mine
If I get home before daylight, I just might get some sleep tonight

Anyway, a couple of nice songs, and even if the Dylan/Springs composition doesn’t rate with me as a masterpiece, being able to put together a song of that quality just by sitting together and singing and strumming… that sure is something.   It’s only when comparing the song with the fact that Dylan had recently written, “Where are you tonight?” makes me feel it is not right up there with the best of them.

But that’s probably just me wanting works of genius all the time.

By Larry Fyffe

Jezebel of Tyre marries Ahab, the ruler of (North) Israel, Solomon’s former kingdom of Canaan having been split in two – into Israel and Judea. Jezebel is determined to have her people worship nature and agriculture (symbolized by Baal) to the dismay of the followers of Yahweh:

According to the Bible, she and her allies treat the followers of the Hebrew God rather badly:

(Joel 3:6)

The prophet Joel warns the inhabitants of the North Country that the true God will punish them if they don’t mend their wicked ways:

(Joel 3:7)

The New Testament Book of Revelation is filled with allegories and symbols in reference to ‘end times’ and the Second Coming. Old Testament-oriented Bob Dylan’s song lyrics lend themselves to an interpretation of history as a recurring cycle of bright and dark times; various groups tick off the clock in a game of ‘king of the hill’.

There’s the poor being downtrodden by the rich:

(Bob Dylan: Thunder Mountain)

As far as religion goes, whether a follower of cow-headed Isis, or of Jezebel’s Baal, or of the cross-bearing Christian Fathers of St. Herman, the culture of the ‘stranger’ is considered something to be destroyed – ie, the indigenous beliefs of the Inuit.

The Book of Joel again used by Dylan as a template:

(Bob Dylan: Thunder Mountain)

(Bob Dylan, Tombstone Blues)

Assuming an autobiographical aspect, singer/songwriter Bob Dylan (watched from above by the jealous eye of the Thunder God Zeus) is not beyond taking a humorous look at himself and some aspects of the Jewish religion:

(Bob Dylan: Thunder Mountain)

He loves that country pie.

When it comes right down to it, perhaps Jezebel, the lover of the agricultural northern coastal plains of Israel, be the victim of bad press:

(Bob Dylan: Thunder Mountain)

What else is on the site

1: 500+ reviews of Dylan songs.  There is an index to these in alphabetical order on the home page, and an index to the songs in the order they were written in the Chronology Pages.

2: The Chronology.  We’ve taken the songs we can find recordings of and put them in the order they were written (as far as possible) not in the order they appeared on albums.  The chronology is more or less complete and is now linked to all the reviews on the site.  We have also produced overviews of Dylan’s work year by year.     The index to the chronologies is here.

3: Bob Dylan’s themes.  We publish a wide range of articles about Bob Dylan and his compositions.  There is an index here.

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

5:  Bob Dylan’s creativity.   We’re fascinated in taking the study of Dylan’s creative approach further.  The index is in Dylan’s Creativity.

6: You might also like: A classification of Bob Dylan’s songs and partial Index to Dylan’s Best Opening Lines and our articles on various writers’ lists of Dylan’s ten greatest songs.

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 songs listed as being written and recorded after the work with Jacques Levy are of a very different style and approach from all that went before, and indeed it is not clear if this song is actually a Dylan original, or something he heard and re-worked.  Most likely it was just a song that popped into his head without him quite knowing where it came from.

But along with “Patty’s Gone to Laredo” this song came out of the period after working with Levy and turned up on Renaldo and Clara.  It appears at 1 minute 37 seconds on this recording.

Dylan said in the Rolling Stone interview about the movie that it is “as if the songs themselves were trying to communicate with each other, as if they were saying goodbye to each other,” and maybe that is the point – that at this point reviewing the songs as individual units starts to break down.

The writer Penelope Gilliatt said to  the film maker Buñuel in an interview, “Your films make one wonder what’s going on in people’s minds,” and he replied, “Dreams, and also the most everyday questions: ‘What time is it?’ ‘Do you want to eat?'” and that seems to be (to me at least) where we are in Renaldo and Clara and where we are in this song.

In the Rolling Stone interview Dylan also said, “The highest purpose of art is to inspire. What else can you do? What else can you do for anyone but inspire them?”  Here I guess he is inspiring us to think about the unthinkable – the end of the world, the Second Coming, the descent into hell for us unbelievers.

Dylan also described the film, in the Rolling Stone interview, as being post-existentialist, and that notion has caused me to ponder for a while.  What exactly is post-existentialism?  I’m not 100% certain, but here’s where I have got to…

Existentialism posed the questions such as, “What is the meaning of living?  What is the point in carrying on existing?”

It asked these questions at a time when people had stopped automatically believing in God – and thus the questions needed to be asked because the old certainty of religious answers had vanished.

But that left the question how do we find meaning in a world like that we have now?  The answer seems to be, that maybe we don’t have to.  Just possibly, our postmodern culture has saved us from asking ourselves this question.  Chris Hughes in Blasting News suggested that the post-existentialist now experiences a life in which, “We need life to be occupied 24/7.  We need to worry about work, money etc, because these worries distract us from existential worry.  Only, if we find living difficult and troublesome, do we forget to ask, what is the point of living?  The awkwardness of living provides an escape from the awareness of the futility of it all.  The tedium of living needs to be horrible so that we don’t have to confront the horror that, in the end, it may all be pointless anyway.”

So when Jesus returns for the Second Coming there is every chance that we’ll be so busy with the mundane reality of life that we don’t even notice.

The Dylan interview in Rolling Stone does give a lot of insight into what is going on in the movie – a movie which we might remember had a very short life span in cinemas after the critics universally panned the piece as a mishmash.   And yet it is clear from this interview just how deeply Dylan and his fellow film makers were thinking about what they were creating.

It is interesting therefore that Heylin notes the song as quickly descending into “the shopping list school of poetry”.  Yet the interview with Dylan in RS suggests there is so much more going on in the film that it would seem impossible for the song not to have a deeper significance.

And in effect the movie makes reviewing the song as an individual element, rather than as part of the movie, quite impossible.  It was part of the total concept that the movie explored, rather than a film track.

The lyrics that Heylin so objects to

are exactly right as questions to be posed in a movie that moves beyond the point of asking questions about the point of living.   We do indeed avoid the questions by being too busy to worry.

Think there’s something missing or wrong with this review?

You are of course always welcome to write a comment below, but if you’d like to go further, you could write an alternative review – we’ve already published quite a few of these.  We try to avoid publishing reviews and comments that are rude or just criticisms of what is written elsewhere – but if you have a positive take on this song or any other Dylan song, and would like it considered for publication, please do email Tony@schools.co.uk

What else is on the site

1: 500+ reviews of Dylan songs.  There is an index to these in alphabetical order on the home page, and an index to the songs in the order they were written in the Chronology Pages.

2: The Chronology.  We’ve taken the songs we can find recordings of and put them in the order they were written (as far as possible) not in the order they appeared on albums.  The chronology is more or less complete and is now linked to all the reviews on the site.  We have also produced overviews of Dylan’s work year by year.     The index to the chronologies is here.

3: Bob Dylan’s themes.  We publish a wide range of articles about Bob Dylan and his compositions.  There is an index here.

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

5:  Bob Dylan’s creativity.   We’re fascinated in taking the study of Dylan’s creative approach further.  The index is in Dylan’s Creativity.

6: You might also like: A classification of Bob Dylan’s songs and partial Index to Dylan’s Best Opening Lines and our articles on various writers’ lists of Dylan’s ten greatest songs.

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

The satirical essays that Mark Twin writes in regard to the Judeo-Christian Bible influence song lyrics of Bob Dylan.  Twain makes note of God’s all-too-human flaws – not unlike the Demiurge conjured up by the Gnostics – God’s selfish and vindictive; jealous with mood swings that often leads to anger. Sometimes He’s just downright nasty to his earthly creations as demonstrated in the way He sets them up for a Fall. Not only that, He’s still not satisfied and goes after them in the Great Beyond:

(Mark Twain: Letters From Earth)

Even beyond the grave,  Heaven or Hell, it’s a-gonna be.

The Almighty Deity starts out by kicking Adam and his partner out of earthly Paradise for their eating of the tree of good and evil:

(Bob Dylan: Talking World War III Blues)

The story comes from the Holy Bible:

(Genesis 3: 22, 24)

After being that unkind, God reveals that He still has a bit of a mean streak left in Him:

(Bob Dylan: Highway 61 Revisited)

The story above Dylan also takes from the Bible:

(Genesis 22: 2)

The loveliest and the best

(Bob Dylan:Tempest)

(Matthew 27: 45, 46)

Covering an ironically and ambiguously worded song by Kris Kristofferson, who studied the poetry of mystic William Blake, Bob Dylan sings about a ‘Son of Man’ who is killed (as are Gandhi and King, Jr.) while God, as Almighty as He is supposed to be, just looks down – notwithstanding that some claim Jesus said He’s the Son of God while others claim that indeed He is.

In any event, nothing is delivered:

(Matthew 27: 41, 42, 43)

But Jesus never says that He is the Son Of God:

My God, they killed him

(Bob Dylan: They Killed Him – original by Kristofferson)

Neither Mark Twain nor Bob Dylan accept the dogma of orthodox religion. Simply put – because no matter what saith the Holy Bible, the story never ends:

(Bob Dylan: With God On Our Side)

by Tony Attwood

Apologies: I originally posted an early draft of this piece by mistake; here’s the correct version.  (That’s what comes of changing time zones by 11 hours).

Sometimes it seems to me that commentators – be they reporters of the work of sports teams or commentators on the creations of songwriters – expect every moment of the waking life of a genius, itself to be a work of genius.   But the Dylan/Levy partnership needed  the occasional break, and time to explore other ideas, as much as any other combination of writers.  And after writing “Black Diamond Bay” both men might well have been inclined to take a bit of time reflecting on what else was possible.

And this was certainly the case with their next composition was “Catfish”, and the one after that: “Mozambique”.  Catfish was not used on the album, but instead turned up on Bootleg 1-3, so can of course be found there. It is an exploration of what might be possible in a different way of doing things – rather as Mozambique is.

It is a slow atmospheric blues with a reverberating harmonica played throughout – while the blues band does its blues band thing.   If anything I think (and this is just my view) the individual instrumental parts – the harmonica and the various guitars – are overplayed and end up competing with each other, which rather spoils the effect that I feel Dylan was after: the turning of a sports event with all the wild cheering and appreciation that goes with it, into an aesthetic moment that speaks to us about the essence of human life, exactly as the blues can do.

However I do not wish to decry what has been tried by way of experiment.  Most people would have ended up with crowd cheering dubbed over the song.  Dylan, always the master of the alternative approach, went for atmosphere in a completely different way – a way that probably no one else would have ever contemplated.

But this means that there is ultimately so much going on that at times the song appears to be in danger of becoming a mishmash of sound rather than a piece of atmospheric writing which gives us an insight into deeper meaning.

I have also, on occasion, wondered a little if the two composers were deadly serious in what they were doing here; but of course you’ll have to decide.  It starts off fine, but … well maybe some of the accompaniment would probably have been edited down if the song had made it on to the cut of the album.

The theme of this extended 12 bar blues song is the pitcher Jim Hunter who was known as Catfish Hunter.  I will have to leave it to others to explain exactly what he did, since I know little of the sport myself.   Seen on their own, the lyrics don’t really inspire much in the way of deeper thought or meaning, and so they are, I guess, completely dependent on one’s cultural knowledge and on the emotion and feeling portrayed by the accompaniment.

Catfish, million-dollar-man
Nobody can throw the ball like Catfish can

Used to work on Mr. Finley’s farm
But the old man wouldn’t pay
So he packed his glove and took his arm
An’ one day he just ran away

up where the Yankees are
Dress up in a pinstripe suit
Smoke a custom-made cigar
Wear an alligator boot

Catfish, million-dollar-man
Nobody can throw the ball like Catfish can

Carolina born and bred
Love to hunt the little quail
Got a hundred-acre spread
Got some huntin’ dogs for sale

Catfish, million-dollar-man
Nobody can throw the ball like Catfish can

Reggie Jackson at the plate
Seein’ nothin’ but the curve
Swing too early or too late
Got to eat what Catfish serve

Catfish, million-dollar-man
Nobody can throw the ball like Catfish can

Even Billy Martin grins
When the Fish is in the game
Every season twenty wins
Gonna make the Hall of Fame

Catfish, million-dollar-man
Nobody can throw the ball like Catfish can

However I have seen the song described as a rare classic, so not for the first time I might be completely out of order in suggesting it is anything but.

As for Catfish himself, at his National Baseball Hall of Fame Induction Day Speech in 1987 he is reported to have said, “Winning isn’t everything. Wanting to win is.”  Although it is not a style of life that I aspire to, I can see his point.

The Joe Cocker version extends the deliberations of the blues even further and here I am not completely convinced that this isn’t something of a self-indulgence.  But I’m probably starting in the wrong place, and it is all very much a personal view determined by a cultural background.

Think there’s something missing or wrong with this review?

You are of course always welcome to write a comment below, but if you’d like to go further, you could write an alternative review – we’ve already published quite a few of these.  We try to avoid publishing reviews and comments that are rude or just criticisms of what is written elsewhere – but if you have a positive take on this song or any other Dylan song, and would like it considered for publication, please do email Tony@schools.co.uk

What else is on the site

1: 500+ reviews of Dylan songs.  There is an index to these in alphabetical order on the home page, and an index to the songs in the order they were written in the Chronology Pages.

2: The Chronology.  We’ve taken the songs we can find recordings of and put them in the order they were written (as far as possible) not in the order they appeared on albums.  The chronology is more or less complete and is now linked to all the reviews on the site.  We have also produced overviews of Dylan’s work year by year.     The index to the chronologies is here.

3: Bob Dylan’s themes.  We publish a wide range of articles about Bob Dylan and his compositions.  There is an index here.

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

5:  Bob Dylan’s creativity.   We’re fascinated in taking the study of Dylan’s creative approach further.  The index is in Dylan’s Creativity.

6: You might also like: A classification of Bob Dylan’s songs and partial Index to Dylan’s Best Opening Lines and our articles on various writers’ lists of Dylan’s ten greatest songs.

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

Some listeners to Bob Dylan’s lyrics claim that ideas for his songs just pop into his head out of nowhere. Then again, some believe that most of his songs are about Jesus.

Apparently, many of the latter listeners also believe that the Old Testament of the Holy Bible refers to the not-yet-born Christian Messiah – His love for the Church faithful as allegorized in Song Of Solomon, for example.

The Jewish allegorical interpretation of the Song Of Solomon is that it’s about God’s enduring love for Israel, the rose of Sharon – Sharon being a plain in northern Palestine:

Thou hast ravished my heart my sister, my spouse
Thou hast ravished my heart with one of thine eyes
With one chain of thy neck
(Song Of Solomon 4: 9)

A Gnostic married brother and sister act – Isis and Osiris – reveals itself. And
there is no doubt what the rose of Saron’s garden represents in Freudian terms. There in the song too is Yahweh, a jealous God – no wonder, his spouse does not unreservedly commit herself to Him:

A garden enclosed is my sister, my spouse
A spring shut up, a fountain sealed
(Song Of Solomon 4:12)

Singer/songwriter Bob Dylan recognizes a good source of image material when he finds one – as presented in the revised allegory in the song below:

As I went out one morning
To breathe the air around Tom Paine’s
I spied the fairest damsel
That ever did walk in chains
I offered her my hand
She took me by the arm
I knew that very instant
She meant to do me harm
(Bob Dylan: As I Went Out One Morning)

It’s an allegory oft repeated by Dylan in other songs – a damsel lures the narrator into her ‘garden’ in order to trap the freedom-loving artist inside the walls of social and religious conformity.

Below the song with a thousand faces – in one version, Robert Zimmerman does not want to get stuck inside seven-hilled Rome with the Jerusalem blues again because of lust lost:

She was the rose of Sharon from paradise lost
From the city of seven hills near the place of the cross ….
She had bells in her braids and they hung to her toes
But I kept hearing my name and I had to be movin’ on
I saw the screws break loose, saw the devil pound tin
I saw a house in the country being torn from within
I heard my ancestors calling from the land far beyond
(Bob Dylan: Caribbean Wind)

A Dylanesque theme – trapped within the walls of Puritan John Milton’s sexless prison all hell’s bound to break loose; only in the rose garden exists a place where there are no lies:

At dawn my lover ones to me
And tells me of her dreams
With no attempts to shovel the glimpse
Into the ditch of what each one means
At times I think there are no words
But these to tell what’s true
And there are no truth’s outside the gates of Eden
(Bob Dylan: Gates Of Eden)

With a bit of ironic black humour, Dylan pens his own version of the Song Of Solomon about the Rose Of Sharon. He tells it as plain as day in the lyrics of the Rose Of Acapulco:

I’m going down to Rose-Marie’s
She never does me wrong
She puts it to me plain as day
And gives it to me for a song ….
Well, sometimes you know when
the well breaks down
I just go pump on it some
Rose-Marie, she likes to go to big places
And just set there waitin’ for me to come
(Bob Dylan: Going To Acapulco)

A spoof of the ‘Song Of Solomon’, featuring Father Yahweh’s jealousy at being treated like a stranger by the rose of Sharon, straight-faced Bob Dylan’s not capable of resisting:

Oh, sister, when I come to lie in your arms
You should not treat me as a stranger
Our Father would not like the way that you act
You must realize the danger
(Bob Dylan: Oh Sister)

What else is on the site

1: 500 reviews of Dylan songs.  There is an index to these in alphabetical order on the home page, and an index to the songs in the order they were written in the Chronology Pages.

2: The Chronology.  We’ve taken the songs we can find recordings of and put them in the order they were written (as far as possible) not in the order they appeared on albums.  The chronology is more or less complete and is now linked to all the reviews on the site.  We have also produced overviews of Dylan’s work year by year.     The index to the chronologies is here.

3: Bob Dylan’s themes.  We publish a wide range of articles about Bob Dylan and his compositions.  There is an index here.

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

5:  Bob Dylan’s creativity.   We’re fascinated in taking the study of Dylan’s creative approach further.  The index is in Dylan’s Creativity.

6: You might also like: A classification of Bob Dylan’s songs and partial Index to Dylan’s Best Opening Lines and our articles on various writers’ lists of Dylan’s ten greatest songs.

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

What a wonderful way to reach review number 500 on this site, a song that for me sums up Dylan across the years.  He knocks out a few lines and makes up a few more plus the accompaniment and melody on the spot, he does a very hard to understand rough recording, and then they don’t use the song in the film.   Except it gets picked up years later and becomes a monumental hit.

Yes, I know Dylan is “It’s alright ma” and “Desolation Row” and “It’s not dark yet” and “Tell Ol Bill” and on and on – but in terms of his the oft used rambling methodology of this overwhelmingly brilliant songwriter, this is the perfect example which is why I love the coincidence that it became review 500.

In this review I’m giving links to Dylan’s original improvised sketch of the song made during the “Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid” rehearsals but I’ve had such a jolly morning playing through the history of this song, I want to start with this version, not least because I love Old Crow Medicine Show (as I might have mentioned in connection with Visions of Johanna).

It has been written that the Dylan original is “not so much a song as a sketch, crudely recorded featuring most prominently a stomping boot, the candy-coated chorus and a mumbled verse that was hard to make out”.  That seems a bit heavy, but it is sort of right, and yet this is what Ketch Secor of Old Crow Medicine Show took and to which he added verses about hitchhiking home.

Secor himself was a Dylan fan as he stated in one interview:

“I listened to Bob Dylan and nothing else. Nothin’ but Bob for four years. It was like schooling. Every album and every outtake of every album and every live record I could get my hands on and every show I could go see live. I was a teenager who was really turned on to Bob.”

The original source of Bob Dylan’s sketch was noted as “Rock Me Mama” in 1973,  a phrase that Dylan had apparently taken from Arthur Crudup.

So Secor did the re-write and got Bob Dylan to agree to a co-writing copyright contract, apparently at 50/50.

And thus we have a song that deals with hitchhiking from north America.  The chord structure is a classic (A, E, F#m, D) and there it is: dead simple.  It’s popularity built up, it seems, by word of mouth rather than by hype or a big radio push, and not because it was released as a Bob Dylan original or anything like that.

And after 16 years it turned into a gold disc.

But it didn’t stop there because now it is often said that the song is not just Old Crow Medicine Show’s signature song, it is actually bigger in some ways bigger than the group itself”.

One report on Wiki says that “The group reportedly performed the song in Nashville in 2001, as part of a series of songs commemorating Bob Dylan’s 60th birthday long before they had a recording contract with a major label.  The song went platinum in April 2013 and of course the band still play it – although they have had time to do the complete re-run of Blonde on Blonde – from which their version of Johanna noted above is taken.

It is also (although being a sober upstanding member of the community in middle England I can’t confirm this), in the US, a “bar room staple that drunks love to loudly request, regardless of who the band is.”  And here’s one other snippet, “The New England Americana Festival sells a shirt with an image of a wagon wheel with a line through it—creating a “no ‘Wagon Wheel’ zone”.

The song has been covered many times and was finally certified triple Platinum in 2014.

Here’s where it all started.  Sorry about the poor balance and lack of everything else on this but it is, I think, the only version we have.

And here is what it became, with the complete set of lyrics.

Headed down south to the land of the pines
And I’m thumbin’ my way into North Caroline
Starin’ up the road
And pray to God I see headlights

I made it down the coast in seventeen hours
Pickin’ me a bouquet of dogwood flowers
And I’m a hopin’ for Raleigh
I can see my baby tonight

So rock me mama like a wagon wheel
Rock me mama anyway you feel
Hey mama rock me
Rock me mama like the wind and the rain
Rock me mama like a south-bound train
Hey mama rock me

Runnin’ from the cold up in New England
I was born to be a fiddler in an old-time stringband
My baby plays the guitar
I pick a banjo now

Oh, the North country winters keep a gettin’ me now
Lost my money playin’ poker so I had to up and leave
But I ain’t a turnin’ back
To livin’ that old life no more

So rock me mama like a wagon wheel
Rock me mama anyway you feel
Hey mama rock me
Rock me mama like the wind and the rain
Rock me mama like a south-bound train
Hey mama rock me

Walkin’ to the south out of Roanoke
I caught a trucker out of Philly
Had a nice long toke
But he’s a headed west from the Cumberland Gap
To Johnson City, Tennessee

And I gotta get a move on fit for the sun
I hear my baby callin’ my name
And I know that she’s the only one
And if I die in Raleigh
At least I will die free

So rock me mama like a wagon wheel
Rock me mama anyway you feel
Hey mama rock me
Rock me mama like the wind and the rain
Rock me mama like a south-bound train
Hey mama rock me

And here’s a version that I rather like…

So that is it.  The 500th review on this site.  Not all written by me – far from it, and including at least one song not written by Dylan at all, plus including a number of songs reviewed by different people.  I’m quite proud of this little moment – especially as it comes just as I am about to toddle off to the other side of the world (although I hope to be keeping the site running even so).

If you would like to join in the fun and write a review of a Dylan song – either one not yet covered here or one that has been reviewed but to which you think you can add a different angle, send me your contribution, and all being well I will publish it.

I’ve often said in these occasional look backs that I am so grateful to my great pal Pat who encouraged me over and over to come back to the site when I got a bit fed up with it in the early days, (because Wikipedia refused to link to it even when we were something completely new about a Dylan song).  But it was worth coming back to.  And when I return from the other side of the world I will start work on all those Basement Tapes songs that are still missing from the reviews.

If you have been, thanks for reading.

Think there’s something missing or wrong with this review?

You are of course always welcome to write a comment below, but if you’d like to go further, you could write an alternative review – we’ve already published quite a few of these.  We try to avoid publishing reviews and comments that are rude or just criticisms of what is written elsewhere – but if you have a positive take on this song or any other Dylan song, and would like it considered for publication, please do email Tony@schools.co.uk

What else is on the site

1: 500 reviews of Dylan songs.  There is an index to these in alphabetical order on the home page, and an index to the songs in the order they were written in the Chronology Pages.

2: The Chronology.  We’ve taken the songs we can find recordings of and put them in the order they were written (as far as possible) not in the order they appeared on albums.  The chronology is more or less complete and is now linked to all the reviews on the site.  We have also produced overviews of Dylan’s work year by year.     The index to the chronologies is here.

3: Bob Dylan’s themes.  We publish a wide range of articles about Bob Dylan and his compositions.  There is an index here.

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

5:  Bob Dylan’s creativity.   We’re fascinated in taking the study of Dylan’s creative approach further.  The index is in Dylan’s Creativity.

6: You might also like: A classification of Bob Dylan’s songs and partial Index to Dylan’s Best Opening Lines and our articles on various writers’ lists of Dylan’s ten greatest songs.

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

‘Red River Valley’ is a traditional folk song that dates back to the Red River Colony in Manitoba, Canada. The Red River flows from Minnesota, Bob Dylan’s home state, into the Great White North; it’s waters eventually end up in Hudson Bay where the Masked Marauders stayed.

American singers of country and western songs, riding the red horse of cultural imperialism, turn the ‘girl’ in that song into a ‘cowboy’, who oddly enough speaks French (‘adieu’). The original song features a half-French, half-native maiden who falls in love with a soldier sent with troops from Eastern Canada to put down the Red River Rebellion of 1870:

So come sit by my side if you love me
Do not hasten to bid me adieu
Just remember the Red River Valley
And the girl who loves you so true
(Red River Valley)

The original song lyrics take, not the point of view of a ‘cowboy who loves you so true’, but the point of view of the forsaken girl:

There could never be such a longing
In the heart of a white maiden’s breast
As dwells in the heart you are breaking
With love for the boy who came West
(Red River Valley)

Lyrics to a related song by Bob Dylan indicate that its writer is aware of the forsaken girl from the North country – whether it’s by a soldier or a cowboy that she’s been left behind on the Red River shore.

Dylan adds a twist to the love story:

Well, I sat by her side for a while
I tried to make that girl my wife
She gave me the best advice and she said
‘Go home and lead a quiet life’
Well, I been to the East and I been to the West
And I been out where the black winds roar
Somehow though I never did get that far
With the girl from the Red River shore
(Bob Dylan: Red River Shore)

The colour ‘black’ is characteristic of Baroque poetry; Dylan lightens things up a bit in a reference to Jesus Christ at the end of the song: “Well, I don’t know what kind of language that he used”. Perhaps on the cross Christ says ‘adieu’.

Christian analysts of Dylan’s lyrics, at least the ones on a narrow path through life, consider that the whole song is about Jesus, that even the Red River girl represents Christ. Seems they feel obliged to give Jesus a sex change operation in many a song that Dylan writes so they can marry Him or something. Tweeter, it’s weird, I tell you.

The Kingston Trio sing a traditional song from real cowboy country called ‘Red River Shore’ that features the river that flows into the the Gulf of Mexico. The bronco-riding cowboy in that song meets his doom on the way to meet the girl on the Red River shore, his chest pierced by flying angels from the pistols of her kinsmen.

Dylan’s certainly aware of that song’s Poe-like tragic ending, and mixes the two rivers – one North, one South – together down in his basement – note, we mustn’t forget Joe Two Rivers in the lonely log cabin up in Canada where Lenore is tapping at the window like a raven with a broken wing:

At the foot of yon mountain where the big river flows
There’s a fond creation and a soft wind that blows
There’s a fair maiden, she’s the one I adore
She’s the one I will marry on the Red River shore
She wrote me a letter; she wrote it so kind
And in that letter these words you will find
‘Come back to me darling, you’re the one I adore
You the one I will marry on the Red River shore’
(Red River Shore: Kingston Trio)

Bob Dylan, a professional artist, steals the written-letter-so-kind line from the song above and places it in ‘Not Dark Yet’. In his own ‘Red River Shore’, Dylan likewise rhymes ‘adore’ and ‘shore’. True to form, added is a Dylanesque twist:

Well, I can’t escape from the memories
Of the one that I’ll always adore
All those nights when I lay in her arms
Of the girl from the Red River shore
(Bob Dylan: Red River Shore)

Also mentioned is the lonely cabin in the Canadian woods:

Pretty maids all in a row lined up
Outside my cabin door
I’ve never wanted any of them wanting me
Except for the girl from the Red River shore
(Bob Dylan: Red River Shore)

And that Gnostic Mary Magdalene is always hanging around the gates of Eden:

Mary, Mary, quite contrary
How does your garden grow
With silver bells and cockle shells
And pretty maids all in a row
(Nursery rhyme)

In his ‘Red River Shore’, Dylan sings: ‘Well, I’m a stranger here in a strange land’
– he’s a Jew in mostly Christian America – which is a reference to a Bible story in which Moses seeks shelter on the Red Sea shore – from the Egyptian Pharoah. In exile, Moses marries, according to some interpretations of the Bible story, a black girl:

And Moses was content to dwell with the man
And he gave Moses Zipporah, his daughter
And she bore him a son, and he called his name Gershom
For he said, “I have been a stranger in a strange land”
(Exodus 2: 21,22)

Oh dear, maybe it was ‘Oprah’ that he married – I get all mixed up and confused sometimes – that’s for sure.

What else is on the site

1: Almost 500 reviews of Dylan songs.  There is an index to these in alphabetical order on the home page, and an index to the songs in the order they were written in the Chronology Pages.

2: The Chronology.  We’ve taken the songs we can find recordings of and put them in the order they were written (as far as possible) not in the order they appeared on albums.  The chronology is more or less complete and is now linked to all the reviews on the site.  We have also produced overviews of Dylan’s work year by year.     The index to the chronologies is here.

3: Bob Dylan’s themes.  We publish a wide range of articles about Bob Dylan and his compositions.  There is an index here.

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

5:  Bob Dylan’s creativity.   We’re fascinated in taking the study of Dylan’s creative approach further.  The index is in Dylan’s Creativity.

6: You might also like: A classification of Bob Dylan’s songs and partial Index to Dylan’s Best Opening Lines and our articles on various writers’ lists of Dylan’s ten greatest songs.

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

My original aim in starting this blog was to undertake reviews of all the songs Dylan released on studio albums.  Then I started adding the songs from the bootleg series – and now as I approach the 500th review we’re onto some rather more obscure material, some of which turn out to be brilliant pieces, others are knock about ideas that didn’t make the grade.

“Goodbye Holly” is  a piece of film music Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid which was not used in the movie.

In 2010 the Daily Telegraph, a right wing national daily newspaper published in London, ran the article “The gems that Bob Dylan discarded” in which Clinton Heylin picked what the writer of the introduction to the piece called “25 of his finest unheard tracks.”   Goodbye Holly came in at number 9.

I am not sure it truly merits a listing as high as number 9, or indeed a listing on the “finest unheard tracks” list at all, but since the list includes a number of songs none of us has ever heard, I think we can take the introduction with a pinch of salt.

What I can say is that “Goodbye Holly” didn’t make the cut for, and still wouldn’t be part of, my list of The 20 Sometimes Forgotten Dylan Masters that you can still find online.  And speaking of online, if you fancy finding out about an online bonus that’s the link to follow.

And of course in gambling and in music we each have our own judgements.

This song was one of a whole range of songs Bob wrote for the Pat Garrett movie which were to be used to mourn the death of each member of the gang, but as with several other songs was set aside once “Knocking on Heaven’s Door” was composed a little later.

Here are the lyrics in full…

Goodbye Holly, Holly goodbye
Your wife’s a gonna miss you
Your baby’s gonna cry
Goodbye Holly, Holly so long

All your good times have passed now and gone.
Pat Garrett, he shot you with a Colt 44
He dropped you across a table
Now you’re gone forever more.

The recording sessions for the movie started on 20 January in Mexico City, with Billy 7, being recorded (along with lots of other “Billy” takes.   Also recorded in the session on that day were “Under Turkey”, “Billy Surrenders”, “And He’s Killed Me Too”, “Goodbye Holly” and “Pecos Blues”.

The rest of the songs were recorded in February, and that was that for the film, but the way was set for a return to a year of highly productive writing.

Here’s the list of songs taken from 1973 as we’ve listed them in the Dylan Songs of the 70s index.

1. Goodbye Holly
2. Rock me Mama
3. Knocking on heaven’s door
4. Never say goodbye
5. Nobody cept you
6. Going going gone
7. Hazel
8. Something there is about you
9. You Angel You
10. On a night like this
11. Tough Mama
12. Dirge 
13. Wedding Song

Rock me Mama will be reviewed next which will complete the review of the year, and take us to 500 review articles.

Think there’s something missing or wrong with this review?

You are of course always welcome to write a comment below, but if you’d like to go further, you could write an alternative review – we’ve already published quite a few of these.  We try to avoid publishing reviews and comments that are rude or just criticisms of what is written elsewhere – but if you have a positive take on this song or any other Dylan song, and would like it considered for publication, please do email Tony@schools.co.uk

What else is on the site

1: Almost 500 reviews of Dylan songs.  There is an index to these in alphabetical order on the home page, and an index to the songs in the order they were written in the Chronology Pages.

2: The Chronology.  We’ve taken the songs we can find recordings of and put them in the order they were written (as far as possible) not in the order they appeared on albums.  The chronology is more or less complete and is now linked to all the reviews on the site.  We have also produced overviews of Dylan’s work year by year.     The index to the chronologies is here.

3: Bob Dylan’s themes.  We publish a wide range of articles about Bob Dylan and his compositions.  There is an index here.

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

5:  Bob Dylan’s creativity.   We’re fascinated in taking the study of Dylan’s creative approach further.  The index is in Dylan’s Creativity.

6: You might also like: A classification of Bob Dylan’s songs and partial Index to Dylan’s Best Opening Lines and our articles on various writers’ lists of Dylan’s ten greatest songs.

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

The Not So Narrow Road That Leads To Dylan’s Door

By Larry Fyffe

Woe unto analysts of the lyrics composed by Bob Dylan who are sure they can make his songs featuring biblical imagery fit the moral and theological messages contained in the pages of the Judeo-Christian Bible.

David Weir, for example, looking at Dylan’s ‘Narrow Way’ contends that the song is about Jesus, God, and humanity. In a manner somewhat Gnostic in tone, Weir claims that the song depicts the dark human side of Jesus as well as His divine side (by having faith in the light-emitting side of Jesus, humanity achieves peace through redemption, the grace of God, and the blood of the Lamb). Though no names are mentioned by Dylan in the song, Weir makes the case that there’s tension shown in ‘Narrow Way’ between two facets of Jesus – one divine and one human.

Weir presents the interesting idea that Dylan builds an analogy beside Jesus, and nails His human and divine sides to it – to the historical event known as the War of 1812:

Ever since the British burned the White House down
There’s a bleeding wound in the heart of town
(Bob Dylan: Narrow Way)

Wier states: “The implication is that the British need to ‘go back home’ so leaving the
Americans in peace” – the Americans represent the suffering of Christ on the cross while the British symbolize Man redeeming himself by taking responsibility for doing bad things and going home.

The problem is that the analogy flies in the face of historical accuracy – it is the Americans who declare war in 1812 with the intention of looting, plundering, and taking over Canada (British North America); the invading American armies burn York, and British forces respond by burning the White House. American ground forces are ousted from Canada by British troops with the help of Canadians.

Among the Canadian fighters are English, French, and ‘Indian’ characters akin to those portrayed in Dylan’s famous 1964 CBC-TV appearance from the city of Toronto (formerly, York).

So if any religious meaning for ‘Narrow Way’ is warrented better construed it be that God allows the British to set the White House on fire in order to punish the United States of America for its sinful ways. Mama, the country’s only bleeding because it worships the Golden Calf, the Almighty Dollar, and covets its neighbour, Canada – the burning of the White House analogous to the destruction of the Holy Temple in Jerusalem; God’s no longer on America’s side.

Such a theme Dylan presents in many of his lyrics – the United States he paints in a red colour as though it were the New Babylon; not the saviour of the world like many US politicians would have it. Furthermore, David Weir’s analysis requires listeners to the song accept, at least in metaphorical terms, that Jesus possesses a Gnostic-like sexual identity. In some verses, Christ appears in the form of a female, he claims:

I gonna have to take my head and bury it between your breasts
(Bob Dylan: Narrow Way)

No doubt the song by Dylan being about the trial and tribulations of relationships between men and women is easier to maintain; out on the D-train, Dylan plays ‘pin the tail on the allusion’.

Ironic Post Modern Art features the montage technique. A songwriter mixes fragmented pieces of the works of other writers, including pieces of his own previous creations, into his songs. The fragmented pieces are supposed to reflect that in modern times every thing is broken:

Look down angel from the stars
Help my weary soul to rise
I kissed her cheek, I dragged your plough
You broke my heart, I was your friend ’til now
(Bob Dylan: Narrow Way)

Bought to mind is the following poem:

Look homeward angel now and melt with ruth
And O ye dolphins waft the hapless youth
(John Milton: Lycidas)

And a song from Dylan himself:

Businessmen, they drink my wine
Ploughmen dig my earth
(Bob Dylan: All Along The Watchtower)

And another:

You’ve got a lot of nerve to say you are
my friend
When I was down you just stood there grinnin’
(Bob Dylan: Positively 4th Street)

In the ‘Narrow Way’, the listener trips over shadows of the Bible;

It’ s a long road, it’s a long and narrow way
(Bob Dylan: Narrow Way)

That being:

Because straight is the gate
And narrow is the way
Which leadeth unto life
And few there is that find it
(Matthew 7: 14)

And over the shades of the Beatles:

The long and winding road that leads to your door
Will never disappear
(Paul McCartney: The Long And Winding Road)

Even more as the moving finger writes, and moves on:

You went and lost your lovely head
For a drink of wine and a crust of bread
(Bob Dylan: Narrow Way)

Bringing it all back home to the drunken Persian:

A book of verses underneath the bough
A jug of wine, a loaf of bread, and thou
Beside me singing in the wilderness
Oh, wilderness were Paradise enow
(Edward Fitzgerald: Rubaiyat Of Omar Khayyam)

Indeed, many an allusion there be:

If I had a thousand tongues, I couldn’t count them all
(Bob Dylan: Narrow Way)

And so it goes:

Give me a thousand kisses and a hundred more
(Catulus: To Lesbia)

What else is on the site

1: Almost 500 reviews of Dylan songs.  There is an index to these in alphabetical order on the home page, and an index to the songs in the order they were written in the Chronology Pages.

2: The Chronology.  We’ve taken the songs we can find recordings of and put them in the order they were written (as far as possible) not in the order they appeared on albums.  The chronology is more or less complete and is now linked to all the reviews on the site.  We have also produced overviews of Dylan’s work year by year.     The index to the chronologies is here.

3: Bob Dylan’s themes.  We publish a wide range of articles about Bob Dylan and his compositions.  There is an index here.

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

5:  Bob Dylan’s creativity.   We’re fascinated in taking the study of Dylan’s creative approach further.  The index is in Dylan’s Creativity.

6: You might also like: A classification of Bob Dylan’s songs and partial Index to Dylan’s Best Opening Lines and our articles on various writers’ lists of Dylan’s ten greatest songs.

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

This turns up on Another Self Portrait.  I can’t find it on line, so you’ll have to get the album or else go to Spotify  – here’s a link in case you are not familiar with the service…

Wiki tells us that after work on Self Portrait was just about done and dusted a series of sessions were held in New York with George Harrison, Charlie Daniels and Russ Kunkel but nothing came from the sessions that was going to be used.

And the New Yorker in a review called it “a fun if inessential collaboration between Dylan and George Harrison”.

But what Mr Harrison – a man known to be rather interested in gurus – made of it all I am not quite sure.  He seems to be playing along quite happily, so presumably he was in on the joke.

It is in essence a standard 12 bar blues, which means all the musicians can follow Dylan at once without any rehearsal – because everyone who has ever played pop or rock knows how to play extended 12 bar blues.  Hence they can get this sort of result in the first recording without any rehearsals.  It also explains why Bob calls out, after the second verse “Hey one time” indicating the next verse is a guitar solo.  Bob is obviously playing rhythm guitar as normal, holding it all together.

I’m not sure if any lyrics were written down even though Bob clearly had some words in mind, because the repeat of verse two into verse three, and the repeat of verse one in verse four suggests he just had a smattering of an idea.

Anyway, as much because I don’t have anything else to add as for any other reason, here are the lyrics…

Rain all around, windshield wipers movin’
Water on the ground, sure don’t feel like groovin’
Working on a guru
Working on a guru
Working on a guru, before the sun goes down

Rain all around, I need me an umbrella
Water on the ground, I am that kind of fella
Looking for a guru
Working on a guru
Working on a guru, before the sun goes down

Walking on the street, I need me an umbrella
Just to keep it sweet, I am that kind of fella
Looking for a guru
Working on a guru
Working on a guru, before the sun goes down

Rain on the ground, windshield wipers movin’
Water all around, I sure don’t feel like groovin’
I’m working on a guru
Yes, I’m working on a guru
But I’m working on a guru, before the sun goes down

Working on a guru
Working on a guru
Well, it’s true, it could be you
I’m working on a guru

Now there is one area of all this that you might want to indulge in, and maybe even have the ability to disentangle, which is the Church of Bob, which appears in the Dylanchords site and which makes reference to this song.

I am not at all sure my understanding of what is going on there is adequate to bring any further meaning to this song, so I leave that one totally in your hands.  If you want to give a summary of what those pages are all about, please do write in.

Think there’s something missing or wrong with this review?

You are of course always welcome to write a comment below, but if you’d like to go further, you could write an alternative review – we’ve already published quite a few of these.  We try to avoid publishing reviews and comments that are rude or just criticisms of what is written elsewhere – but if you have a positive take on this song or any other Dylan song, and would like it considered for publication, please do email Tony@schools.co.uk

What else is on the site

1: Almost 500 reviews of Dylan songs.  There is an index to these in alphabetical order on the home page, and an index to the songs in the order they were written in the Chronology Pages.

2: The Chronology.  We’ve taken the songs we can find recordings of and put them in the order they were written (as far as possible) not in the order they appeared on albums.  The chronology is more or less complete and is now linked to all the reviews on the site.  We have also produced overviews of Dylan’s work year by year.     The index to the chronologies is here.

3: Bob Dylan’s themes.  We publish a wide range of articles about Bob Dylan and his compositions.  There is an index here.

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

5:  Bob Dylan’s creativity.   We’re fascinated in taking the study of Dylan’s creative approach further.  The index is in Dylan’s Creativity.

6: You might also like: A classification of Bob Dylan’s songs and partial Index to Dylan’s Best Opening Lines and our articles on various writers’ lists of Dylan’s ten greatest songs.

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

La Mancha Is Blowing in The Wind:
Bob Dylan And Don Quixote (Part II)

By Larry Fyffe

There are those analysts of Bob Dylan’s songs lyrics who want to strap him into a straight jacket, stuff him in a box marked ‘Serious Hebrew’ or ‘Serious Christian’ or ‘Serious Hebrew-Christian’, and then nail the lid down tight and dump it down a hole in the ground.

Having had lots of funny things happen to him on the way to feed the lions at the Roman Coliseum, the master escapist isn’t that easy to pin down:

While one who sings with his tongue on fire
Gargles in the rat race choir
Bent out of shape by society’s pliers
Cares not to come up any higher
But rather get you down in the hole he’s in …..
My eyes collide head-on with stuffed
Graveyards, false goals, I scuff
At pettiness which plays so rough
Walk upside-down inside handcuffs
Kick my legs to crash it off
Say okay, I have had enough
What else can you show me?
(Bob Dylan: It’s alright ma (I’m Only Bleeding))

Then Bob jumps on a bicycle and rides it across a tight-rope while juggling Egyptian Mythology (it carries Sky Mother and Earth Father on its back) with Christian Theology that has its Commander-in-Chief standing on its shoulders (God the Father stretches all the way up to the cloud-strewn canopy of the circus tent).

Dressed as a clown, Dylan looks down and there’s Eve chained to the straw-covered floor by her angry Father. She’s caused Adam to fall off the wire with her when she fell while trying to balance an apple on her nose. It’s a dark and dreary place down there.

In the meantime, Dylan sprinkles Seth, the hyena-headed devil of Egyptian mythology, with star dust and the hairy hyena turns into the goodly father figure of Christian theology. Still on the tight-rope, our singer/songwriter, now attired in the long black cloak and a top hat, pulls back a curtain, taps a silver cane three times, and reveals Satan, surrounded by smoke and mirrors, as the new sparkling symbol of evil .

In short, using the Bible as a template, Bob Dylan, the imaginative artist, creates his own mini-mythologies like that of ‘John Wesley Harding‘, an outlaw of the Old West, who is changed into a saint right in front of our eyes.

The singing alchemist of whom we speak can certainly be described as a Gnostic seeking to perfect body and soul through the medium of a ‘magnum opus’. A strict Gnostic he’s not because Dylan mixes much of the ingrediants for his medicine show down in the burlesque basement with the help of someone called Johnny.

They label the medicine with instructions that say when followed carefully one can not help but smile when it’s consumed; a baloon over a picture of the face of Dale Carnegie is inscribed – ‘slowly pour this stuff into your ear’. And before you know it, visions and versions of Don Quixote and Sanzo Panza will suddenly appear dancing and swirling in your head – like the one below:

Well, John the Baptist, after torturing a thief
Looks at his hero, the Commander-in-Chief
Saying, ‘Tell me, great hero, but please make it brief
Is there a hole for me to get sick in?’
(Bob Dylan: Tombstone Blues)

Miguel de Cervantes might himself appear holding a stolen image of Satan surrounded by flags a-flying:

The banners of Hell’s monarch come towards us
‘Look to discern him’, spake my guide
As when breathes a cloud, heavy and dense
Or when the shades of night fall on our hemisphere
Viewed from afar seems like a windmill
Which the blast stirs briskly around
(Dante: The Divine Comedy -Canto 34)

Perhaps he’ll be accompanied by the Knight of La Mancha who’s saddled up and gargling in a rat-infested washroom of Babylon where he’s tilting at a windmill that looks a lot like an electric razor’:

This is hard country to stay alive in
Blades are everywhere and they’re breaking my skin
I’m armed to the hilt and I’m struggling hard
You won’t get out of here unscarred
It’s a long road, it’s a long and narrow way
If I can’t work up to you, you’ll surely
Have to work down to me some day
(Bob Dylan: Narrow Way)

He’s talking to Saint Paul.

What else is on the site

1: Almost 500 reviews of Dylan songs.  There is an index to these in alphabetical order on the home page, and an index to the songs in the order they were written in the Chronology Pages.

2: The Chronology.  We’ve taken the songs we can find recordings of and put them in the order they were written (as far as possible) not in the order they appeared on albums.  The chronology is more or less complete and is now linked to all the reviews on the site.  We have also produced overviews of Dylan’s work year by year.     The index to the chronologies is here.

3: Bob Dylan’s themes.  We publish a wide range of articles about Bob Dylan and his compositions.  There is an index here.

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

5:  Bob Dylan’s creativity.   We’re fascinated in taking the study of Dylan’s creative approach further.  The index is in Dylan’s Creativity.

6: You might also like: A classification of Bob Dylan’s songs and partial Index to Dylan’s Best Opening Lines and our articles on various writers’ lists of Dylan’s ten greatest songs.

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