Thunder on the Mountain

What's that? Is that the sound of Dylan laughing at us all trying to make sense of the absurdity of the song and its lyrics? This is Dylan laughing not just at that but at his critics and people who have put words in his mouth or tried to make him into something he isn't. A few years ago, the press went gaga over Alicia Keys, declaring her, like Dylan, Springsteen and Prince, lo so many years ago, the great saviour of pop music. This of course, is dumb - you shouldn't look for saviours in pop music. Of course all those critics are obsessing over the references to Alicia here (lol). Of course, she didn't turn out to be anything like that. Dylan makes allusions to his past and the things he has done to confound the critics, fans and so forth - his turn towards Christianity, his (and likewise Alicia Keys) "sell-out", his critics obsession with his divorce (likewise his own) and so forth. As he says "she aint no angel and neither am I" - and he goes on to condemn everyone and says he "doesn't give a damn about your dreams" - Part of the song is sung in the voice of these critics, fans and people who looked towards him as their saviour - their false bravado, piety - secular and otherwise. In the end, their yammering and blather amounts only to "Thunder on the Mountain" -- he even takes it further and relates the critical blather to the mass of offensive punditry so prevalent on cable TV and in politics ("all the ladies of Washington scrambling to get out of town"). Dylan sums it up in the last line - "for the love of God, you ought to take pity on yourself"

Our wordsmith at his finest. In the words of Allen Ginsberg, " Bob Dylan is the master of American tongue ".

Why Alicia Keys?

awesome song!

Well vinylminer (which is an awesome name by the way) seems to have sumed it up rather nicely. I would just like to say that when I bought Dylan's new album and threw it in, this song knocked my socks off. It is a great way to kick off the album, and kudos to Dylan for still kickin' ass.

I love this song, and I agree with vinylminer about it's meanings. "Gonna raise me some army, some tough sons of bitches/I'll recruit my arm from the orphanages" is straight golden.

This is Dylan at his very best. The whole Album is superb. Why do folk try to find something that most likely isn't there? Just enjoy listening as much as Dylan likes singing.

It’s full of Judeo Christian apolcalyptic imagery from the old and New Testament. It’s also full of ideas from Jesus and the epistles of the New Testament. I quickly counted a minimum of 25 references.

The "Jesus Freak" movement of the seventies temporarily hooked in a batch of hipsters, but Dylan shows that he's not one of these: "Some sweet day I'll stand beside my king I wouldn't betray your love or any other thing"

I have listened to Dylan (as many of you have ) for amy years and am still perplexed by some of his lyrics. However, Thunder on the Mountain is one that, I believe, I have some grasp on. Dylan is talking about 9/11 in many of the phrases. i.e. "better roll your airplane down" "ladies in Washington trying to get out of town" "gonna raise me an army some tough sons a bitchs, I'll recruit my army from the orphanges"...airplane down reference to all planes being brought in on 9/11; ladies in Washington--scrambling is reference to Washington pandemonium on 9/11 (see the video); raise army,tough SOB from orphanges is reference to the children left without parents after 9/11; "hammers on the table, pitchfork on the shelf" is reference to we can war with you or have peace with you (9/11 persons); "for the love of God ya'll take pity on yourselves" is reference to war with U.S. will bring no pity. There are other refernces, also, to 9/11 in the lyrics. Some lyrics like "I've got the porkchop she's got the pie" have nothing to do with 9/11, and are pretty easy to comprehend; but overall, most of the song lyrics refer to 9/11.