| Bob Dylan – Tangled Up in Blue Lyrics | 17 years ago |
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What I see in this song is Dylan's attempt to enact Cubist philosophy in his writing. By using unabashed hyperbole instead of analogy and forsaking reality by means of avoiding chronology, he presents the emotion of the story despite the ambiguities of the text. A man dealing with slaves may be a man losing track of his morality, or becoming too controlling. Working for a while on a fishing boat may represent his vagabond quest for sustenance. Mathematicians and carpenter's wives being illusions seem to illustrate how those who affix themselves to science and religion respectively are not idols in his eyes- he's much older than that now. So on and so on and back one step and forward one-half. Ultimately these pieces form a whole that resembles only slightly their original foundation- however in a slightly surrealist fashion, the conveyed notion will be analogous. The title I think is an homage to Picasso's blue period. |
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| Bob Dylan – John Wesley Harding Lyrics | 18 years ago |
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After the Beatles released SPLHCB and the rest of the musical community was knee-deep in psychedelia Dylan took the polar opposite approach to John Wesley Harding. Clearly by sound alone you can hear the simple American traditionalism it's rooted in, written and recorded in Nashville, Tennessee. But in addition to that, while The Beatles, Byrds and Jefferson Airplane were dealing with the very esoteric aspects of existence and reaching out as far as they could with their thoughts and music, Dylan reared back and examined things in their bare nature from the start. John Wesley Harding which is the first track and title of the album groups things together as well as Dylan's previous 'album-starters'. Clearly reminiscent of Woody Guthrie's Pretty Boy Floyd, John Wesley Harding is a glorified outlaw whose sins are forgotten and virtues extolled. In this sense it is stylistically and musically a tribute to folk Americana. However history would note that John Wesley Harding is a fictal character while John Wesley Hardin was a real man. Is this misspelling intentional? Also history would note that the JWH initials are comprable to the Hebrew moniker for Jehovah. Could this also be intentional? Throughout the album Dylan draws on numerous Biblical references dealing with traditional Christian themes. It only makes sense that the album title and first song would serve to encompass this. |
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| Bob Dylan – All I Really Want to Do Lyrics | 18 years ago |
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As this song is on the surface a love song, it is more accurately a song dealing with inter-personal relationships. Like It 'Aint Me Babe and Positively 4th Street I believe it's again Dylan using the template of the love song to direct an inter-personal message at a specific target. In this case his critics. That's mostly due to the context of when he wrote this, though lines like categorize you or advertise you do lend to the theory's creedence. Similarly I think it's important that the song begins the album. Dylan had a habit of beginning his album with an overview of what he wanted to get out of the record (It AInt Me Babe, Like A Rolling Stone). What's cute in the body of the song is that the yodel bit is him obviously 'putting himself out there' and being himself. While it's just a fun little yodel as in Honey Just Allow Me More One Chance with the backdrop of the song's meaning it's more of a statement and device than just a sound. |
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| Bob Dylan – All the Tired Horses Lyrics | 18 years ago |
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I always thought this song was symbolically important given it's context. Self Portrait is my favorite Dylan album and in my opinion does a better job summing him up than any biography would later to prove to (including Biograph and Chronicles). To begin the album 'Self Portrait' he composes All The Tired Horses- a song he arranged and wrote yet does not have a voice in. One of a handful of songs on his albums where he does not sing, but the only one where someone else sings and he is absent. Given it's placement on the album and the album which it is on the implication is that this is either the backdrop of his life- or extending the metaphor- the blank canvas against which his likeness is composed. Fittingly the album is constructed of various standards he has re-tooled in his own fashion as well as a few of his classics performed live. All the Tired Horses is reminiscent of a hymn or work song- which ultimately were the birth parents of modern American folk and country music. All the Tired Horses seems to be Dylan reconstructing the birth of both him ad his music. |
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| Bob Dylan – The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll Lyrics | 18 years ago |
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For any young poets/songwriters take a look here at how he uses rhyme. Every rhyme during the body of the verse contains two syllables (even from-him which he'll mutate to one word) and impresses in the feminine scheme- doubt, weakness, and sympathy. Then when he takes his hard-line stance during the refrain, the abrupt and finite- face, fears, tears- to which is very direct and in the masculine scheme harsh and powerful. Notably he also uses the masculine mono-syllabbic scheme when she is 'slain by a cane' to produce the similar effect. |
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| Bob Dylan – With God on Our Side Lyrics | 18 years ago |
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If you ever come across it, you'll recognize the melody of the Irish folk song 'The Patriot Game' as the one Dylan borrowed to base With God On Our Side upon. The Judas Iscariot line is one of the best. Basically re-telling the Biblical betrayal of Jesus by Judas Iscariot (Matthew 26:49) where Judas said that whomever he kissed would be the one to take away. However there is much speculation the Judas did not betray Jesus and that the two were actually working together to deliver Jesus to martyrdom. Dylan's line here (the decision) could mean one of two things. He could be asking which of these scriptural interpretations we choose to believe, whether Judas was working in earnest for Jesus or betraying him. Or he could be asking if we believe that Judas' betrayal of Jesus was also the work of God- as all is the work of God. The line that seems derivative of this work is 'even Satan could quote scripture to serve his purposes) implying that the Bible and the concept of God is so malleable that it is stretched to the means of all ends. As far as multiple versions there were several lyrical variations he added in the years which are published as alternates in his lyric books, none of them change the overall theme however, nor are as good as the original. In regards to Dylan being a Soviet apologist, it's clear he falls far to the right of the line drawn in the sand by Woody Guthrie and extended lecherously by Pete Seeger. Dylan was no Communist and you'd be hard pressed to pick out one of Plato's Governmental prototypes that Dylan would sign his name next to. Given his heritage it is immaginable that he would be sentimentally disposed to relatively dramatizing the Holocaust, yet I don't think he does. Think of what was the current situation during the era this song was written. The Soviet situation was an open book and although Dylan was a topical songwriter, he rarely makes your mind up for you in his protest songs. The Holocast was history, which is why it is written as such. For the USSR, 'you'll have to decide'. |
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| Bob Dylan – Sign on the Window Lyrics | 18 years ago |
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This used to be my favorite song while growing up. I always was intrigued by the third 'verse' which is that three line interlude. It starts with the rhyme 'rain' in te first line and ends with the rhyme 'sleet' in the third. They're joint together in the middle line as 'Main Street' which reflects both side (rain and sleet) which is nice since Main Street also symbolizes a median. It's the very subject of crossing a median and looking to the other side which symbolizes what this song is all about. Turning the corner from adolescence and youth to middle age- with concepts of filial love and stability. If you think about youth and how you always look to the other side with transparency, you may see the approach of death (middle-age) as a sign on the window. |
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| Bob Dylan – When the Ship Comes In Lyrics | 18 years ago |
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yes it is true it was written in the wake of being refused a hotel room because of his scruffy image, but inspired only so much as Ode to a Grecian Urn was written about a vase in the living room or the love song of alfred prufrock was written about some guy in a coffeeshop Obviously a song about change. Introduced by Dylan- a song about new , different Goliath's that must be stopped. The sea is often used as a place of uncertainty, where no man makes a home and where the unknown lies. When the ship comes in there will be the collision of the outcast or departed with the structures of society on land. Very well written and very good, this song shows how much better Dylan got at channeling his anger since Masters of War |
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| Bob Dylan – I Dreamed I Saw St. Augustine Lyrics | 18 years ago |
| Joan Baez used to perform Joe Hill and probably played it for Dylan before 65. Undoubtably he heard it and when he writes something so close to another he usually borrows not only melody and structure but meaning as well. Joe Hill was a labor organizer. Augustine of Hippo did the majority of writing on Original Sin. In fact Augustine said that all babies who are not baptized will burn in hell. Augustine appears in glory and luster (coat of solid gold) providing shelter from the proverbial storm (blanket underneath his arm). Augustine's belief in Original Sin explains the utmost misery and why the souls have already been sold. Augustine's only wish is to save those he meets and alert them to the sin they are unaware of. This of course doesn't work out so well. Who's he put out to death then? Jesus or St. Augustine. Either is the answer, since both would be a sin. The fact is that a sin has been commited. Beautifully stated, a sin that he committed in his sleep yet follows him into his waking hours, such as Original Sin which is not committed in life yet in ancestry. He then puts his head against the glass, seeing through to the other side (death) and cries. | |
| Bob Dylan – Blowin' in the Wind Lyrics | 18 years ago |
| You can best decipher it's meaning and relation to civil rights be deriving the melody. Dylan often borrowed melodies or structures and usually did so hile doing justice to the original song. Here he borrows the verse of No More Auction Block hich he was playing earlier in the 60s hile hanging around the Gaslight. | |
| Bob Dylan – Big Yellow Taxi (Joni Mitchell cover) Lyrics | 18 years ago |
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They called Joni Mitchell the female Bob Dylan Joni Mitchell said I don't think anyone calls Bob Dylan the male Joni Mitchell |
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| Bob Dylan – Ballad in Plain D Lyrics | 18 years ago |
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You can think of it as marriage, that's a good interpretation yet I don't make it my own. Simply I don't think in a song glorifying perfect love Dylan would conclude it by having other voices dissatisfied with marriage. There of course is the literal of actual friends in a prison who have not women, yet my interpretation is slightly different than that. In Huxley' Brave New World the masses of society are imprisoned in a web of happiness. In this web they are unable to feel real pain. Pain is one of the emotions that makes man feel most alive. However even today much of society situates themselves in ways that help them avd pain- through the creation of routines and familiar scenarios. Routines and familiarity proved odious to Dylan as they would Kerouac or Guthrie. It is the life of wanderer that is marred with pain either physical or spiritual that also helps sustain him and validate him. Yet in one of the deepest pains of his life Dylan asked is it all worth it? Is it worth trying to live as a musician instead of a store clerk or electrician? Is it worth it moving to New York when I could go to trade school in Minnesota? Is it worth living life as I feel I am driven to by my inner nature when I could live life as much of society urges men to and seemingly trades them security and some happiness for their dreams? My friends in college and my friends with jobs and cars ask me how fun is it to move around with just your thumbs and a guitar, but I ask them, between my nature and the open road do I really have a choice? |
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| Bob Dylan – Who Killed Davey Moore? Lyrics | 18 years ago |
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It was March of 1963 in a triple title night at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles. Davey Moore had succesfully defended his Featherweight title 5 times and put it on the line against the Cuban Sugar Ramos. Ramos knocked the 5'2" Moore down into the ropes in the tenth round but Moore who was nicknamed The Little Giant popped up and finished the fight. He lost in the scorecards however and the title was transferred to Ramos. Moore walked back to the locker room and in a post-fight interview stated he couldn't wait to fight Ramos again to get his title back. Shortly after the reporters left Moore complained of headaches and fell unconscious. He died of inoperable brain damage in a local hospital where his wife had been flown to meet him. Geraldine Moore, on being informed of her husband's death said "It was God's will" and fainted. Dylan wrote this in '63 back when he was doing a lot of social protest songs. This one however is different. I'll warn you, don't read too much into it as far as Dylan's perspective is concerned. I don't think Dylan believes boxing is all that bad. Dylan's rival Phil Ochs had written a song called Davey Moore and it seems as though Dylan wrote his version to show his superiority as a songwriter. It does man's and society's hypocrisy - and in that aspect very Dylanesque, yet if you think Dylan wrote this song to lead a flowers and bandanas revolution against boxing you might as well puke up the mushrooms. An additional irony was added to Dylan's song when doctors concluded the autopsy of Davey Moore. Apparently when Moore had fallen in the tenth round his head had hit the ropes in what doctors called a "thousand to one" accident. The bottom rope had caused the brain to swell in the back which eventually proved fatal. So who killed Davey Moore? The inanimate and unfeeling ropes of the ring. The ropes that seperate the fighter from the crowd. Created by folks in some warehouse of a sports manufacturing company either to help hold men up or be pinned against. |
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