I can only imagine how many times the other reactors I watch would pause this video and ask stupid questions. Your reaction is vibing to the song with your face and your eyes. That is a true reaction. Not useless words. You save everything for the end which is the best time. And you feel the harmonica with your body. Thanks for sharing. Peace.
Once you fully realize the meaning of the song, it will be 10 times as good but to be stunned by it on first listen is common. There is almost nothing like it. You are right in that I always marvel at how Dylan chose the best way to sing it on the album. The phrasing IS sharper and precise than in most live versions. His slow but deliberate meandering through the landscape is constantly on beat, on phrase. Having Charlie McCoy's acioustic guitar riffs envelop the song was a stroke of genius. I have three top Dylan favorites among hundreds of great songs , his career has been so astonishing Desolation Row It's All Right Ma (I'm only bleeding) Visions ofJohanna
I first heard this song when i was 15 yrs old , i have listend to it many many times And just heard it again just now and it sends the same response to me ,hairs stand up on the back of my neck at the harmonica, the lyrics are unique ,no wonder he received a nobel prize for literature absolutely brilliant,
Fantastic reaction. This song touches you but it is so enigmatic at the same time. He is commenting on society, commenting on the social space we live in, and so many other things with thought-provoking and ambiguous lyrics at the same time. Your brain is in constant thought trying to figure it all out, you are impressed and confused at the same time. You feel it says something profound but at the same time you can't state what it is. That is the mastery of Bob Dylan and that is the masterpiece of this song.
I was 14 when that song came out...one morning I slipped in class 15 minutes before school started and wrote all the lyrics to that song on the blackboard. Teacher didn't erase it for the entire day. Also blew his mind.
That's the type of song that the word masterpiece exists for. It gives me goosebumps every time I listen to it and I've been listening to it for decades. The Bob is on a whole other level to almost everyone else.
One of Bob Dylan's most iconic works. What might not be widely known is that the starting point in the first verse is a lynching that took place in Duluth Minnesota in June of 1920 when three Black workers from a travelling circus were abducted and hung by a mob. Among the witnesses to this ghastly scene was a boy named Abraham Zimmerman, who would later become Bob Dylan (Zimmerman)'s father and related it to his son. Dylan was born there in Duluth, 21 years after the lynching. That's why it begins with: "They're selling postcards of the hanging" and "the circus is in town", a direct reference to the event of June 15, 1920 as a departure point for the disjointed dystopia that follows. Distasteful as it sounds, selling postcards from a lynching was a common practice in that primitive-yet-not-that-long-ago time. A photo from that night, showing three victims stripped to the waist hanging from a tree against the night sky, is one of the most commonly found of these disturbing images in a Google search, and in 1965 it made its way into Bob Dylan's imagery.
Understanding Dylan isn’t easy very complicated been listening to him for over 40 yrs and still left puzzled by his words. Love your honest reactions your body and facial movements make it very enjoyable thanks for sharing
This song is accessible once it is seen as a gestalt and not try to deconstuct each character or symbol. The labdscape is dsystpian inhabited by icons from literature, religion, politics culture but their roles are now in service to that dystopia. Desolation Row is the sanctuary the artist has found after years of fighting and assaulting the forces that rule this dystopia, from his direct protest era (Hard Rain, Masters of War,etc) to Bringing It All Back Home with the masterpiece "It's All Right Ma" "Disillusioned words like bullets bark As human gods aim for their mark Make everything from toy guns that spark To flesh-colored Christs that glow in the dark It’s easy to see without looking too far That not much is really sacred" to nearly every song on Highway 61 Revisited but in more wildly surrealistic style "The ghost of Belle Starr, she hands down her wits To Jezebel the nun, she violently knits A bald wig for Jack the Ripper, who sits At the head of the Chamber of Commerce" Thabove is probably the only surreaistic song Dylan wrote about Vietnam (*Tombstone*-dead soldiers-Blues And from title song "Rovin' gambler, he was very bored Tryin' to create a next world war He found a promoter who nearly fell off the floor "I never did engage in this kind of thing before But yeah, I think it can be very easily done" "We'll just put some bleachers out in the sun Have it on Highway 61" This is a depraved society with no redeeming value After the fury of his assault, he retreats to this sanctuary where only the outsiders, Cindrrella, Einstein, The Good Samaritan, the FortuneTelling Lady can dwell. All orthers must "peek into it, "get punished for going there", and are prevented from going by insurance men doing the bidding of their Masters. Dylan says it all in the last verse. You get it or you don't. As Kesey said "you are on the bus or off the bus". To all the lame interviwers for years who wasted his time with inane questiions and anyone else "Right now I can't read too good Don't send me no more letters no Not unless you mail them From Desolation Row".
I am excited to hear a long playing song and this one was quite melodious and appealing to my senses. Quite a story and beautiful lyrics Bob Dylan has got there about Desolation Row. Cim Cim, I love that instrument! Shout out to Mike for this song.
I first got into Bob Dylan almost 55 years ago when I was in my early teens, and his music blew my mind and changed my life. I am happy you have discovered his music. Great reaction. Dylan has a huge catalogue with both well-known and lesser known songs. There are also great cover versions of his songs by a variety of artists such as Nina Simone, Jimi Hendrix, The Byrds, Joan Baez, Willie Nile, and Bettye LaVette among many others. Please continue to do a deep dive into his music. Take care. Peace, Love, and Happiness.
Great take Ms.Cymdi........ my favorite line is..... "Cinderella she seems so easy...... it takes one to know one she smiles..... then puts her hands in her back pockets, Bette Davis style" the man can certainly paint a picture. As for his harmonica playing..... the beauty is in the ear of the beholder : )
CimdyStyle seemed so easy it takes one to know she smiles!! First thanks for all the Dylan I'm 73 and was or should I say still am addicted to Bob and The Beatles!! The entire "Highway 61 Revisited" is incredible please check "Ballad of a thin man" out!!
If you want another long song from Dylan, you might want to react to "Sad-Eyed Lady of the Lowland," which is ostensibly about his wife at the time, Sara Lownds Dylan, "Lownds" being the last name of her previous husband. The song occupies the entire side four of the double-album, "Blonde on Blonde," and is 11 minutes and 22 seconds long. His singing is more pronounced on the song, and the harmonica performance is among his best, especially during the fade-out at the end of the song. "Just like a Woman" would be another suggestion from "Blonde on Blonde," during which he does more actual singing. For poetry from "Blonde on Blonde," you can't beat "Visions of Johanna," considered by some to be his best song ever. Most critics consider "Blonde on Blonde (1966)" to be his best album, and is has been listed as one of the top 20 best albums of all time.
Occasionally when I was doing gigs at small local bars or restaurants I would have an audience once in while that were there not really paying much attention to the music. Basically it was just background music for those who were primarily there to drink, socialize or try to hook up with someone. That never really bothered me, I would often take that opportunity to play "Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands". It's always been one of my favorite songs to play, but it was hard to fit in most gigs where people were actively listening and dancing to the music. There were sometimes when it caught enough people's attention that more of the crowd became interested in listening to the music!
Hey Cim, I love your reactions. You have a wonderful journey ahead of you. I as you started with a love afair with The Beatles. The prog rock genre will make you cry.
Id you decide to react to "Ballad of a Thin Man," I suggest you choose the live video from Bob Dylan's 1965-1966 world tour. It will give you an indication of his mental state after have recorded three albums from 1965-1966. The tour was grueling, stressful, demanding, and exhaustive: he was getting booed at each venue because he decided to include electric music in the second-half of each show. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-63ucJmVonAc.html
Your analysis continue to impress me. You are a very good reactor and the first thing that is important for that to be true is you have to be a good listener. You are an exceptional listener. Great work. Thank you.
And in terms of the elements you were talking about like assonance and alliteration, it's because I think some of his stuff could actually qualify as early hip hop. Early rap. The same things we measure rap by today are the same things. It's just that nowadays we call it flow. But you always look for everything that you talked about plus internal rhyme structure, and what kind of rhythm patterns are set up and then how are they violated for effect, and so forth, also usually looking for at least double meanings in a lot of the bars. If you go back and listen to something like Subterranean Homesick Blues again, you'll see an even more extreme example of this, but you're right, this song is not only a great song, but it's about the delivery and the timing and the cadence. It's great.
I say this on most reaction vids, Dylan's phrasing and delivery is insane, but I don't know another artist that can do anything like Dylan. how do you know where to or how to put it in or do you learn it or does it come natural and the way he can fit so many words in a verse. Songwriting is hard, I've written a couple and after one or two it gets sooo hard. love your reaction 👌
"Desolation Row" is the last song on side two of Highway 61 Revisited. The lyrics are surreal, but not impossibly inscrutable -- "All these people that you mention \ Yes, I know them, they're quite lame \ I had to rearrange their faces \ And give them all another name" -- The songs on that album kicked off the sixties, more or less, that is, the cultural upheaval in the United States in the later years of that decade. Surprising somewhat, in hindsight, as this song begins like a cantina ballad of the sort one might hear in a Western movie from the 1950's set in Texas or Arizona or Mexico before turning into a monster of a barn-stormer built around his harmonica. The Beatles were definitely paying attention. The title "Desolation Row" echoes the title of the 1945 novel "Cannery Row" by American author John Steinbeck, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1962. That novel tells a story about an assorted group of oddballs inhabiting a waterfront street lined with fishing canneries in Monterey, California. Dylan mentions the place in his song "Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands". But this song seems to take its cue from the novel, filling in the details about the characters populating some dirt road in the middle of nowhere, like a desert or vast fields of land lined with a ramshackle line of buildings evocative of a ghost town, desolation amid emptiness and destruction. Now consider the nick names a poet might give to the various people inhabiting such a place while describing their eccentricities...
It’s alright ma, I’m only bleeding is another of his long masterpieces from that era you might love. Then there’s another great long song he made just recently called Murder Most Foul about the assassination of President John Kennedy.
This song is a transcendent masterpiece of surreal imagery... forget about The Beatles and The Rolling Stones... forget about Shakespeare... no one is even on the same planet as Robert Allen Zimmerman aka Bob Dylan.
I think the final verse is an older person who has just "received this letter", which is the previous verses. The young writer is too judgemental of others, lacking experience. The older man thinks he should not be just an observer until he has truly lived on Desolation Row. Then he might see he has misjudged the people. One of the best ever albums, for me. Dylan was about 24!
And that verse you are breaking down about how they filled Casanova up with self-confidence and then poisoned him with words, the extra bit of meaning packed into that is that Casanova in modern times has become a term for a lady's man. Somebody who was dashing and really got around.
Dylan is the ambassador for bad singing voice, dull or even contrary musicianship - and perfect for the leading edge artistry. Someone HAD to step up and say, "You don't need to be pretty or handsome, you don't need a swooner's voice. You can still be pretty, handsome and make people swoon yourself." Even though a lot of his songs were (and are) fiction. Be thoughtful. Be smart. And be yourself.
I was born in 1963 to a father just becoming a Dylan fan.... don"t remember a time when Dylan wasnt playing in the background...and when i was a kid i HATED it, it was 'old fogies' music as far as i was concerned. Dad liked it so i felt obliged to hate it.... as it should be. It was listening to this song good and stoned sometime in high school that made me a 'convert'.... when that harmonica hit it was all over. I've seen him 13 times since 1985... 8 of those times with my dad.
