"Die hippies!"
- Eric Cartman
Might as well watch this because You Ain't Goin' Nowhere.
But you might be knockin’ on heaven’s door.
Or stuck in Mobile
or tangled up in blue
and may you stay forever young.
Seemingly Dylan doesn't buy the Warren Commission report either.
Coming out with a 17 minute long song about JFK, 50 years after the fact and during a global health crisis perfectly encapsulates my feelings of 'why does anyone like this guy?'
Q is the 17th letter of the alphabet.
Interesting time to put out a song about JFK as well.
2 notes of a Dylan song is more than enough for me. Never understood what the draw was about him
Oh I don't know, maybe because he is the greatest songwriter...ever? Even if you don't like his music, his songwriting is unreal. Pre-1980 anyway.
Too much of Bob Dylan in my life already, but thank you
This was awful. Like really, really awful.
6.8.0A lot of hot millennial takes in this thread. Why don’t you all go listen to your Post Malone in your parents’ basements and leave the real music discussions to those of us with taste?
Why are you so angry?
His cousin wasnt allowed back in the country.
I had enough of Bob Dylan the first time I heard him.
Love Bob Dylan. Perhaps the best living American poet. But this is, um, lacking.
Born in Duluth, Raised in Hibbing!
I didn't know he was still alive!
No thanks, I don't have time for a conspiracy podcast today
The only two songs where his voice sounded really good was Lay Lady Lay and Knockin' on Heavens Door. Back when was 8 to 10 when both songs came out, I did not realize it was Dylan until I was a bit older.
First time I saw Dylan was at Hill Auditorium, row 8, circa 1981. I was already a big fan, but when I saw him live I was blown away. Unbelievable aura. The coolest person I've ever seen.
May I recommend Phil Ochs "The Crucifixion" (acoustic) for an even more insightful, or inciteful take on the JFK assassination. Same era, folk hero. Also, quite long. or try the Jim and Jean version.
Poor Phil Ochs. "I Ain't a-Marchin' Anymore," "The Power and the Glory," "Here's to the State of Mississippi," and several others deserve a honored place in the American music canon. That said, I think Dylan's new song isn't *really* about the JFK assassination as it is about... well, a lot of things.
They say that patriotism is the last refuge
to which a scoundrel clings
Steal a little and they throw you in jail
Steal a lot and they make you a king
A few lines from a (sort of) throwaway '80s song shows what a genius songwriter Dylan is. Maybe not musically (he borrowed and stole a lot there), but he brought such an entirely new vocabulary to the popular song... I mean, they don't give out Nobel Prizes to just anybody. He'll go down as one of the, what, half dozen greatest musical geniuses of the 20th century? Mine, at least.
Dylan's voice is polarizing, I get that – one critic memorialized it as sounding like "a calf with its leg caught in a fence." It's always been an acquired taste, but I like it – especially in his early days – and his phrasing has always been true. Agree with Uminks that he never sounded like he does on those two songs (well, the entire Nashville Skyline LP); supposedly his voice was whiskey-soaked for those sessions. And it deteriorated steadily over the years, it's been shot since the '80s really. But his voice isn't what made him great.
Seventeen minutes of any song is a lot to swallow, especially an epic fever dream like this. If you take it all in, it's really not about the JFK assassination. On first listen, it's an affirmation of the redemptive, therapeutic powers of the arts – and music in particular. And somehow a commentary about the times we live in and this moment in history, with this pandemic, this president. The "Murder Most Foul" might be that of the republic as we know it. In the last lines is he weeping for the murder of our flag, and by extension, our nation?
Lyrics: https://genius.com/Bob-dylan-murder-most-foul-lyrics
Ive got all the Dylan in my life that I care to. Interesting and heartwarming to see John Fogerty and his dog singing during this tragic crisis, though, compared to the nauseating, vomit inducing, cringe worthy celebrity sing along that was Imagine..
If, like me, you were in high-school classes leading up to wrestling practice during the afternoon of November 22, 1963, Murder Most Foul might bring you back to that day and the long weekend that followed when many of us were transfixed by the events unfolding on the flickering images of black-and-white TV sets with their rabbit-ear antennas.
Dylan’s background music in Murder Most Foul reminds me a bit of the muffled drums playing as the funeral cortège with JFK’s flag-draped casket on a horse-drawn carriage was brought through the streets of Washington, D. C. to the Capitol building.
I wouldn’t expect most MGoBloggers to like Murder Most Foul as much as I do. Maybe you had to be there. Tunneler, thanks for posting this.