The subtitle of this song in Dylan’s notebook is “fourth street affair”; it’s about infidelity. He’s a married man who can’t stop cheating. That’s why he “lost the ring” (divorce). That’s why “he felt the heat of the night” because he knew he was cheating on his wife again. That’s why they stopped into a cheap hotel “with the neon burning bright”. That’s why his ex-wife was “born in spring”. Spring is about rebirth, new life, purity but he “was born too late” possibly in fall which is about plants (or life) dying and decaying.
This is true: it's about Suze Rotolo, his first true love, who he met and dated on Fourth Street, where the NY folk community centered. He loved her and in this song dredged up the confusion they both felt right before Suze took a long tour in foreign lands. Jump from this song way back to "Boots of Spanish Leather."
He flips into first person for just one line, “I remember well”. This seems significant. My general sense is that a twist of fate brought them together and a twist of fate dictated it could not last and he has a hard time accepting the outcome. What-might-have-beens have a way of lingering in your head.
I have vivid memories of my 21st Birthday party listening in to a very drunk good friend explaining to my dad (in confidence, thinking that nobody else could hear) that he had fallen in love with a prostitute in Marseille whilst travelling on a student trip around Europe and she would be the love of his life for ever and a day. Guess it happens
Thank you for your brilliant real time interpretation of the song. Blood on the Tracks is sometimes called Dylan's divorce album and infidelity lurks behind a lot of scenes in the songs on this album. You can go from Tangled up in Blue and Simple Twist of Fate to Shelter from the Storm to find the character in even more precarious situations where he is bound to seek shelter with other women; to Idiot Wind where it's all going to hell; on If You See Her Say Hello and You're a Big Girl Now the scenarios have turned retrospective. So Blood on the Tracks is like a circle of infidelity, divorce, rage and regret.
@@olajohansson1678 Poetry is classified as fiction. Dylan is notoriously private about his personal life. Some of his obscurantism is intended to hide the personal. What gets me is that people who know nothing about what is and isn't poetry, and don't ever read it, nonetheless presume themselves to be experts on it.
The fun of Dylan is allowing yourself to join him in this exploration of not only what the words mean literally but what they conjure up in your mind. Olajohansson touches it for me or maybe his wife's comment that it is brings up the inability to connect just based on a simple twist of fate. The spark starts the connection but then it falls apart-is not that the risk of any relationship? Enjoy the search!
Blood on the Tracks is the greatest ever breakup record and one of the greatest albums of all time. This sounds like one of the bootleg versions of the song, the album version is different.
The one duff line in the song is "walk along with a parrot that talks", which seems to have wandered in from his earlier surrealistic style. He seems to have thought the same since he soon changed it to "walks alone through the city blocks". A recent version of the verse where the man wakes up alone in the hotel runs: "He woke up and she was gone He didn't see nothing but the dawn Got out of bed and put his shoes back on Pushed back the blind Found a note she'd left behind 'What did it say?' Said, you should have met me back in '58 We could have avoided this little simple twist of fate"
That line has always grated on my ear. There may be such a thing as a parrot that does not talk but, even so, it always strikes me as filler, for the sake of the rhyme.
I've come a bit late to this party. Beg pardon. -- However, -- This song is about infidelity (understood from the "feel" of the whole song before beginning the analysis). -- One thing I have learned from a lot of Dylan's "story" songs is that the first verse in kinda the last verse put at the beginning. When you find a first person reference somewhere, as in this one, it probably is a real memory of his. This makes that first verse an introduction to his memory of the whole episode. -- I think he felt he actually made a big mistake, brought on by a Simple Twist of Fate.
If you are interested in poetry then yiu are listening to the wrong Dylan songs bud. This and a tangled up in blue are straight storytelling songs. You need to to be starting with a hard rains a gonna fall,my back pages, tambourine man,its all right ma, master's of war. There you get Dylan's lyrical genius.
I don’t think it’s straight story telling in the sense of being a simple story. It seems he’s referring to two separate women here-the woman who left him (whose good character is reflected by her charitable giving) and he now realizes he should have made the effort to develop a relationship with, and a prostitute he visits while telling himself he doesn’t care about the lost opportunity for love. I think it’s a sad and powerful song about waiting passively for a meaning relationship (as a simple twist of fate) and thereby letting it pass right by you because you’ll never find it by just waiting for it to pick you out.
I disagree. To me this album, Blood on the Tracks, is Bob Dylan’s best work lyrically. All of a sudden he becomes intimate, personal and vulnerable, whereas before he was usually more distanced, even if the words and concepts were more grandiose.
If you’re looking for his poetry, you should listen to Hard rains gonna fall, Subterranean homesick blues, My back pages, Queen Jane approximately, Mr Tambourine man, Like a rolling stone,
@@TroubadourChannel It makes one look at oneself honestly, at least for the moment, and see one's deficiencies -- "And wished that he'd gone straight". Another problem with Dylan is the changes in pronouns.
You found a nice alternative version to the album track. I might even prefer it. About Dylan's lyrics: it's rare if not impossible to find a song where you can ferret out "the" meaning. There are usually multiple levels any given song can be "sort of" understood on. But just when you think you're about to get it, Dylan will throw in a curve ball verse and blow the whole thing up, forcing you to reevaluate the whole song from scratch. His lyrics are like an iceberg but he only reveals the tip, but suggesting a lot of depth and breadth below that the listener has to try to figure out. Frustrating in a way, but a technique that allows the listener to never get sick of the lyrical content, because you're own interpretation is somewhat different every time, as "the" meaning always lies just out of reach. The difference between Dylan and other lyricists who might attempt the same game of being "vague", is that, even though he just gives up fleeting glimpses, I believe Dylan has a fully formed philosophical point of view and cosmology of symbolism undergirding his songs. Similarly to how JRR Tolkien had a massive, fully developed history of an alternate world all worked out that gave the little narratives resting on top a "reality" that other fantasy writers struggle to attain. And that is why people keep trying in vain to understand his lyrics, because it seems like the mental effort is worth it to try to dive for the pearls he is hiding.
Funny story. A colleague at a university and I discussed Shelter from the Storm and got stuck in the fourth verse. We just couldn't get passed it and we were both very familiar with Dylan's music. Then I played the song for my wife, who is a visual artist and was completely unfamiliar with the song, and after the fourth verse she immediately said that it was about infidelity. The trick is that she didn't try to interpret what the words said, but what they showed. I think she was spot on and I also think infidelity is what's going on in Simple Twist of Fate.
Nope: He was awarded the Nobel Prize in a "Special Category" -- that is separate from Literature -- for two reasons: 1. "Overwhelming" recommendations from fans that he be awarded the Nobel in Literature, 2. Skepticism about his work. Why is it that "fans" must aggrandize and hyperbolize into inaccuracy? Is it about, in this instance, Dylan, or about the "fan"? Is the "fan" insecure that all the hype about Dylan might be just that, so they feel it necessary to post counter-hype? If we respect the award then we don't misrepresent it.
@@jnagarya519 Everything I’ve looked up says he won the Nobel prize in literature. What is your source? And I never claimed to be a big Bob Dylan fan, even though I do think he’s a good song writer. Not sure why you put fan in quotes 🙄
@@modoc97405 The prize was specifically in a "special category" -- the Nobel Committee hasn't a history of giving awards to pop culture song writers who many claim is a significant poet. So they created a specific category in which to put him. The Nobel website will have the specific information. I am a big Bob Dylan fan; but unlike so many who are actually uncomprehending of poetry -- that a piece of writing rhymes does not automagically make it poetry -- praise him with the greatest of superlatives. In my view he is certainly a superior writer; and he has at times written what can be viewed as poetry. But some distinguish between song lyrics and poetry. And though some describe him as a "chameleon" because of the various "phases" of his presentation, I view some of the changes, some sharp and extreme, as inconsistency. Ultimately he is a finite, imperfect human, therefore is not perfect; and that which is not perfect is legitimately subject to critical evaluation.
Our lives and history are a series of cause and effect. Sometimes seemingly insignificant events can eventually end up bringing about significant effects on us down the line. As much as the events themselves, our perceptions of those events affect us just as much. I think that's what this song is about and how certain events/perceptions first lead to the speaker's love of a woman and how other events/perceptions lead to the breakup with that woman.
Interesting version...it isn't the original track from the album though. Wonder if it's from one of the outtakes - a number of them were featured in "More Blood, More Tracks". EDIT: (I guess if I'd waited 10 more seconds, that would have become clear)...The original had some more verses and some altered lines.
This is the first time hearing this song soI might be wrong but isn't he the prostitute or gigolo here who fell in love with a client? He hopes she will pick him out again while he is cruisin down at the docks for sailors coming in from the sea. It's a sin to feel to much when you are working but he can't help it. And the title works much better I feel in this scenario. What do you think?
In the first verse he doesn't realize she is a prostitute. That's the twist. In the second verse he is confused, but he figures it out when they get to the neon hotel. The reality of the situation hits him like a freight train. In the third verse she drops a coin into the cup of "another blind man". He was the first blind man. Now he sees clearly who she is, but he still has feelings for her. I think the whole story is an allegory for his first marriage which is breaking up.
It's a conundrum... Is Dylan a poet? Not really...poets don't require a backing track. Is he a great singer? Not really...his vocals are legendarily mocked. However....he is undoubtedly one of the most influential singer songwriters of all time and he is a Nobel literature laureate. Dylan is my all time favorite musical artist and I never stop asking questions about him... Maybe that's why he's my all time favorite?
Great interpretation of the lyrics. Thank you. I think it's either a one-night stand or possibly a prostitute. I don't know which, and it doesn't matter. It's a beautiful song.
This is a relatively straightforward lyric. To get at the "poetry" of his writing try "Mister Tambourine Man" -- which is actually musical by itself, without any reference to the music. "a song is a poem that can't walk by itself" -- Dylan.
id check out "mr tambourine man", youve prob heard that one but really listen clisely......"visions of johanna" (album version, i always reccomend album, official versions for bob, this was some beautiful, alternate outtake, its "official", but not on the album, & released in the last ten years, i like it equally, im just saying generally, stick to album versions for the first listens to dylan songs)....in "tangled up in blue" every verse is written from a different point of view, a different tense (kind of , past tense, present tense, etc, etc)...anyway, bob;s idea was to emulate picasso's cubism where several sides of the same object was merged into one image....lastly, these lyrics...by the time he brought this album on tour the lyrics had changed, & he did it for every song, its like he was changing the songs to fit his terrible mood on the day....prostitute: bob isnt forthcoming about anything, very cagey...all thats known 100% is that he was going thru a divorce from 1974 to 1978. Anyway, great reaction, liked & subbed:)
First of all, Dylan is enigmatic. Second, sometimes, he just rhymes. To me, much of his work is kaleidoscopic. That said, I will take a crack at some of this. My take is that this is generally about a one night stand, perhaps a commercial encounter. It seems to me the narrator knows it was doomed from the strt as, perhaps, he is gay. Maybe he fell in love with her. Maaybe he was seeking a way to "go straight." Maybe they successfully have sex, maybe they don't. At any rate, he fell asleep and she left. He keeps searching for her, or "it." BTW, I hear the line: "She dropped a coin into the cup of the blind man by the gate." as a metaphor for her having given the "blind" narrator a triffle while passing him by. But that's just me.
I believe each verse is talking about a different person. It is not a continous story but one about different characters, meeting their simple twist of fate. That' why you are having trouble.
"heat" = SEX. Also in that instances "twist of fate" = SEX. "freight train" -- it is a movie cliche in older films: when a couple have sex the film instead shows a train entering a tunnel.
A story in reverse. Wishing he'd said something when she dropped a coin into the cup. Too strung out to notice, and knows it was a missed opportunity. The first two verses are what he imagined might have happened. Maybe. . . .
Theres a somewhat intimate live rendition of "Love Minus Zero / No Limit" Might be my favorite of his. Well, its too hard to pick a favorite. You should check iit out "..My love she speaks like silence, Without ideals or violence, She doesn't have to say she's faithful, Yet she's true, like ice, like fire. People carry roses, Make promises by the hours, My love she laughs like the flowers, Valentines can't buy her..." ua-cam.com/video/9w1mCevu3sU/v-deo.htmlsi=pPFf6aJPqvqQ2oDD
If you want to listen to true Dylan poetry...you need to listen to Like A Rolling Stone, Desolation Row, A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall, Blowin' in the Wind, Maggie's Farm, etc.
The lyrical value of most Dylan songs oscillates between words and music. Conventional literary analysis is insufficient and all too reductive for a song like A Simple Twist of Fate. Conventional music criticism is also insufficient. What's required is a certain kind of performance analysis. Tangled up in Blue, for instance, is about precarious experiences on the road (cf. Steinbeck and Kerouac) and cascading imagery (closely aligned with certain modes of modern painting) as much and as poetic stanzas. But it's all carried by music, it can't be separated from the music if it is about Bob Dylan's lyricism.
I'm at a minute 13.11, I'll give it a shot... He makes a deal with a prostitute on a park bench and falls for her in a "spark" knowing that he can't have her, which makes him feel alone and wishes he could have her and turn both their lives around. He wishes he had been "straight" up about this from the start The "heat of the night" is lust They go to the "neon" hotel she frequents. He wakes up, and she is gone. He feels regret for not being "straight" with her. He feels alone again She gives a "coin" to the busker she knows all too well and maybe heads to docks where the sailors dwell He strolls the docks where the sailors have a woman at every port, dorning a talking parrot like a pirate trying to steal her away from the sailors, and the talking parrot will guide his way to her... searching for a "twist of fate"
Nice analysis, but I would definitely recommend you adjust the sound because the music was drowning you out. I could hear it, but you need to bring your voice up.
the only thing more annoying than someone who stops the song every couple of sec.s , is someone who insists on talking during the song . i know it's your vid., but show some class cause it's bobs song. try playing the song uninterrupted, then go back and replay it stopping it as much as you want to point out whatever you want , sounds like a win/win. the songs are not that long so length shouldn't be a problem, this particular vid. is 19.25 min.s the songs only 3 maybe 4 min.s , how much you got to say?.
It's the real Dylan, an alternate take from the NY sessions of Blood on the Tracks and its posted on Dylan's UA-cam page. ua-cam.com/video/oXlkwHECabU/v-deo.html
The subtitle of this song in Dylan’s notebook is “fourth street affair”; it’s about infidelity. He’s a married man who can’t stop cheating.
That’s why he “lost the ring” (divorce). That’s why “he felt the heat of the night” because he knew he was cheating on his wife again. That’s why they stopped into a cheap hotel “with the neon burning bright”. That’s why his ex-wife was “born in spring”. Spring is about rebirth, new life, purity but he “was born too late” possibly in fall which is about plants (or life) dying and decaying.
This is true: it's about Suze Rotolo, his first true love, who he met and dated on Fourth Street, where the NY folk community centered. He loved her and in this song dredged up the confusion they both felt right before Suze took a long tour in foreign lands. Jump from this song way back to "Boots of Spanish Leather."
He flips into first person for just one line, “I remember well”. This seems significant.
My general sense is that a twist of fate brought them together and a twist of fate dictated it could not last and he has a hard time accepting the outcome. What-might-have-beens have a way of lingering in your head.
Would love you break down the Dylan song from 1964 "Its All Right Ma I'm Only Bleeding" or Visions of Johanna from 1966.
I have vivid memories of my 21st Birthday party listening in to a very drunk good friend explaining to my dad (in confidence, thinking that nobody else could hear) that he had fallen in love with a prostitute in Marseille whilst travelling on a student trip around Europe and she would be the love of his life for ever and a day. Guess it happens
Thank you for your brilliant real time interpretation of the song. Blood on the Tracks is sometimes called Dylan's divorce album and infidelity lurks behind a lot of scenes in the songs on this album. You can go from Tangled up in Blue and Simple Twist of Fate to Shelter from the Storm to find the character in even more precarious situations where he is bound to seek shelter with other women; to Idiot Wind where it's all going to hell; on If You See Her Say Hello and You're a Big Girl Now the scenarios have turned retrospective. So Blood on the Tracks is like a circle of infidelity, divorce, rage and regret.
And we don't know that a shred of it is, in the lyrics, autobiographical rather than fiction.
@@jnagarya519 Who’s we?
@@olajohansson1678 So you know that it is autobiographical because notoriously-private Dylan told you so?
@@olajohansson1678 Poetry is classified as fiction. Dylan is notoriously private about his personal life. Some of his obscurantism is intended to hide the personal.
What gets me is that people who know nothing about what is and isn't poetry, and don't ever read it, nonetheless presume themselves to be experts on it.
@@jnagarya519 Finish high school, then we’ll talk.
The fun of Dylan is allowing yourself to join him in this exploration of not only what the words mean literally but what they conjure up in your mind. Olajohansson touches it for me or maybe his wife's comment that it is brings up the inability to connect just based on a simple twist of fate. The spark starts the connection but then it falls apart-is not that the risk of any relationship? Enjoy the search!
Listen to “Desolation Row” to hear great Dylan lyrics.
Blood on the Tracks is the greatest ever breakup record and one of the greatest albums of all time. This sounds like one of the bootleg versions of the song, the album version is different.
The one duff line in the song is "walk along with a parrot that talks", which seems to have wandered in from his earlier surrealistic style. He seems to have thought the same since he soon changed it to "walks alone through the city blocks".
A recent version of the verse where the man wakes up alone in the hotel runs:
"He woke up and she was gone
He didn't see nothing but the dawn
Got out of bed and put his shoes back on
Pushed back the blind
Found a note she'd left behind
'What did it say?' Said, you should have met me back in '58
We could have avoided this little simple twist of fate"
That line has always grated on my ear. There may be such a thing as a parrot that does not talk but, even so, it always strikes me as filler, for the sake of the rhyme.
I've come a bit late to this party. Beg pardon. -- However, -- This song is about infidelity (understood from the "feel" of the whole song before beginning the analysis). -- One thing I have learned from a lot of Dylan's "story" songs is that the first verse in kinda the last verse put at the beginning. When you find a first person reference somewhere, as in this one, it probably is a real memory of his. This makes that first verse an introduction to his memory of the whole episode. -- I think he felt he actually made a big mistake, brought on by a Simple Twist of Fate.
Oh! That’s a useful interpretive tool
what woman hangs out on the docks waiting for sailors?
So many good Dylan songs for you to dive into
If you are interested in poetry then yiu are listening to the wrong Dylan songs bud. This and a tangled up in blue are straight storytelling songs. You need to to be starting with a hard rains a gonna fall,my back pages, tambourine man,its all right ma, master's of war. There you get Dylan's lyrical genius.
And chimes of freedom .
I will listen to those. I’m just going through this album on a recommendation first :)
I don’t think it’s straight story telling in the sense of being a simple story. It seems he’s referring to two separate women here-the woman who left him (whose good character is reflected by her charitable giving) and he now realizes he should have made the effort to develop a relationship with, and a prostitute he visits while telling himself he doesn’t care about the lost opportunity for love. I think it’s a sad and powerful song about waiting passively for a meaning relationship (as a simple twist of fate) and thereby letting it pass right by you because you’ll never find it by just waiting for it to pick you out.
I disagree. To me this album, Blood on the Tracks, is Bob Dylan’s best work lyrically. All of a sudden he becomes intimate, personal and vulnerable, whereas before he was usually more distanced, even if the words and concepts were more grandiose.
If you’re looking for his poetry, you should listen to Hard rains gonna fall, Subterranean homesick blues, My back pages, Queen Jane approximately, Mr Tambourine man, Like a rolling stone,
He "felt alone" because that sort of attraction -- "spark" -- isolates one from all else.
Oooh! Yeah that makes sense. Great insight
@@TroubadourChannel It makes one look at oneself honestly, at least for the moment, and see one's deficiencies -- "And wished that he'd gone straight".
Another problem with Dylan is the changes in pronouns.
You found a nice alternative version to the album track. I might even prefer it. About Dylan's lyrics: it's rare if not impossible to find a song where you can ferret out "the" meaning. There are usually multiple levels any given song can be "sort of" understood on. But just when you think you're about to get it, Dylan will throw in a curve ball verse and blow the whole thing up, forcing you to reevaluate the whole song from scratch. His lyrics are like an iceberg but he only reveals the tip, but suggesting a lot of depth and breadth below that the listener has to try to figure out. Frustrating in a way, but a technique that allows the listener to never get sick of the lyrical content, because you're own interpretation is somewhat different every time, as "the" meaning always lies just out of reach. The difference between Dylan and other lyricists who might attempt the same game of being "vague", is that, even though he just gives up fleeting glimpses, I believe Dylan has a fully formed philosophical point of view and cosmology of symbolism undergirding his songs. Similarly to how JRR Tolkien had a massive, fully developed history of an alternate world all worked out that gave the little narratives resting on top a "reality" that other fantasy writers struggle to attain. And that is why people keep trying in vain to understand his lyrics, because it seems like the mental effort is worth it to try to dive for the pearls he is hiding.
Funny story. A colleague at a university and I discussed Shelter from the Storm and got stuck in the fourth verse. We just couldn't get passed it and we were both very familiar with Dylan's music. Then I played the song for my wife, who is a visual artist and was completely unfamiliar with the song, and after the fourth verse she immediately said that it was about infidelity. The trick is that she didn't try to interpret what the words said, but what they showed. I think she was spot on and I also think infidelity is what's going on in Simple Twist of Fate.
Oh that’s interesting! Glad I’m at least on the right track (so to speak :) )
Not just a great lyricist, he won the Nobel prize in literature
Nope: He was awarded the Nobel Prize in a "Special Category" -- that is separate from Literature -- for two reasons:
1. "Overwhelming" recommendations from fans that he be awarded the Nobel in Literature,
2. Skepticism about his work.
Why is it that "fans" must aggrandize and hyperbolize into inaccuracy? Is it about, in this instance, Dylan, or about the "fan"? Is the "fan" insecure that all the hype about Dylan might be just that, so they feel it necessary to post counter-hype?
If we respect the award then we don't misrepresent it.
@@jnagarya519 Everything I’ve looked up says he won the Nobel prize in literature. What is your source? And I never claimed to be a big Bob Dylan fan, even though I do think he’s a good song writer. Not sure why you put fan in quotes 🙄
@@modoc97405 The prize was specifically in a "special category" -- the Nobel Committee hasn't a history of giving awards to pop culture song writers who many claim is a significant poet. So they created a specific category in which to put him.
The Nobel website will have the specific information.
I am a big Bob Dylan fan; but unlike so many who are actually uncomprehending of poetry -- that a piece of writing rhymes does not automagically make it poetry -- praise him with the greatest of superlatives.
In my view he is certainly a superior writer; and he has at times written what can be viewed as poetry. But some distinguish between song lyrics and poetry. And though some describe him as a "chameleon" because of the various "phases" of his presentation, I view some of the changes, some sharp and extreme, as inconsistency.
Ultimately he is a finite, imperfect human, therefore is not perfect; and that which is not perfect is legitimately subject to critical evaluation.
@@jnagarya519 You are taking this far too seriously 🙄
@@jnagarya519 And I see no mention of a “special category”
Our lives and history are a series of cause and effect. Sometimes seemingly insignificant events can eventually end up bringing about significant effects on us down the line. As much as the events themselves, our perceptions of those events affect us just as much. I think that's what this song is about and how certain events/perceptions first lead to the speaker's love of a woman and how other events/perceptions lead to the breakup with that woman.
First approach to a poem:
A poem is larger than the space it occupies on the page.
Interesting version...it isn't the original track from the album though. Wonder if it's from one of the outtakes - a number of them were featured in "More Blood, More Tracks". EDIT: (I guess if I'd waited 10 more seconds, that would have become clear)...The original had some more verses and some altered lines.
Best reaction I’ve heard.👍
Thanks!
This is the first time hearing this song soI might be wrong but isn't he the prostitute or gigolo here who fell in love with a client? He hopes she will pick him out again while he is cruisin down at the docks for sailors coming in from the sea. It's a sin to feel to much when you are working but he can't help it. And the title works much better I feel in this scenario. What do you think?
I've been listening to the song for 50 years and never heard it that way, but it's a fascinating take on it.
In the first verse he doesn't realize she is a prostitute. That's the twist. In the second verse he is confused, but he figures it out when they get to the neon hotel. The reality of the situation hits him like a freight train. In the third verse she drops a coin into the cup of "another blind man". He was the first blind man. Now he sees clearly who she is, but he still has feelings for her. I think the whole story is an allegory for his first marriage which is breaking up.
are we sure that's Bob Dylan singing? (sounds different...
Yes it’s him
It's a conundrum...
Is Dylan a poet?
Not really...poets don't require a backing track.
Is he a great singer? Not really...his vocals are legendarily mocked.
However....he is undoubtedly one of the most influential singer songwriters of all time and he is a Nobel literature laureate.
Dylan is my all time favorite musical artist and I never stop asking questions about him...
Maybe that's why he's my all time favorite?
I like this :)
Tangled up in Blue,Lay Lady Lay
Dylan: Songs that fit the throat.
Great interpretation of the lyrics. Thank you. I think it's either a one-night stand or possibly a prostitute. I don't know which, and it doesn't matter. It's a beautiful song.
This is a relatively straightforward lyric. To get at the "poetry" of his writing try "Mister Tambourine Man" -- which is actually musical by itself, without any reference to the music.
"a song is a poem that can't walk by itself" -- Dylan.
id check out "mr tambourine man", youve prob heard that one but really listen clisely......"visions of johanna" (album version, i always reccomend album, official versions for bob, this was some beautiful, alternate outtake, its "official", but not on the album, & released in the last ten years, i like it equally, im just saying generally, stick to album versions for the first listens to dylan songs)....in "tangled up in blue" every verse is written from a different point of view, a different tense (kind of , past tense, present tense, etc, etc)...anyway, bob;s idea was to emulate picasso's cubism where several sides of the same object was merged into one image....lastly, these lyrics...by the time he brought this album on tour the lyrics had changed, & he did it for every song, its like he was changing the songs to fit his terrible mood on the day....prostitute: bob isnt forthcoming about anything, very cagey...all thats known 100% is that he was going thru a divorce from 1974 to 1978. Anyway, great reaction, liked & subbed:)
Thanks! And I will listen to Mr tambourine man
Le prix Nobel de littérature 2016 a été décerné à l'auteur-compositeur-interprète américain Bob Dylan
That I knew!
These songs were written during and after his marriage breaking up.
He'd all along had affairs on the side. Then she had an affair and he objected.
First of all, Dylan is enigmatic. Second, sometimes, he just rhymes. To me, much of his work is kaleidoscopic. That said, I will take a crack at some of this.
My take is that this is generally about a one night stand, perhaps a commercial encounter. It seems to me the narrator knows it was doomed from the strt as, perhaps, he is gay. Maybe he fell in love with her. Maaybe he was seeking a way to "go straight." Maybe they successfully have sex, maybe they don't. At any rate, he fell asleep and she left. He keeps searching for her, or "it."
BTW, I hear the line: "She dropped a coin into the cup of the blind man by the gate." as a metaphor for her having given the "blind" narrator a triffle while passing him by.
But that's just me.
interesting version - not the blood on the tracks take.
I believe each verse is talking about a different person. It is not a continous story but one about different characters, meeting their simple twist of fate. That' why you are having trouble.
"heat" = SEX.
Also in that instances "twist of fate" = SEX.
"freight train" -- it is a movie cliche in older films: when a couple have sex the film instead shows a train entering a tunnel.
I request you play PAINT IT BLACK by The Rolling Stones
A story in reverse. Wishing he'd said something when she dropped a coin into the cup. Too strung out to notice, and knows it was a missed opportunity. The first two verses are what he imagined might have happened. Maybe. . . .
Nice!
One night stand.... see it like a painting.
Theres a somewhat intimate live rendition of "Love Minus Zero / No Limit" Might be my favorite of his. Well, its too hard to pick a favorite. You should check iit out
"..My love she speaks like silence,
Without ideals or violence,
She doesn't have to say she's faithful,
Yet she's true, like ice, like fire.
People carry roses,
Make promises by the hours,
My love she laughs like the flowers,
Valentines can't buy her..."
ua-cam.com/video/9w1mCevu3sU/v-deo.htmlsi=pPFf6aJPqvqQ2oDD
Thanks! I need to do a few more reactions.
If you want to listen to true Dylan poetry...you need to listen to Like A Rolling Stone, Desolation Row, A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall, Blowin' in the Wind, Maggie's Farm, etc.
Have you done "Its alright Ma, I'm only bleeding " by Dylan.
Not yet!
The lyrical value of most Dylan songs oscillates between words and music. Conventional literary analysis is insufficient and all too reductive for a song like A Simple Twist of Fate. Conventional music criticism is also insufficient. What's required is a certain kind of performance analysis. Tangled up in Blue, for instance, is about precarious experiences on the road (cf. Steinbeck and Kerouac) and cascading imagery (closely aligned with certain modes of modern painting) as much and as poetic stanzas. But it's all carried by music, it can't be separated from the music if it is about Bob Dylan's lyricism.
@@atomicnumber34 Great observation, I fully agree!
MANET OR MONNET OR BOTH PAINTERS
I'm at a minute 13.11, I'll give it a shot...
He makes a deal with a prostitute on a park bench and falls for her in a "spark" knowing that he can't have her, which makes him feel alone and wishes he could have her and turn both their lives around. He wishes he had been "straight" up about this from the start
The "heat of the night" is lust
They go to the "neon" hotel she frequents. He wakes up, and she is gone. He feels regret for not being "straight" with her. He feels alone again
She gives a "coin" to the busker she knows all too well and maybe heads to docks where the sailors dwell
He strolls the docks where the sailors have a woman at every port, dorning a talking parrot like a pirate trying to steal her away from the sailors, and the talking parrot will guide his way to her... searching for a "twist of fate"
Thanks for the notes and thank you for at least trying with me! 😀
Nice analysis, but I would definitely recommend you adjust the sound because the music was drowning you out. I could hear it, but you need to bring your voice up.
Thanks!!
This is not the official version but an earlier take with slightly different lyrics and quite a few bum notes!
Yeah I’ve been hearing that about this song. I’ll try to select a better version for the next one I do.
This is an early version before he8d finalised the lyrics
I never seem to select the correct version of Dylan
Dylan never finalizes his lyrics.
@@EricVoegelin So I'm discovering!
That's just like Wordsworth...
It's not the same version on BOTT this is off the bootleg more blood more tracks
Try listening to the original version by Bob Dylan.
This is not Dylan singing
You don't have to be a good singer to sing. If you enjoy it, sing!
the only thing more annoying than someone who stops the song every couple of sec.s , is someone who insists on talking during the song . i know it's your vid., but show some class cause it's bobs song. try playing the song uninterrupted, then go back and replay it stopping it as much as you want to point out whatever you want , sounds like a win/win. the songs are not that long so length shouldn't be a problem, this particular vid. is 19.25 min.s the songs only 3 maybe 4 min.s , how much you got to say?.
This is NOT Bob Dylan. Jeez people!
It's the real Dylan, an alternate take from the NY sessions of Blood on the Tracks and its posted on Dylan's UA-cam page.
ua-cam.com/video/oXlkwHECabU/v-deo.html
It certainly is!
This is bullshit he has totally heard this before.
No that was my first time hearing it
@@TroubadourChannel at your age, you are a “poet” and don’t know Bob Dylan’s work? Embarrassing
@@Gonegonegone977I am not a poet. Nor have I ever claimed to be. I love poetry and teach classic English poetry. I am enjoying bob dylan for sure.
That sounds like a cover of Dylan. Not Dylan.
It’s definitely him
Durnn
Never heard of Bob Dylan? Extremely doubtful, your no eighteen year old now are you 🤣🤣
I never said I hadn’t heard of Dylan. I had never heard this song.
This is not Bob Dylan. . . . just so you know. lol
Yes it is…
It’s not?
This isn't Dylan
It's the real Dylan, an alternate take from Blood on the Tracks and its posted on Dylan's UA-cam page
ua-cam.com/video/oXlkwHECabU/v-deo.html
It is you can't have heard much dylan if you don't know his voice I could pick it out anywhere