Been a Dylan fan since 63 apart from being a music fan you have to study his lyrics to appreciate his genius,l love playing his songs and I feel that you learn something more every time,!
Reacting to "Desolation Row !!?? That's quite an endeavor, but I think you did a great job.Bob Dylan was always hounded by the press and was asked once, "If you were elected President, what is the first thing you would do ??" and Dylan quickly replied... "Tell all the kids to forget the National Anthem, and memorize "Desolation Row" !! I am 76 years young and have been a fan since the beginning, in 1963. I was 15 yo, in '63 and I went to the pawn shop and bought an old "Gibson" guitar and taught myself to play, and tried to memorize every song. I love watching you react. You are becoming my FAV. Keep it up !!
Your deep dive into Dylan's music makes me so proud. Your writer's instincts and your good-hearted soul says so much about your wisdom on his lyrics. You need a diving bell for this deep dive, don't you😊. He is so deep, and tells it like it is. Rant on, Saeed, because we are here to listen. Much love to you and your family. ❤😊
Back in sixty four when I was playing his early at my workplace god I took some stick of some the people I was working with saying things like turn that off you to go and fine some decent music to play,here we are sixty something years on ,I no I was onto an amazing ,and I never slow hand clapped him at the free trades hall like some of the other muppets LOL!
Well, a l'ill late but, just now caught your reaction to Desolation Row. Sheesh! God Damn! What a great reaction; so enriching, so enlightening for someone like me who's not a reader or wordsmith, history buff and all that kinda stuff - I luv music and songs but, have never been able to get, extract, or decipher the message or the crux of a song properly or effectively. Dang! Gracias for your reactions, my friend. 👊
Saeed, thanks for doing my favorite Dylan song. It never gets old, the imagery is outstanding and the guitar that strums all through make this a real treat. It's like a movie going on in your mind following the lyrics. What a mind he has.....
The beautiful second guitar is played by the late Charlie McCoy, great Nashville multi-instrumentalist. He played the fantastic bass part throughout John Wesley Harding.
@@haroldsteinblatt2567 You my man seem to really know your Dylan. And why not? he has been an inspiration to me since I was a kid and i'm 77 now and still listen to him almost daily.
Boy (that's as in "boy oh boy" amaziing; NOT addressed to the reviewer in thay racial way -- "hey, boy, bring me a mint julep." That's the best of these reaction reviews I've seen! Can tell the reviewer has had a lot of similar thoughts himself. And, he also doesn't get something he's out front about it -- hey, I don't know who Dr Filth is either. A friend toid me years ago he was an abortionist "pre--Roe". A lot of😂
@@hopsears8450 Agreed, I think this guy has seen a few things in his life and therefore can relate to Dylan. He is genuinely affected by the greatest poet of our time. I think it will help him in his life journey and what a treasure to have for the rest of his life.
I think another song you would love to analyze "A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall". After listening to Dylan you should check out the great Patti Smith singing it at his Nobel Prize ceremony. She messes up and has to start over but it is very moving to watch.
Just gotta say real quick -- you're so relatable and seem so nice, which suggests you're secure and happy in your self-knowledge. A cool and accomplished person certainly should feel that way! ❤
I'm loving your Dylan reactions Saeed. Wonderful stuff. Highway 61 Revisited was the first Dylan album I bought some 40 odd years ago as a very impressionable 14 year old, and "Desolation Row" was the song that made me a Dylan fan for life. It still gives me goosebumps.
Thanks Saeed for your reaction.!! You're very perceptive & obviously very well read. I've visited various "Reaction channels" mostly for fun but here I've been mentally stimulated & I appreciate what you're doing.!! I'm 72 & Dylan is a hero of mine as I'm also a writer, musician & filmmaker but I've been so busy living life as you say in "The Matrix Construct"...it's been hard to find the time to "Live the creative Life"...?? Was married, raised four kids, they're all married except my 40yr. old son who I'm gladly helping with his business..!?! And now I'm slowly getting a chance to work on "My Projects"..!?! Really enjoyed your observations.!! It's a rare occurrence these days. Desolation Row has always been one of my favorite Dylan songs. Jackson Browne is also a thoughtful, poetic singer/songwriter you might enjoy as is Van Morrison (and Jim Morrison of The Doors for that matter) but even they would say..."There's no one like Bob Dylan"..!! Thx, again.
Thanks so much for the kind words and sharing a bit about your story. Great that you are finding the time to work on your own projects. We need to sprinkle those in between the obligatory tasks in life. I reacted to a few Jackson Browne songs. Really resonate with his music as well.
Dylan is the first musician to be awarded Nobel Prize in literature. I think of him as the poet laureate of my generation. You can get lost in his poetry. Desolation Row is an apocalyptic epic poem that I don't even fool myself by pretending to understand entirely. This song could be a full semester in a university literature class. His best writing imo. I've attended many of his concerts, he always surprises me when I catch some line I missed years ago. Great reaction Saeed, I like your interpretation.
There are many people who thought that award was an outrage. Given to Dylan for publicity, and to give the impression that the Nobel committee was trying to stay current and raise interest from the younger generation. I'm a Dylan fan dating back to 1963, but I agree with that sentiment.
@@stevenmeyer9674 I have heard the criticism over Dylan being awarded with the Nobel prize. The criticism has some merit, so I understand your dismay. However, he holds it still. I remember the uproar over John Steinbeck’s Nobel prize for his body of work. The Nobel committee has faced controversy in the past, and will in the future. Literature is rather subjective and so disagreement is bound to be an issue. What one finds as the finest literature ever penned, someone else is going to disagree.
Highway 61 is my favorite Dylan album and objectively is always places very high on lists of great albums. Opening with the incredible "LIke A Rolling Stone", and ends with this gem. And everything in between is pretty great. Dylan at his best.
There isn't really a "key" to the meaning of Desolation Row, but the nearest we get to a clue is almost at the end: "All these people that you mention/I know them they're quite lame/I had to rearrange their faces/And give them all another name". Dylan is, it seems, painting surrealist portraits of his Greenwich Village friends, rivals and acquaintances and disguising them as figures from music, film and literature in order to make sense of how he relates to them (and , perhaps, they to him). Ultimately it's inscrutable, fascinating and beautiful, and everything about it - melody, lyrics, performance and accompaniment - is utterly convincing.
I think that is too literal an interpretation. Dylan is not riffing on petty figures in his life. This entire album and much of BIABH is a savage assault on mid 60' America. The canvas is broad. Highway 61 Revisited (album) is Dylan's "Guernica". The literary, historical and religious and Biblical icons that fill the song comprise the heart of western civilization and Dylan "Rearranges their faces and gives them all another name", he creates a new context in that by using them he illustrates poetically and impressionistically the depravity of the landscape of the era. The "letter" is the letter by Irwin Silber who published it in an "open letter to Bob Dylan" in Sing Out magazine in November 1964 castigating Dylan for leaving and "betraying" the folk protest movement. Dylan is saying to him and all who think like him in that verse, if you can't dig where I am coming from, (Desolation Row) don't bother me."
Dylan wrote Hurricane after mistakingly only getting one side of the story directly from Rueben Carter. He took Carter's story hook line and sinker. Dylan stopped performing the song after he realized that he had been likely duped. Carter received a flawed trial, but the lifelong violent criminal was guilty of the crime. He was not retried because the government correctly knew they would not get a conviction after all the publicity.
@@SaeedReacts. The song is amazing. Dylan sounds ANGRY in Hurricane. It is a shameful story. A song on the same line is The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll, also based on a true story. No movie about that one though.
@@SaeedReacts. There is a really important back story to this song. Dylan wrote this after interviewing only Ruben Carter. It wasn't long after the song came out that Dylan realized he had been conned by Carter and consequently never performed it again in public soon after. Carter was unfairly tried, but he was also guilty as sin. He was a life long violent criminal who had already served 10 years in prison and released before the murder in question. After his release on appeal, he brutally beat the woman who was leading the attempt to have him permanently acquitted of the crime. He wasn't a good guy. Great song though. Too bad Carter didn't deserve the sympathy.
Keep in mind he wrote this in 1965. I first heard this song when the album came out. I was 14 years old. It is, and has been, my favorite Dylan song ever since.
His voice and the melody alone make this song great along with the first harmonica solo that blows my mind. As he said, "those early songs were just magically written.
Dylan went deep on this one, and so did Saeed. Nice breakdown. Ezra Pound was a poet and critic that thought outside the lines of conventional society, and was eventually institutionalized in the US from 1946 to 1958.
pound's obsession with economic theory led him down the path of fascism, but his cantos are magnificent. he championed joyce and eliot ["windows of the sea" is a nod to j. alfred prufrock] before most knew of them
@@SaeedReacts. Ezra Pound was a great poet and pathological antisemite who broadcast propaganda for Mussolini during World War II, leading to his being charged with 19 counts of treason. He was deemed insane and was institutionalized.
Tapped into something indeed! He has said that he doesn't know where those early songs came from, they just appeared in his mind. I believe that most great artists are really conduits
The most astute Dylan reaction video I’ve seen. If your mind isn’t blown by almost every line in Desolation Row, you may be among “all those people.” You took the mind blown and added so much more to it. It’s definitely Matrix but since it predates that I’m guessing Dylan was thinking Kafka, especially the verse with the castle and heart attack machine. I’ve probably listened to this song 50-60 times since the 1980s and you brought new tears to my eyes. One thing missing was the stunning beauty of Charlie McCoy’s contrapuntal guitar driving the entire background like band on the deck of the titanic.
Loving your Dylan reactions! You really take the time to parse out what's happening in the lyrics which is almost essential to a Dylan reaction, yet so few reactors actually do it. Hope there's more to come!
It's quite tender that you are really trying to get what he means through his words... There are books full of theories...but you're really trying. You're fantastic ❤ Desolation Row is definitely one of his masterpieces!
Maybe one day i can write a book about it myself 😅 Nah, got to many ideas already. 😄 All jokes aside, amazing song! Definitely one i will be revisiting more, because there is much more to unpack. Thanks for watching.
My all-time favorite song. I take the lyrics quite literally, but your interpretation makes a lot of sense. It is truly satisfying to watch someone willing to go deep into a song and analyze every word and bit of information. Greetings from Brazil
BALLAD OF A THIN MAN, HIGHWAY 61 REVISITED, JUST LIKE TOM THUMB'S BLUES 😊SO THERE'S A FEW GREATS FROM HIS ALBUM ( HIGHWAY 61 REVISITED ) SAEED! 👍ENJOYYY!💯
"I need directions back to desolation row..." ROFL with this one ! it's incredible how seeing one's first time reaction, can make us relieve once again that sensation in some weird sort of way!
This is one of his best songs for me because of the breath and depth of his characters and images. Great first job of trying to make sense of it. I don't think anyone can understand it all. This is one reason why Dylan is the only songwriter to win the Nobel Prize in Literature, which was quite controversial. I relish your site and enjoy your company.
Its a brilliant song and i agree that it probably will never be fully understood. That is definitely part of the genius and mystique. Love. Thanks for watching.
The setting for this was to be a public hanging. They were big deals, financial boons, for the towns, with spectators coming from all around. Entire families, including children, came to witness the gruesome spectacle. The postcards were sold as souvenirs, and parents bought “penny whistles” for children. “You could hear them blow.” Excellent reaction. I’m awaiting your “Murder Most Foul.” It’s Shakespeare. “How do you know when a Shakespeare play is over? Everyone is dead.”
@@kathleenmathias9134 The first verse is about the lynching of 3 black circus workers in Duluth somewhere around 1920. Dylan's father lived 3 blocks from where it happened.
Thanks for the thoughtful reaction Saeed. Most of this and much of Dylan's lyrics are over my head, but I still love the hell out of it. I'd love to hear you react to Mr Tambourine Man if you haven't yet.
Thanks so much for watching. Definitely lyrics i need to revisit over the years to grasp more of it. I reacted to Mr. Tambourine. It was my very first Bob Dylan reaction.
Brilliant, an epic song from a superb album, one of my favourites. I love both the early pure folk & Dylan's electric folk style, both have his amazing lyrics, which are socially critical in a surrealist way. I used to be able to sing "Desolation Row" all the way through, I can still manage most with Bob's help. Keep checking him out. Thank you from an old hippy who stepped out of Desolation Row in the 60's.
Love seeing your reactions as you discover Dylan’s deep, brilliant and mind-blowing lyrics that can have so many meanings. I checked how this song was described in Dylan’s biography, “No Direction Home”, and kudos to you it parallels a lot of your thoughts on this song. The song’s theme is interpreted as “unless we renounce materialism, this will be our future… The scenery is a dreamed mental landscape. Dylan’s description combines the grotesque, the existential…Desolation Row is a grotesque Mardi Gras where heroes and villains of our mytho-history range side by side. As bizarre as his cast is they are real people…the faces have been rearranged and the names changed - shades of cubism… the only truth lies in desolation row.” He depicts cynicism: “What difference which side you’re on if you’re sailing on the Titanic?” He certainly is up there with the greatest poets. Appreciate hearing your interesting and insightful reactions. Thanks. (Sorry for the long comment.)
Thanks so much for sharing this. I definitely must read up on his life and work at some point. And i feel similar about the world sometimes or at least humanity, but then I see other sides that do inspire hope. Thanks again for watching!
@@SaeedReacts. Despite all the inequities, materialism etc., I think we need to try and see the good, make sense of this world and fight for a better world.
One of the Great Works of His Bobness. In the running for magnum opus, as far as I'm concerned. You did a better job at understanding it than I ever have.
Thanks for the great reactions to Dylan's songs. They have been part of my life for well over 50 years and I'm still finding new relevance in them. One not often mentioned is "The Chimes of Freedom". I don't think you'll be disappointed if you listen to it.
Only 5 minutes into this song again, last night I went deep into the lyrics reacting to another reactor, the young man who is a drummer from N.Y. He identified heavily with Desolation Row, trying to escape it himself. Like some of your other commenters, I became a Dylan fan around 1963, when I heard "Blowing In the Wind" sung by Peter, Paul and Mary. "What movie did that song come from.?" As yourself and many of his fans, we are listeners and also writers, musicians and just people, trying to cope in the Universe, perplexed by what we see around us, figuring out if we can do anything at all to improve it before we die. In fact, the wind here was blowing hard as i came from the store, I thought of "Blowing In the Wind" and a guy stops and offers me a ride home, which I usually refuse but I took up is offer, my three cats needed their food to have a peaceful house. Maybe this was the answer, "We all have to give another person a lift, now and then." Writing this, this is Dylan's whole life in a nutshell. "Blowing In the Wind" became an anthem for Martin Luther King's Civil rights movement. He helped win that war. He tried to stop the unjust and crazy Vietnam War along with the Leftist radicals his girlfriend, Joan Baez, was in with. He didn't want a life of protest for any cause like her. What he wanted was a wife and kids just like any other man. Then he met Sara Lowdes, for who he wrote the best of his love songs. Most listeners of Dylan focus on his protest songs, like "Hurricane" which I won't listen to. "Hurricane Carter" wasn't much of a person, a promising fighter who became involved with the wrong crowd and was thrown in prison. Maybe he was innocent of that crime, but after he was freed, he committed crimes he was guilty of. The media, who is always searching for causes like Cervantes' hero, are attacking windmills. Dylan hooked on drugs, nearly died in a motorcycle crash on his Triumph whose logo is on his T-shirt. It took a long recovery, he moved out of N.Y. City and bought property in upstate N.Y. near Woodstock. He became a recluse, almost. I don't know what Sara was doing but he bought Big Pink, where he could work with his back-up musicians, The Band. Dylan was sick of being used by the media and the radical Left. He wanted to go electric and write personal songs. He saw what fortune and fame brought and hated his life. People forget, at heart, Dylan was this troubadour but in the modern world. He is not of the city or their castles and the evils of fortune and fame. He isn't among those attacking the castle either because if they win, they will only rebuild the castle and moat like in Orwell's Animal Farm, the former slaves will become the new slave owners. He was shocked into this revelation because just by going electric to reach more people, he was receiving death threats by the radical Left. Some people conjectured his accident was an attempt to kill him. I don't know if he knows what caused the accident. One of his early friends, fellow musician Richard Farina died in a motorcycle accident. His wife was Joan Baez sister. When he wrote "Positively 4th Street" it was those people he was talking about. It wasn't about the establishment but the 'street people'. Desolation Row is about those street people, hanging out trapped in the most around the big castle. (I am becoming my own metaphorist, here.) Dylan found God when in recovery, he turned Christian and wrote his country albums, Nashville Skyline and others. I forget which ones they were. He went on tours with a traveling circus of his creation. It was this period, I stopped listening to him. My favorite love songs of his was "Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands". No one but ancient forgotten poets have ever written a ballad so beautiful. Four or five kids later, he cheats on her. She gave him the life he dreamed of. In 'Sara' he admits it. There was no going back. He blew it big time. Secretly, he married again but that didn't last. I know he never wrote her the love songs which matched Sara's. If he did, no one knows them. I've accepted the fact my hero, poet and writer is flawed. I hate what critics and most fans say about him. He gives evasive answers with most interviewers. He is being real, people. His fans and I guess his enemies try to analyze his songs, especially his surrealistic ones. Look at his art work, it's abstract but with distorted images. This is how he sees himself. He doesn't give answers because he doesn't know. One responder said he'd write lyrics in 15 to 30 minutes. I can do that, Don't ask me or him what motivated him to write it. Sometimes he'll know, sometimes he won't. What most of his fans do not understand is when you sing a song, that song is no longer yours. It is like love, you gave it to someone and they can do with it what they may. You hope they'll keep it and treasure it but they also can put it in the trash bin of their memories. On Haight Street in the Summer of 1967 in S.F. I met the girlfriend of one of Dylan's buddies, Bobby Neurwith. Her one room was covered in posters which read "No One Sings Dylan Like Dylan". The Monterey Pop was going to be in a few days and Dylan's manager Grossman with help from Neurwith was putting it on. They also handled the filming. John Phillips of the Mama and Papas got all the bands together. Watch the people Dylan chooses to perform with. Groups like "The Byrds" made much of their careers doing his folk songs into pop. If he likes how you did, it he'll preform with you. If you really catch his attention, he'll do a duet doing someone else's songs he wished he could have written. Bob Dylan is really well read. People say he can recall pages of literature for years, to begin to understand the images in Desolation Row, read what books, plays, movies and songs he has. No one can. Please don't try to analyze what he's thinking. He gave this word painting to you and what you and your imagination does with it is yours and yours alone. Enjoy it as long as it gives you pleasure and satisfaction. From an almost 'hippy' Peace and Love. (If you want to find out about Dylan look to those he called 'brothers', George Harrison, Tom Petty, Roy Orbison, Arlo Guthrie and his father, and Jerry Garcia to whom he wrote a moving short eulogy for.) All these people are fellow troubadours. He is just one, no more, no less. Listen to his song, "All I Really Want to Do". Sonny and Cher did it. The problem is no one believes it. That is their problem and trap. Don't fall into the quicksand. Rabbit holes you can climb out of. Just sayin'. In closing. good job for a Dylan beginner. Remember, Dylan dropped out of college. The Media wants you to recall "The Times They Are a Changin'" but after he wrote that one, he wrote "My Back Pages" which he''ll sing with a whole stage of fellow musicians, people who know him personally and been through what he has. "Good and bad, I defined these terms, no doubt, quite clear somehow, but I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now." People asked him about "The Times, They Are a Changin': and said do you believe it?" Dylan said "No, not personally, I just wrote what I saw going on all around me." He always was and will remain forever being a very complex thinker, except when he writes his love songs, which most people forget. His early songs had a lot of love and humor. I've never seen some one comment about "If Not For You", big hit by Olivia Newton John, "Lay, Lady, Lay," or songs for his kids "Forever Young". Our Media focuses on the negative 90% of the time. Why? It sells, good news doesn't. I was a journalism major until I discovered the editors won't allow you to print or say the complete truth. No one knows the complete truth but at least we can try. Most people don't try for whatever reasons or excuses. Like my Dad always said, "People don't think" Like Dylan's hero, Woody Guthrie, my Dad was from Oklahoma. Sometimes we must forget the past, the Desolation Rows and chart newer, better territories. When we get on our feet, maybe we can rescue a few survivors from the ship called N.Y. City and other places.
@@SaeedReacts. The pleasure is all mine. Do you realize how difficult it is to find serious Dylan fans. I had one friend, and a cowboy poet and millionaire who liked the early Dylan but he died. After my older brother died, we became as brothers. I had no one of my intelligence to talk to. I never met a Dylan fan who wasn't very intelligent. Most are also artistic.
You must watch the documentary on Dylan, "NO DIRECTION HOME". Deep dive into Dylan. Also you asked about Handwritten lyrics, I believe his handwritten lyrics, "Like a Rolling Stone" sold for over $1,000,000
Also recommend Scorcese’s “No Direction Home”, which only covers his first few years of songwriting and also shows what was going on in his life and American music and culture at the time.
thanks for sharing Saeed. I stumbled on your video and didn't know this Dylan song or you. you incites on meanings is sharp. I'll wait to what else you got!
Brilliant, brilliant song. I first heard it high and I howled with laughter and totally adored it. His singing is the best ever, the guitar backup (not him) is brilliant. As far as looking for the 'meaning', I find that ridiculously juvenile. It's full of wonderful foolishness...that rhymes! Period. But the melody, the accompaniment, the beautiful singing, that is what makes the song, along with the hilarious, absurdist lyrics.
I strongly recommend reacting to "Bob Dylan's 115th Dream" in which he's "retelling" the story of the discovery of the new world/America. It's showing a somehow lighter side of Dylan. "Desolation Row" is quite an enigma to me - possibly there are more people with such an impression. However, even as such it's still an inspiration and a bit of a challenge each time I'm listening to it.
So glad you are exploring Dylan. I would attempt to guide you through his catalog, but it would be futile. Just keep digging you can't go wrong. One of my favorites is "Tangled Up in Blue", a song he has changed and added to many times on the fly (including a Christian version) performing it live.
Dylan is a wordsmith of the highest caliber. He has books with everything he ever wrote, published, look them up. He is Americas finest son. He has a Nobel prize for his works! Not bad for a jewish boy from Minnesota who skipped college because they had nothing to teach him. Sheltered from the Storm, Tangled up in Blues. Ballad of a thin man, and Masters of War!, i can go on and on all day. Be prepared though, his catalog is enormous and still relevant.
Excellent reaction and analysis ... but, most of all thank you for your barring of your emotions while experiencing Dylan's masterpiece of 'Desolation Row'. Saeed, keep doing what you're doing in discovering his art. As a 73 year old, it warms my heart to see the multitude of emotions that wash over you on each new song that hits your "soft spots". One of my favorites is 'It's All Over Now, Baby Blue'. Yes ... your reactions to Dylan and Aurora keep you as my fav reactor. More, please.
Thank you so much for the kind words. It is such an amazing journey discovering these incredible artists. And this is a true masterpiece that i will be revisiting often. There is a lot of insight to be gained from this song. Excited to continue this journey.
This song is based on a real hanging. In 1920 that took place in Minnesota. Bobs birthplace, the men were later to be found innocent and then a statue was put up to claim there innocence. This picture is from 'keys to the rain Definative Bob Dylan encyclopedia '
Only that LINE is about the hanging. The rest of the song isn't. The song isn't "about" or "based on" anything. It's surrealist poetry with a central image the other images revolve around.
@@redadamearth The first verse of the 1965 song "Desolation Row" by Bob Dylan, who was born in Duluth, references the lynchings in Duluth: They're selling postcards of the hanging They're painting the passports brown The beauty parlor is filled with sailors The circus is in town.[18] Dylan was born in Duluth, and grew up in Hibbing, 60 miles (97 km) northwest of Duluth. His father, Abram Zimmerman, was 9 years old in June 1920 and lived two blocks from the site of the lynchings. The three black men lynched worked for a visiting circus.
Al Kooper, who played electric guitar on the first recordings of "Desolation Row", suggested that it was located on a stretch of Eighth Avenue, Manhattan, "an area infested with whore houses, sleazy bars and porno supermarkets totally beyond renovation or redemption" 😮
Seed, my friend you look like you found the holy grail....lol. He will only help your creative writing juices and you know what ??? You have this treasure to enjoy for the rest of your life...awesome isn;t it?
This is one of Bob's song that's impossible to deconstruct. Al Kooper, who played on these sessions, probably got as close as anyone when he said, "I think he had 8th Avenue in mind." ( ramshackled district full of prostitutes, drug dealers, porn movie houses and general decay
The thoughts I had while listening to the verse about Einstein. When Hitler rose to power, Einstein was forced to emigrate from Germany (maybe that is why his memories were packed in his trunk). His contribution to the understanding of the Universe and the atomic age led to the development of atomic weapons. He wanted to be a force for good (a Robin Hood) but ultimately it was just a disguise. His biographers write about his disappointment in later years on how his discoveries were used. Maybe the Electric Violin represents nuclear weapons. His reciting of the alphabet could be his most famous equation E=MC squared. The beauty of Dylan's art is that it can be interpreted in so many ways...
First off, I love the deep analysis you do. I've been trying to unpack this song for years, and you definitely have an interesting take on it. There's a guy on You Tube that loves Bob Dylan called Calico Silver (shout out). His take on the Dr. Filth verse is that it's a reference to the holocaust and the cruel experiments that were performed on the Jewish prisoners. If this song is kind of a bleak vision of humanity, than that makes sense, since the holocaust is sort of the end point for the world going to Hell and the potential for man's cruelty to one another when we lose our sense of community and enter a state of ultra-tribesmanship (is that a word?). Anyways, love your channel. Keep it up! On a side note, I want to pose a question to all: Are there any songwriters anywhere near the level of Bob Dylan, anymore? If not, why not?
Thanks for taking the time to share this! Much appreciated. Didnt know Calico Silver, might check him out. At least the songs i have done already. In terms of songwriters today, there probably are people who are near this level, it might be harder to find them in this immense market. Maybe its harder to make it big as a lyricist these days. Coming from a mostly hiphop background i can confidently say that there are some rappers who have incredible skill when it comes to putting together words and seem to be master of the English language. Other genres im not that familiar with, but i am on a journey of discovery. I have come across amazing songwriters, but maybe not this level.
Hi I love your Bob Dylan reactions!!! I know I mentioned before that you should react to Bob Dylan's song 'Murder Most Foul' from 2020. I can't wait to see you react to it as it is his 1st ever No.1 single and was his first original song to be released after becoming the 1st songwriter to win the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2016. He was also 79 when this song was released. It is incredible!!!
Jip. Talking about the blind commissioner. Yes, one hand is tied and the other actually counting money in the pocket😂. Craftsmanship at it's best. And Saeed your mind is a treasure and tx for your insights. Nobody could escape also let me think of the sect where the people drank poison to not escape their parameters but escape society. My mind is also blown by this and working overtime. In my mind's eye I see TS. Elliott writing poetry whilst fighting in his mind. I don't get the fisherman with the flowers (maybe they had a huge day in catching, not fighting but winning while working in unison?) Which side are you on.....fighting through life or go without scrambling and enjoy life. Man, tons of ideas running through my head. Greetings from South Africa
Great reaction. There is so much Dylan music to enjoy. In some ways it would be good to sample it in chronological order, but that is a long trip. Penny whistles, mentioned in Desolation Row, are a featured sound in the song Highway 61 Revisited, another great one from this album. Jokerman from the album Infidels (1983) is another banger.
Bob is awesome. I would love for you to hear a classic from the son of a traditional american folk writer and singer named Woody Guthrie. Bob went to New York to meet Woody, just before he died. Long story, sorry, Arlo Guthrie is Woody's son and wrote a classic anti-war song called Alice's Restaurant. There are many versions, but I think you might enjoy this hilarious singer-songwriter. The live version in the mid-80s, a concert called Farm Aide, is pretty good.
Your remark about the long length of some of Dylan's songs and his composition process reminds me of the time Dylan's recording company asked him if he could record a shorter version of the song; Dylan responded: "This is the short version".🤣
Methinks that Desolution Row is just a Dylanesque ( almost Shakespearian ) reference to the society of losers, both professional and amateur. Oh.....and its also a song title. lol
Great reaction, again, Saeed. The Matrix analogy felt spot on. I’ve always experienced this as Dylan’s surreal description of the counter-culture he experienced in Greenwich Village. The place where artists and drop-outs went to live outside of conventional society. “Straight” people could only peek, enviously, into this alternative lifestyle, filled as it was with oddballs and characters whom Dylan describes while masking their identities in metaphor. The last line is the key. If you want to contact Bob, you’ve got to abandon convention and get yourself down to Desolation Row.
I think it is the opposite although you get the ending right. All the figures drawn from history., literature, the Bible are iconic representations of western civilization. By "'rearranging their faces and giving them all another name", he is using them to illustrate the depravity and chaos in mid 60's America.Desolation Row should be seen in the context of the savage assault on America in many of the albums other songs. It is the closing piece of withdrawal into some form of sanctuary. I agree it is the land of the outsiders.
@@kenkaplan3654 How nice to meet someone on here who has the definitive answers to Dylan’s lyrics, something he always cautioned against. Fortunately, as with any art, there is no “right” interpretation, which is why individual reactions are just that, no more, including yours. 😎
@@davidbowman6740 Dylan's "cautions" especially about his early music when he was at a zenith that "they didn't mean anything" was BS. He was desperate to escape the incessant demand that he explain his music in left brain dialogue. He hated that. He got caught by mistake in the famous Time magazine interview in "Don't Look Back" (you might watch it) and he mentions "truth". the Time person asks" what is the truth, and Dylan becomes tongue tied falling all over himself trying trying to give a definition or examples. He wanted to avoid that nonsense at all costs. I don't pretend to know the meaning in many ways of a great deal of his songs. I have no idea who "Like a Rolling Stone" might be directed to, although the universal theme of a bad fall from social grace is quite clear. (which happened to me exactly-losing middle class status for a while and being homeless I don't really know if "Visions of Johanna" is literally about Joan Baez or just her deep aspirational life or if "Johanna" is at all a reference to her ( she thought so) but it is quite clear the song is about the failure to find the transcendence the singer desperately seeks, lost and trapped in the bleakness of the urban, electronic modern world. Gone is the more youthful hope "Yes, to dance beneath the diamond sky with one hand waving free Silhouetted by the sea, circled by the circus sands With all memory and fate driven deep beneath the waves Let me forget about today until tomorrow "Journey Through Dark Heat" absolutely is about his immediate post divorce but don't know if "Tangled Up in Blue" is about one woman or a surreal montage of women in his life."It took me 10 years to live" he said.Hmmm 1964-1974 Dylan said much later in life that the majority of his material came from his relationship to America and Highway 61 Revisited (album) and Desolation Row are exactly that, in spades. The person to whom I replied might have mixed up their comment. In the song "Desolation Row" is a sanctuary from the depravity and chaos the singer sees in society and certainly could have been inspired by the counter culture or even aspects of village life. The commenter is right on about those unable to get into, because of their own limitations or oppression, this sanctuary but the characters and symbols in the song are quite clearly NOT "In* Desolation Row but are aspects of a society gone wrong the singer sees from that sanctuary. But the assertion "“Straight” people could only peek, enviously, into this alternative lifestyle, filled as it was with oddballs and characters **whom Dylan describes** while masking their identities in metaphor" is impossible. If Desolation Row is 'The place where artists and drop-outs went to live outside of conventional society. (and be a place where unless you dig it, Dylan is not interested) then the "Insurance men"," Dr. Filth", Ophelia, those on the Titanic fighting over "which side are you on" (a mantra of the folk protest movement), the punishment of Casanova, and especially the opening verse which sets the tone of a real life depravity, the hanging of 3 black circus workers in Duluth witnessed by Dylan's father from which post cards were made and distributed have nothing to do with those fortunate few **inside** of Desolation Row. The song is much vaster than dealing with personalities in Dylan's life in the village, unlike a song like "Positively 4th street", which very well may be. That's all I was responding to. Most astute critics see the same thing, although I agree with you any work of any artist is important to the viewer on their own terms. As one critic put it "Desolation Row is probably Dylan’s most misunderstood song, which is predictable given the lack of a clear narrative and the wild, surrealistic imagery. I think the source of most of the confusion centers around the assumptions made about Desolation Row. When something is called “desolate” the natural inclination is to think it must be bad and unattractive. I doubt there’s a street called Desolation Row in all of America. Who would want to live there? In this song, however, in keeping with the outsider theme of the album, Desolation Row is on the right side of the tracks. Desolation Row is the place for all right-minded persons, the place for people who have rejected the easy god-fearing morals and Hollywood ideals of glamour and success. Once the listener understands this idea, then the rest of the song falls into place. Desolation Row is the home of the outsider, a place the narrator and his associates are comfortable in. In fact, he doesn’t even want to communicate with anyone unless they are in Desolation Row: Don’t send me no more letters no Not unless you mail them From Desolation Row The authorities are afraid of this place. Casanova is punished for going there. The Row is a target of the “riot squad” ( i.e. the police or National Guard). The authorities are actively preventing people from “escaping to Desolation Row”. It’s a dangerous place, to them anyway." Etc I hope this clears things up
@@kenkaplan3654 The thing about the best art is that it’s often created when the artist’s subconscious is freewheelin’, so that even the artist can be mystified at times. Saeed touched on that in both his Dylan reactions and that’s the reason there are as many valid interpretations as there are listeners. Some interpretations add something to your own experience and others don’t, it’s such a personal thing. Saeed has a great journey ahead of him and I’ll be listening all the way😎
get a hold of "Visions of Johanna" & "Highlander" next, once down the dylan rabbit hole you'll 50+ years getting out; like me except its 60+ in my case, you'll love every minute too!
If you want some other gems that are challenges to decipher, try out Changing of the Guards, Jokerman, and/or Senor...Fewer people will recommend these, but given how much you're getting outta this and some other deep Dylan tunes, I'm sure you're gonna like 'em...No rush - I'll enjoy any Dylan you care to check out!
This song was partly influenced by T. S. Eliot, whom Alan Ginsburg had recently introduced him to. Eliot's 'The Waste Land' and desolation Row have similarities, but Eliot was into classical learning and Dylan decided to write something more demotic - of the ordinary people. All his references are popular cultural figures, as opposed to Eliot's Greek characters. The mermaids and the windows of the sea probably come from Eliot's 'The Love Song of Alfred J. Prufrock'. But there are more personal references, too, taken from his own life in Greenwich Village. He really is a complex, multi-layered poet, able to take the personal and expand it into a universal context that relates to us all. By the way, there really were postcards of a hanging (lynching) that took place in Duluth in the 1920s.
While the lyrics to this song are incredible (if well beyond my capacity to understand)... it's that harmonica at the end that REALLY makes my big toe jump up in my boot.
Now we have a problem. The next album is a double. Maybe Visions Of Johanna, maybe the epic Sad-eyed Lady Of The Lowlands. Maybe the tiny I Want You. You're on the train now my friend. edit: Just seen you have done Visions. I'll see you over there.
Great analysis. I believe the verses regarding Cinderella is a metaphor for the womens libration movement at the time. There were many civil rights movements in the 60s. The Monk is jealous of Einstein for reaching more people than religion. Doctor filth is Freud who Dylan hates. I know tidbits but mainly I write my own thesis about Dylan's songs just like everyone else. The older I get I see some of his songs differently. Dylan is an obsessive reader and has books like Moby Dick completely memorized because he reads them countless times. Dylan is the best.
Thanks so much for adding your thoughts. I will definitely listen to his songs more often. There is much to be learned. Seems i got the reading part in common with him :)
My hat's off to you, brother! You're taking on a challenge, there. Not just with Dylan, but the whole ball of wax. There was a reaction guy, called Dicon Dissectional reactions, who did deep dives into songs and lyrics, and gave up after a while. It seemed that the short attention span of listeners these days was getting to him. They wanted people to react to the music with a few comments after the song, and that's about it. I hope you fare better! You're good at it, which is saying a lot. Lyrics can have so many perspectives.
Someone told me about his reactions and that they were good. Sorry to hear he is not doing them anymore. I definitely want to continue, but these songs are dense and i get it takes a lot of the brain sometimes. Especially if you want to dive in deep. I recorded a reaction to Hurricane which was a bit more straightforward storytelling and was a bit easier to digest lyrically. Hope to get that one uploaded soon. Thanks for watching!
You asked how long it took Dylan to write Desolation Row. According to the Leonard Cohen biographer Sylvie Simmons, Cohen asked Dylan how long it took him to write 'I and I' and Dylan answered '15 minutes in the back of a cab'. Dylan then asked Cohen how long it took him to write 'Hallelujah', Cohen replied 'a couple of years' because he was embarrassed to admit it really took him five years!
Thanks for letting me know. Sometimes the words just flow and all we need to do is write them down. Sometimes you have to crack your brain to get a few out.
You got it Bro ! Something more uplifting but equally dense try ‘ Gates of Eden ‘ more recently is his epic on the Titanic called ‘ Tempest’ off the Tempest Album is epic … or even his track ‘ Mississippi ‘ or way back ‘ Chimes of Freedom ‘ is a classic in the calibre of Mr Tamborine Man you covered already . Cheers
So many people quote lines from Dylan songs. And I once heard of someone having a party where everyone was supposed to come dressed as a figure from a Bob Dylan song. I think they all could have used this song, heh!
As in Fine Art, Abstract Expressionism in words, like James Joyce. Art for the sake of evocation to the individual viewer or listener. "That's all" as Sister Rosetta Tharpe once sang.
You should do Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands, probably the most beautiful love song ever written. Desolation Row is great art, so is Visions of Johanna, so is A Hard Rain is Gonna Fall, so is Tangled Up In Blue and many, many other ones, but if there is one song that got him the Nobel Prize for Literature, it is Sad-Eyed Lady of the Lowlands. Btw, it is rumored that Ophelia in the song (Desolation Row) is not Hamlet's fiancé, but Joan Baez, whom Dylan has always (probably rightly) considered to be much more passionate than talented (her profession is her religion, her sin is her lifelessness).
The first verse is a real event. It concerns a lynching of three black men, who were working for the circus which visited Duluth, in 1920. The men were falsely accused of raping a young girl. The three men were arrested and placed in the local police cells. A mob entered the police station, with little or no resistance from the police. The men were beaten and then hung from a street lamp. The mob was photographed standing around the lamppost, laughing and smiling. The alleged rape victim finally admitted that the accusation was a lie; and it was meant as a joke. The men who carried out the hangcharged with murder, but were all found not guilty. The photographs of the dead men hanging, was later turned into postcard and sold as a souvenir in Duluth; Bob’s parents were living in Duluth at the time.
You need to do Bob Dylan and the grateful Dead slow train coming from foxboro Sullivan stadium I was there live my all-time favorite song by him but it's got to be with the grateful Dead one of the all-time best concerts I ever saw
His words are soul stirring. Nobody has ever, or will ever, be on Dylans level. Miraculous
Been a Dylan fan since 63 apart from being a music fan you have to study his lyrics to appreciate his genius,l love playing his songs and I feel that you learn something more every time,!
Reacting to "Desolation Row !!?? That's quite an endeavor, but I think you did a great job.Bob Dylan was always hounded by the press and was asked once, "If you were elected President, what is the first thing you would do ??" and Dylan quickly replied... "Tell all the kids to forget the National Anthem, and memorize "Desolation Row" !! I am 76 years young and have been a fan since the beginning, in 1963. I was 15 yo, in '63 and I went to the pawn shop and bought an old "Gibson" guitar and taught myself to play, and tried to memorize every song. I love watching you react. You are becoming my FAV. Keep it up !!
Thanks for sharing that story! Love that 😀
Appreciate the kind words. Have a great day!
Your deep dive into Dylan's music makes me so proud. Your writer's instincts and your good-hearted soul says so much about your wisdom on his lyrics. You need a diving bell for this deep dive, don't you😊. He is so deep, and tells it like it is. Rant on, Saeed, because we are here to listen. Much love to you and your family. ❤😊
And some extra oxygen tanks 😅
Thanks so much for the warm words ❤️ Much love to you and your family 🫂🫂
Back in sixty four when I was playing his early at my workplace god I took some stick of some the people I was working with saying things like turn that off you to go and fine some decent music to play,here we are sixty something years on ,I no I was onto an amazing ,and I never slow hand clapped him at the free trades hall like some of the other muppets LOL!
Well, a l'ill late but, just now caught your reaction to Desolation Row.
Sheesh! God Damn! What a great reaction; so enriching, so enlightening for someone like me who's not a reader or wordsmith, history buff and all that kinda stuff - I luv music and songs but, have never been able to get, extract, or decipher the message or the crux of a song properly or effectively. Dang! Gracias for your reactions, my friend. 👊
Dylan was known to write songs in 15 minutes in the 1960s. Desolation Row probably took half an hour though 😀
Wow! 😮
You have fast become my go-to guy for Dylan. Bravo!
Thanks so much! Looking forward to more!
Saeed, thanks for doing my favorite Dylan song. It never gets old, the imagery is outstanding and the guitar that strums all through make this a real treat. It's like a movie going on in your mind following the lyrics. What a mind he has.....
It really is like a movie in your mind. Beautiful. Thanks for watching!
The beautiful second guitar is played by the late Charlie McCoy, great Nashville multi-instrumentalist. He played the fantastic bass part throughout John Wesley Harding.
@@haroldsteinblatt2567 You my man seem to really know your Dylan. And why not? he has been an inspiration to me since I was a kid and i'm 77 now and still listen to him almost daily.
Boy (that's as in "boy oh boy" amaziing; NOT addressed to the reviewer in thay racial way -- "hey, boy, bring me a mint julep." That's the best of these reaction reviews I've seen!
Can tell the reviewer has had a lot of similar thoughts himself. And, he also doesn't get something he's out front about it -- hey, I don't know who Dr Filth is either. A friend toid me years ago he was an abortionist "pre--Roe".
A lot of😂
@@hopsears8450 Agreed, I think this guy has seen a few things in his life and therefore can relate to Dylan. He is genuinely affected by the greatest poet of our time. I think it will help him in his life journey and what a treasure to have for the rest of his life.
I think another song you would love to analyze "A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall". After listening to Dylan you should check out the great Patti Smith singing it at his Nobel Prize ceremony. She messes up and has to start over but it is very moving to watch.
Loved it. Patti's audience was so gracious.
Just gotta say real quick -- you're so relatable and seem so nice, which suggests you're secure and happy in your self-knowledge. A cool and accomplished person certainly should feel that way! ❤
Thanks so much for the kind words. It definitely took me a while to get to this place. Grateful to be here now ❤️
I'm loving your Dylan reactions Saeed. Wonderful stuff. Highway 61 Revisited was the first Dylan album I bought some 40 odd years ago as a very impressionable 14 year old, and "Desolation Row" was the song that made me a Dylan fan for life. It still gives me goosebumps.
Its an amazing journey and i am learning a lot! Thanks for watching. Have a great day!
superb, my top Dylan track & album too.
Thanks Saeed for your reaction.!! You're very perceptive & obviously very well read. I've visited various "Reaction channels" mostly for fun but here I've been mentally stimulated & I appreciate what you're doing.!! I'm 72 & Dylan is a hero of mine as I'm also a writer, musician & filmmaker but I've been so busy living life as you say in "The Matrix Construct"...it's been hard to find the time to "Live the creative Life"...?? Was married, raised four kids, they're all married except my 40yr. old son who I'm gladly helping with his business..!?! And now I'm slowly getting a chance to work on "My Projects"..!?! Really enjoyed your observations.!! It's a rare occurrence these days. Desolation Row has always been one of my favorite Dylan songs. Jackson Browne is also a thoughtful, poetic singer/songwriter you might enjoy as is Van Morrison (and Jim Morrison of The Doors for that matter) but even they would say..."There's no one like Bob Dylan"..!! Thx, again.
Thanks so much for the kind words and sharing a bit about your story.
Great that you are finding the time to work on your own projects. We need to sprinkle those in between the obligatory tasks in life.
I reacted to a few Jackson Browne songs. Really resonate with his music as well.
Dylan is the first musician to be awarded Nobel Prize in literature. I think of him as the poet laureate of my generation. You can get lost in his poetry. Desolation Row is an apocalyptic epic poem that I don't even fool myself by pretending to understand entirely. This song could be a full semester in a university literature class. His best writing imo. I've attended many of his concerts, he always surprises me when I catch some line I missed years ago. Great reaction Saeed, I like your interpretation.
There are many people who thought that award was an outrage. Given to Dylan for publicity, and to give the impression that the Nobel committee was trying to stay current and raise interest from the younger generation. I'm a Dylan fan dating back to 1963, but I agree with that sentiment.
@@stevenmeyer9674 I have heard the criticism over Dylan being awarded with the Nobel prize. The criticism has some merit, so I understand your dismay. However, he holds it still. I remember the uproar over John Steinbeck’s Nobel prize for his body of work. The Nobel committee has faced controversy in the past, and will in the future. Literature is rather subjective and so disagreement is bound to be an issue. What one finds as the finest literature ever penned, someone else is going to disagree.
@@stevenmeyer9674 - How very sad for you.
@@MichaelMiller-eg5dr why should I be sad?
It definitely could be a full semester. And i would love to attend those class. Amazing conversations would happen!
Thanks so much for watching!
Love how you always go in depth with the reactions and I'm glad to see you are enjoying Dylan, Keep it up!!!
So many great lines here to dig into! Thanks for watching!
"The Lonesome Death of Hattie Caroll", an early Dylan classic also based on a true story.
Highway 61 is my favorite Dylan album and objectively is always places very high on lists of great albums. Opening with the incredible "LIke A Rolling Stone", and ends with this gem. And everything in between is pretty great. Dylan at his best.
There isn't really a "key" to the meaning of Desolation Row, but the nearest we get to a clue is almost at the end: "All these people that you mention/I know them they're quite lame/I had to rearrange their faces/And give them all another name". Dylan is, it seems, painting surrealist portraits of his Greenwich Village friends, rivals and acquaintances and disguising them as figures from music, film and literature in order to make sense of how he relates to them (and , perhaps, they to him). Ultimately it's inscrutable, fascinating and beautiful, and everything about it - melody, lyrics, performance and accompaniment - is utterly convincing.
Takes some unwrapping this song beyond me but I love it❤
Well done sir.
I think many of Dylan's songs from that period had to to with him being dumped by Warhol actress, Edie Sedgwick
@@maggiebryan2355maggie-good to see that you have a voice😊
I think that is too literal an interpretation. Dylan is not riffing on petty figures in his life. This entire album and much of BIABH is a savage assault on mid 60' America. The canvas is broad. Highway 61 Revisited (album) is Dylan's "Guernica". The literary, historical and religious and Biblical icons that fill the song comprise the heart of western civilization and Dylan "Rearranges their faces and gives them all another name", he creates a new context in that by using them he illustrates poetically and impressionistically the depravity of the landscape of the era. The "letter" is the letter by Irwin Silber who published it in an "open letter to Bob Dylan" in Sing Out magazine in November 1964 castigating Dylan for leaving and "betraying" the folk protest movement. Dylan is saying to him and all who think like him in that verse, if you can't dig where I am coming from, (Desolation Row) don't bother me."
Dylan’s song “Hurricane” is based on a true story and a testament to his writing and social commentary. Definitely recommend a listen
That song is on my list. Some people told me about it.
I watched the film with Denzel Washington a long time ago. So I know a bit about the story.
Dylan wrote Hurricane after mistakingly only getting one side of the story directly from Rueben Carter. He took Carter's story hook line and sinker. Dylan stopped performing the song after he realized that he had been likely duped. Carter received a flawed trial, but the lifelong violent criminal was guilty of the crime. He was not retried because the government correctly knew they would not get a conviction after all the publicity.
@@SaeedReacts. The song is amazing. Dylan sounds ANGRY in Hurricane. It is a shameful story. A song on the same line is The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll, also based on a true story. No movie about that one though.
@@SaeedReacts. There is a really important back story to this song. Dylan wrote this after interviewing only Ruben Carter. It wasn't long after the song came out that Dylan realized he had been conned by Carter and consequently never performed it again in public soon after. Carter was unfairly tried, but he was also guilty as sin. He was a life long violent criminal who had already served 10 years in prison and released before the murder in question. After his release on appeal, he brutally beat the woman who was leading the attempt to have him permanently acquitted of the crime. He wasn't a good guy. Great song though. Too bad Carter didn't deserve the sympathy.
@@stevenmeyer9674 the dopey side of dylan...bob made money from that song, like j mitchell did on her son furry.
Keep in mind he wrote this in 1965. I first heard this song when the album came out. I was 14 years old. It is, and has been, my favorite Dylan song ever since.
His voice and the melody alone make this song great along with the first harmonica solo that blows my mind. As he said, "those early songs were just magically written.
Dylan went deep on this one, and so did Saeed. Nice breakdown.
Ezra Pound was a poet and critic that thought outside the lines of conventional society, and was eventually institutionalized in the US from 1946 to 1958.
He did! Incredible song.
Thanks for letting me know about Ezra Pound. Will look his work up.
@@SaeedReacts. Try "Bob Dylan's Dream"😢
pound's obsession with economic theory led him down the path of fascism, but his cantos are magnificent. he championed joyce and eliot ["windows of the sea" is a nod to j. alfred prufrock] before most knew of them
@@SaeedReacts. Ezra Pound was a great poet and pathological antisemite who broadcast propaganda for Mussolini during World War II, leading to his being charged with 19 counts of treason. He was deemed insane and was institutionalized.
Tapped into something indeed! He has said that he doesn't know where those early songs came from, they just appeared in his mind. I believe that most great artists are really conduits
I am of a similar belief. Where ideas come from is not always known, but it is important to recognize them when they do come.
I have heard of people throwing costume parties where everyone came dressed as a character from "Desolation Row"
That is actually a cool idea 😅
@@donniewheat2606 what a great idea love it!
The most astute Dylan reaction video I’ve seen. If your mind isn’t blown by almost every line in Desolation Row, you may be among “all those people.” You took the mind blown and added so much more to it. It’s definitely Matrix but since it predates that I’m guessing Dylan was thinking Kafka, especially the verse with the castle and heart attack machine. I’ve probably listened to this song 50-60 times since the 1980s and you brought new tears to my eyes. One thing missing was the stunning beauty of Charlie McCoy’s contrapuntal guitar driving the entire background like band on the deck of the titanic.
Thanks for the kind words and adding your thoughts. This is definitely a lyrical goldmine. Mindblowing is accurate!
Can never go wrong with Dylan. His catalogue is so huge.
Painting pictures with his words, the literary master of surrealism.
Loving your Dylan reactions! You really take the time to parse out what's happening in the lyrics which is almost essential to a Dylan reaction, yet so few reactors actually do it. Hope there's more to come!
Its just too good not to. Or to try at least 😅
Definitely will be exploring more. Thanks for watching.
It's quite tender that you are really trying to get what he means through his words... There are books full of theories...but you're really trying. You're fantastic ❤ Desolation Row is definitely one of his masterpieces!
Maybe one day i can write a book about it myself 😅
Nah, got to many ideas already. 😄
All jokes aside, amazing song! Definitely one i will be revisiting more, because there is much more to unpack.
Thanks for watching.
My all-time favorite song. I take the lyrics quite literally, but your interpretation makes a lot of sense. It is truly satisfying to watch someone willing to go deep into a song and analyze every word and bit of information. Greetings from Brazil
It probably can be taken literally too. Makes it even more genius. So good! Thanks for watching. Greetings from Belgium.
Thanks for digging into the meaning. You helped me understand this song a lot more than I used to
It's definitely a song that can be mind for lyrical gems over and over. Thanks so much for watching and the kind words.
@SaeedReacts. For sure. Another one you might like is Bob Dylans 115th Dream. Its more light hearted but has some cool lyrics to unpack. Fun song
Shakespeare himself appears in Stuck Inside of Mobile with the Memphis Blues Again.
BALLAD OF A THIN MAN, HIGHWAY 61 REVISITED, JUST LIKE TOM THUMB'S BLUES 😊SO THERE'S A FEW GREATS FROM HIS ALBUM ( HIGHWAY 61 REVISITED ) SAEED! 👍ENJOYYY!💯
Thanks for sharing these, Bob! Have a great day.
A Hard Rain's Gonna Fall will change your life.
"I need directions back to desolation row..." ROFL with this one ! it's incredible how seeing one's first time reaction, can make us relieve once again that sensation in some weird sort of way!
This song truly blew my mind. What an experience!
This is one of his best songs for me because of the breath and depth of his characters and images. Great first job of trying to make sense of it. I don't think anyone can understand it all. This is one reason why Dylan is the only songwriter to win the Nobel Prize in Literature, which was quite controversial. I relish your site and enjoy your company.
Its a brilliant song and i agree that it probably will never be fully understood. That is definitely part of the genius and mystique. Love. Thanks for watching.
The setting for this was to be a public hanging. They were big deals, financial boons, for the towns, with spectators coming from all around. Entire families, including children, came to witness the gruesome spectacle. The postcards were sold as souvenirs, and parents bought “penny whistles” for children. “You could hear them blow.” Excellent reaction.
I’m awaiting your “Murder Most Foul.” It’s Shakespeare. “How do you know when a Shakespeare play is over? Everyone is dead.”
@@kathleenmathias9134 The first verse is about the lynching of 3 black circus workers in Duluth somewhere around 1920. Dylan's father lived 3 blocks from where it happened.
Yes desolation row best song ever
Thanks for the thoughtful reaction Saeed. Most of this and much of Dylan's lyrics are over my head, but I still love the hell out of it. I'd love to hear you react to Mr Tambourine Man if you haven't yet.
Thanks so much for watching. Definitely lyrics i need to revisit over the years to grasp more of it.
I reacted to Mr. Tambourine. It was my very first Bob Dylan reaction.
You are embarking on an amazing journey. His body of work is vast and remarkable. I look forward to more reactions!
Its been wonderful so far! Very much looking forward to discover more! Thanks for watching!
I really like the recent videos of him playing this live.
Brilliant, an epic song from a superb album, one of my favourites. I love both the early pure folk & Dylan's electric folk style, both have his amazing lyrics, which are socially critical in a surrealist way. I used to be able to sing "Desolation Row" all the way through, I can still manage most with Bob's help. Keep checking him out. Thank you from an old hippy who stepped out of Desolation Row in the 60's.
Truly a brilliant song!
Looking forward to more of his music!
Thanks for watching.
Love seeing your reactions as you discover Dylan’s deep, brilliant and mind-blowing lyrics that can have so many meanings. I checked how this song was described in Dylan’s biography, “No Direction Home”, and kudos to you it parallels a lot of your thoughts on this song. The song’s theme is interpreted as “unless we renounce materialism, this will be our future… The scenery is a dreamed mental landscape. Dylan’s description combines the grotesque, the existential…Desolation Row is a grotesque Mardi Gras where heroes and villains of our mytho-history range side by side. As bizarre as his cast is they are real people…the faces have been rearranged and the names changed - shades of cubism… the only truth lies in desolation row.” He depicts cynicism: “What difference which side you’re on if you’re sailing on the Titanic?” He certainly is up there with the greatest poets. Appreciate hearing your interesting and insightful reactions. Thanks. (Sorry for the long comment.)
Thanks so much for sharing this. I definitely must read up on his life and work at some point. And i feel similar about the world sometimes or at least humanity, but then I see other sides that do inspire hope.
Thanks again for watching!
@@SaeedReacts. Despite all the inequities, materialism etc., I think we need to try and see the good, make sense of this world and fight for a better world.
One of the Great Works of His Bobness. In the running for magnum opus, as far as I'm concerned. You did a better job at understanding it than I ever have.
Incredible song! Thanks so much for watching and the kind words! Have a wonderful day.
Thanks for the great reactions to Dylan's songs. They have been part of my life for well over 50 years and I'm still finding new relevance in them. One not often mentioned is "The Chimes of Freedom". I don't think you'll be disappointed if you listen to it.
Brilliant song! Thanks for watching and the recommendation.
Only 5 minutes into this song again, last night I went deep into the lyrics reacting to another reactor,
the young man who is a drummer from N.Y. He identified heavily with Desolation Row, trying to
escape it himself. Like some of your other commenters, I became a Dylan fan around 1963, when
I heard "Blowing In the Wind" sung by Peter, Paul and Mary. "What movie did that song come from.?"
As yourself and many of his fans, we are listeners and also writers, musicians and just people,
trying to cope in the Universe, perplexed by what we see around us, figuring out if we can do
anything at all to improve it before we die. In fact, the wind here was blowing hard as i came
from the store, I thought of "Blowing In the Wind" and a guy stops and offers me a ride home,
which I usually refuse but I took up is offer, my three cats needed their food to have a peaceful
house. Maybe this was the answer, "We all have to give another person a lift, now and then."
Writing this, this is Dylan's whole life in a nutshell. "Blowing In the Wind" became an anthem
for Martin Luther King's Civil rights movement. He helped win that war. He tried to stop the
unjust and crazy Vietnam War along with the Leftist radicals his girlfriend, Joan Baez, was
in with. He didn't want a life of protest for any cause like her. What he wanted was a wife and
kids just like any other man. Then he met Sara Lowdes, for who he wrote the best of his love
songs. Most listeners of Dylan focus on his protest songs, like "Hurricane" which I won't
listen to. "Hurricane Carter" wasn't much of a person, a promising fighter who became
involved with the wrong crowd and was thrown in prison. Maybe he was innocent of that
crime, but after he was freed, he committed crimes he was guilty of. The media, who is
always searching for causes like Cervantes' hero, are attacking windmills.
Dylan hooked on drugs, nearly died in a motorcycle crash on his Triumph whose logo
is on his T-shirt. It took a long recovery, he moved out of N.Y. City and bought property in
upstate N.Y. near Woodstock. He became a recluse, almost. I don't know what Sara was
doing but he bought Big Pink, where he could work with his back-up musicians, The Band.
Dylan was sick of being used by the media and the radical Left. He wanted to go electric
and write personal songs. He saw what fortune and fame brought and hated his life. People
forget, at heart, Dylan was this troubadour but in the modern world. He is not of the city or
their castles and the evils of fortune and fame. He isn't among those attacking the castle
either because if they win, they will only rebuild the castle and moat like in Orwell's Animal
Farm, the former slaves will become the new slave owners. He was shocked into this
revelation because just by going electric to reach more people, he was receiving death
threats by the radical Left. Some people conjectured his accident was an attempt to kill
him. I don't know if he knows what caused the accident. One of his early friends, fellow
musician Richard Farina died in a motorcycle accident. His wife was Joan Baez sister.
When he wrote "Positively 4th Street" it was those people he was talking about. It
wasn't about the establishment but the 'street people'.
Desolation Row is about those street people, hanging out trapped in the most around
the big castle. (I am becoming my own metaphorist, here.)
Dylan found God when in recovery, he turned Christian and wrote his country albums,
Nashville Skyline and others. I forget which ones they were. He went on tours with a
traveling circus of his creation. It was this period, I stopped listening to him. My favorite
love songs of his was "Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands". No one but ancient forgotten
poets have ever written a ballad so beautiful. Four or five kids later, he cheats on her.
She gave him the life he dreamed of. In 'Sara' he admits it. There was no going back.
He blew it big time. Secretly, he married again but that didn't last. I know he never wrote
her the love songs which matched Sara's. If he did, no one knows them.
I've accepted the fact my hero, poet and writer is flawed. I hate what critics and most
fans say about him. He gives evasive answers with most interviewers. He is being real,
people. His fans and I guess his enemies try to analyze his songs, especially his
surrealistic ones. Look at his art work, it's abstract but with distorted images. This is
how he sees himself. He doesn't give answers because he doesn't know.
One responder said he'd write lyrics in 15 to 30 minutes. I can do that, Don't ask me
or him what motivated him to write it. Sometimes he'll know, sometimes he won't.
What most of his fans do not understand is when you sing a song, that song is no
longer yours. It is like love, you gave it to someone and they can do with it what they
may. You hope they'll keep it and treasure it but they also can put it in the trash bin
of their memories. On Haight Street in the Summer of 1967 in S.F. I met the girlfriend
of one of Dylan's buddies, Bobby Neurwith. Her one room was covered in posters
which read "No One Sings Dylan Like Dylan". The Monterey Pop was going to be in
a few days and Dylan's manager Grossman with help from Neurwith was putting it
on. They also handled the filming. John Phillips of the Mama and Papas got all the
bands together. Watch the people Dylan chooses to perform with. Groups like "The
Byrds" made much of their careers doing his folk songs into pop. If he likes how
you did, it he'll preform with you. If you really catch his attention, he'll do a duet
doing someone else's songs he wished he could have written.
Bob Dylan is really well read. People say he can recall pages of literature for
years, to begin to understand the images in Desolation Row, read what books, plays,
movies and songs he has. No one can. Please don't try to analyze what he's
thinking. He gave this word painting to you and what you and your imagination
does with it is yours and yours alone. Enjoy it as long as it gives you pleasure and
satisfaction. From an almost 'hippy' Peace and Love.
(If you want to find out about Dylan look to those he called 'brothers', George
Harrison, Tom Petty, Roy Orbison, Arlo Guthrie and his father, and Jerry Garcia
to whom he wrote a moving short eulogy for.) All these people are fellow troubadours.
He is just one, no more, no less. Listen to his song, "All I Really Want to Do". Sonny
and Cher did it. The problem is no one believes it. That is their problem and trap.
Don't fall into the quicksand. Rabbit holes you can climb out of.
Just sayin'.
In closing. good job for a Dylan beginner.
Remember, Dylan dropped out of college. The Media wants you to recall
"The Times They Are a Changin'" but after he wrote that one, he wrote "My
Back Pages" which he''ll sing with a whole stage of fellow musicians,
people who know him personally and been through what he has.
"Good and bad, I defined these terms, no doubt, quite clear somehow,
but I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now."
People asked him about "The Times, They Are a Changin': and said do you
believe it?" Dylan said "No, not personally, I just wrote what I saw going on all
around me."
He always was and will remain forever being a very complex
thinker, except when he writes his love songs, which most people forget.
His early songs had a lot of love and humor. I've never seen some one
comment about "If Not For You", big hit by Olivia Newton John, "Lay,
Lady, Lay," or songs for his kids "Forever Young".
Our Media focuses on the negative 90% of the time. Why?
It sells, good news doesn't. I was a journalism major until I discovered
the editors won't allow you to print or say the complete truth.
No one knows the complete truth but at least we can try.
Most people don't try for whatever reasons or excuses.
Like my Dad always said, "People don't think"
Like Dylan's hero, Woody Guthrie, my Dad was from Oklahoma.
Sometimes we must forget the past, the Desolation Rows and
chart newer, better territories. When we get on our feet, maybe we can
rescue a few survivors from the ship called N.Y. City and other places.
Interesting read!
The song is no longer yours, i like that. That's the concept Death of the Author. Thanks for taking the time to share this.
@@SaeedReacts. The pleasure is all mine. Do you realize how difficult it is to
find serious Dylan fans. I had one friend, and a cowboy poet and millionaire
who liked the early Dylan but he died. After my older brother died, we became
as brothers. I had no one of my intelligence to talk to.
I never met a Dylan fan who wasn't very intelligent. Most are also artistic.
YOU COULDN'T IMAGINE WRITINGGGG LIKE THIS AT AGE 21-23 COULD YOU SAEED😮, COMPLETE INSANITY, AT IT'S FINEST!!! 💯😊
I definitely could not 😃
Amazing! Thanks for watching.
You must watch the documentary on Dylan, "NO DIRECTION HOME". Deep dive into Dylan. Also you asked about Handwritten lyrics, I believe his handwritten lyrics, "Like a Rolling Stone" sold for over $1,000,000
Directed by Martin Scorcese
Wow! Thats a ton of dough!
Definitely will watch that documentary at some point!
Also recommend Scorcese’s “No Direction Home”, which only covers his first few years of songwriting and also shows what was going on in his life and American music and culture at the time.
Thanks for letting me know about that one! Will look it up.
thanks for sharing Saeed. I stumbled on your video and didn't know this Dylan song or you. you incites on meanings is sharp. I'll wait to what else you got!
Thanks so much for watching and the kind words. Have a wonderful day.
Brilliant, brilliant song. I first heard it high and I howled with laughter and totally adored it. His singing is the best ever, the guitar backup (not him) is brilliant. As far as looking for the 'meaning', I find that ridiculously juvenile. It's full of wonderful foolishness...that rhymes! Period. But the melody, the accompaniment, the beautiful singing, that is what makes the song, along with the hilarious, absurdist lyrics.
I strongly recommend reacting to "Bob Dylan's 115th Dream" in which he's "retelling" the story of the discovery of the new world/America. It's showing a somehow lighter side of Dylan.
"Desolation Row" is quite an enigma to me - possibly there are more people with such an impression. However, even as such it's still an inspiration and a bit of a challenge each time I'm listening to it.
It definitely is a challenge this one, but i bet i can learn from it each time i listen to it.
I really like the version he did on the live Unplugged album.
Thank you
Thanks for watching.
So glad you are exploring Dylan. I would attempt to guide you through his catalog, but it would be futile. Just keep digging you can't go wrong. One of my favorites is "Tangled Up in Blue", a song he has changed and added to many times on the fly (including a Christian version) performing it live.
Thanks so much for watching and definitely will keep exploring
Dylan is a wordsmith of the highest caliber. He has books with everything he ever wrote, published, look them up. He is Americas finest son. He has a Nobel prize for his works! Not bad for a jewish boy from Minnesota who skipped college because they had nothing to teach him. Sheltered from the Storm, Tangled up in Blues. Ballad of a thin man, and Masters of War!, i can go on and on all day. Be prepared though, his catalog is enormous and still relevant.
Excellent reaction and analysis ... but, most of all thank you for your barring of your emotions while experiencing Dylan's masterpiece of 'Desolation Row'. Saeed, keep doing what you're doing in discovering his art. As a 73 year old, it warms my heart to see the multitude of emotions that wash over you on each new song that hits your "soft spots". One of my favorites is 'It's All Over Now, Baby Blue'. Yes ... your reactions to Dylan and Aurora keep you as my fav reactor. More, please.
Thank you so much for the kind words. It is such an amazing journey discovering these incredible artists. And this is a true masterpiece that i will be revisiting often. There is a lot of insight to be gained from this song. Excited to continue this journey.
Thank you for your interpretation thought it excellent 👍
Thanks so much!
This song is based on a real hanging. In 1920 that took place in Minnesota. Bobs birthplace, the men were later to be found innocent and then a statue was put up to claim there innocence. This picture is from 'keys to the rain Definative Bob Dylan encyclopedia '
Only that LINE is about the hanging. The rest of the song isn't. The song isn't "about" or "based on" anything. It's surrealist poetry with a central image the other images revolve around.
@@redadamearth The first verse of the 1965 song "Desolation Row" by Bob Dylan, who was born in Duluth, references the lynchings in Duluth:
They're selling postcards of the hanging
They're painting the passports brown
The beauty parlor is filled with sailors
The circus is in town.[18]
Dylan was born in Duluth, and grew up in Hibbing, 60 miles (97 km) northwest of Duluth. His father, Abram Zimmerman, was 9 years old in June 1920 and lived two blocks from the site of the lynchings.
The three black men lynched worked for a visiting circus.
Al Kooper, who played electric guitar on the first recordings of "Desolation Row", suggested that it was located on a stretch of Eighth Avenue, Manhattan, "an area infested with whore houses, sleazy bars and porno supermarkets totally beyond renovation or redemption" 😮
Very interesting and intelligent interpretation. You make a lot of sense and you understand the unparalleled writer you are listening to. Thanks.
Thanks so much! This is definitely writing on another level. Will be revisiting this often.
Seed, my friend you look like you found the holy grail....lol. He will only help your creative writing juices and you know what ??? You have this treasure to enjoy for the rest of your life...awesome isn;t it?
That is awesome. It is like a creative well you can lower your bucket down into anytime you want. Amazing!
@@SaeedReacts. spoken like a true poet. never looked at that way....lol.
Alan Moore also referenced Dylan’s “All Along The Watchtower.”
This is one of Bob's song that's impossible to deconstruct. Al Kooper,
who played on these sessions, probably got as close as anyone when
he said, "I think he had 8th Avenue in mind." ( ramshackled district full
of prostitutes, drug dealers, porn movie houses and general decay
I would love to see Bob Dylan's reaction video to this.
That would be exciting and scary at the same time :)
The thoughts I had while listening to the verse about Einstein. When Hitler rose to power, Einstein was forced to emigrate from Germany (maybe that is why his memories were packed in his trunk). His contribution to the understanding of the Universe and the atomic age led to the development of atomic weapons. He wanted to be a force for good (a Robin Hood) but ultimately it was just a disguise. His biographers write about his disappointment in later years on how his discoveries were used. Maybe the Electric Violin represents nuclear weapons. His reciting of the alphabet could be his most famous equation E=MC squared. The beauty of Dylan's art is that it can be interpreted in so many ways...
Thanks so much for sharing your interpretation. Definitely something i will be thinking about.
Gotta do a hard rains a gonna fall next. You will be in tears listening to that one bud.
Thanks for the recommendation! Will add it to my list.
Yes, I find that a very moving song.
@@allanelliot9234 I've heard it hundreds of times and it still moves me.
You did great!
Thanks! Appreciate that!
First off, I love the deep analysis you do. I've been trying to unpack this song for years, and you definitely have an interesting take on it. There's a guy on You Tube that loves Bob Dylan called Calico Silver (shout out). His take on the Dr. Filth verse is that it's a reference to the holocaust and the cruel experiments that were performed on the Jewish prisoners. If this song is kind of a bleak vision of humanity, than that makes sense, since the holocaust is sort of the end point for the world going to Hell and the potential for man's cruelty to one another when we lose our sense of community and enter a state of ultra-tribesmanship (is that a word?). Anyways, love your channel. Keep it up! On a side note, I want to pose a question to all: Are there any songwriters anywhere near the level of Bob Dylan, anymore? If not, why not?
Thanks for taking the time to share this! Much appreciated.
Didnt know Calico Silver, might check him out. At least the songs i have done already.
In terms of songwriters today, there probably are people who are near this level, it might be harder to find them in this immense market. Maybe its harder to make it big as a lyricist these days.
Coming from a mostly hiphop background i can confidently say that there are some rappers who have incredible skill when it comes to putting together words and seem to be master of the English language.
Other genres im not that familiar with, but i am on a journey of discovery. I have come across amazing songwriters, but maybe not this level.
Hi I love your Bob Dylan reactions!!! I know I mentioned before that you should react to Bob Dylan's song 'Murder Most Foul' from 2020. I can't wait to see you react to it as it is his 1st ever No.1 single and was his first original song to be released after becoming the 1st songwriter to win the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2016. He was also 79 when this song was released. It is incredible!!!
Better do a lot of research on the kennedy assassination and american cultural figures before you tackle it
Thanks so much! That one is definitely on my to do list!
Jip. Talking about the blind commissioner. Yes, one hand is tied and the other actually counting money in the pocket😂.
Craftsmanship at it's best. And Saeed your mind is a treasure and tx for your insights.
Nobody could escape also let me think of the sect where the people drank poison to not escape their parameters but escape society.
My mind is also blown by this and working overtime.
In my mind's eye I see TS. Elliott writing poetry whilst fighting in his mind.
I don't get the fisherman with the flowers (maybe they had a huge day in catching, not fighting but winning while working in unison?)
Which side are you on.....fighting through life or go without scrambling and enjoy life.
Man, tons of ideas running through my head.
Greetings from South Africa
Amazing song! Thanks so much for sharing your interpretations. This is one we could talk about forever 😄
Greetings from Belgium.
Dylan don't care about the listener. He's a prophet
Great reaction. There is so much Dylan music to enjoy. In some ways it would be good to sample it in chronological order, but that is a long trip.
Penny whistles, mentioned in Desolation Row, are a featured sound in the song Highway 61 Revisited, another great one from this album.
Jokerman from the album Infidels (1983) is another banger.
Chronological would be ideal. Would have to start a Bob Dylan only channel. Might not be a bad idea 😄
Very good breakdown, excellent reaction Saeed.
Thanks so much!
Great review.
Something only Dylan could write.
Thanks! He definitely could! Incredible song.
We are here with you. ❤
Thanks for being here!
Bob is awesome. I would love for you to hear a classic from the son of a traditional american folk writer and singer named Woody Guthrie. Bob went to New York to meet Woody, just before he died. Long story, sorry, Arlo Guthrie is Woody's son and wrote a classic anti-war song called Alice's Restaurant. There are many versions, but I think you might enjoy this hilarious singer-songwriter. The live version in the mid-80s, a concert called Farm Aide, is pretty good.
Your remark about the long length of some of Dylan's songs and his composition process reminds me of the time Dylan's recording company asked him if he could record a shorter version of the song; Dylan responded: "This is the short version".🤣
Haha, that's awesome!
That’s good, thanks very much.
Thanks for watching.
One of the best reactions I've seen
Thank you so much!
I dont know how long it took Dylan to write this song but he said it took him 10 minutes to write his classic Blowing in the Wind
Incredible! Guess he was in the zone and the words flowed through him.
Methinks that Desolution Row is just a Dylanesque ( almost Shakespearian ) reference to the society of losers, both professional and amateur.
Oh.....and its also a song title. lol
Great reaction, again, Saeed. The Matrix analogy felt spot on. I’ve always experienced this as Dylan’s surreal description of the counter-culture he experienced in Greenwich Village. The place where artists and drop-outs went to live outside of conventional society. “Straight” people could only peek, enviously, into this alternative lifestyle, filled as it was with oddballs and characters whom Dylan describes while masking their identities in metaphor. The last line is the key. If you want to contact Bob, you’ve got to abandon convention and get yourself down to Desolation Row.
I think it is the opposite although you get the ending right. All the figures drawn from history., literature, the Bible are iconic representations of western civilization. By "'rearranging their faces and giving them all another name", he is using them to illustrate the depravity and chaos in mid 60's America.Desolation Row should be seen in the context of the savage assault on America in many of the albums other songs. It is the closing piece of withdrawal into some form of sanctuary. I agree it is the land of the outsiders.
@@kenkaplan3654 How nice to meet someone on here who has the definitive answers to Dylan’s lyrics, something he always cautioned against. Fortunately, as with any art, there is no “right” interpretation, which is why individual reactions are just that, no more, including yours. 😎
Thanks so much for watching and sharing your thoughts. Much appreciated! What an incredible song. I feel like i need to study it 😅
@@davidbowman6740 Dylan's "cautions" especially about his early music when he was at a zenith that "they didn't mean anything" was BS. He was desperate to escape the incessant demand that he explain his music in left brain dialogue. He hated that. He got caught by mistake in the famous Time magazine interview in "Don't Look Back" (you might watch it) and he mentions "truth". the Time person asks" what is the truth, and Dylan becomes tongue tied falling all over himself trying trying to give a definition or examples. He wanted to avoid that nonsense at all costs.
I don't pretend to know the meaning in many ways of a great deal of his songs. I have no idea who "Like a Rolling Stone" might be directed to, although the universal theme of a bad fall from social grace is quite clear. (which happened to me exactly-losing middle class status for a while and being homeless I don't really know if "Visions of Johanna" is literally about Joan Baez or just her deep aspirational life or if "Johanna" is at all a reference to her ( she thought so) but it is quite clear the song is about the failure to find the transcendence the singer desperately seeks, lost and trapped in the bleakness of the urban, electronic modern world. Gone is the more youthful hope
"Yes, to dance beneath the diamond sky with one hand waving free
Silhouetted by the sea, circled by the circus sands
With all memory and fate driven deep beneath the waves
Let me forget about today until tomorrow
"Journey Through Dark Heat" absolutely is about his immediate post divorce but don't know if "Tangled Up in Blue" is about one woman or a surreal montage of women in his life."It took me 10 years to live" he said.Hmmm 1964-1974
Dylan said much later in life that the majority of his material came from his relationship to America and Highway 61 Revisited (album) and Desolation Row are exactly that, in spades.
The person to whom I replied might have mixed up their comment. In the song "Desolation Row" is a sanctuary from the depravity and chaos the singer sees in society and certainly could have been inspired by the counter culture or even aspects of village life. The commenter is right on about those unable to get into, because of their own limitations or oppression, this sanctuary but the characters and symbols in the song are quite clearly NOT "In* Desolation Row but are aspects of a society gone wrong the singer sees from that sanctuary.
But the assertion "“Straight” people could only peek, enviously, into this alternative lifestyle, filled as it was with oddballs and characters **whom Dylan describes** while masking their identities in metaphor" is impossible. If Desolation Row is 'The place where artists and drop-outs went to live outside of conventional society. (and be a place where unless you dig it, Dylan is not interested) then the "Insurance men"," Dr. Filth", Ophelia, those on the Titanic fighting over "which side are you on" (a mantra of the folk protest movement), the punishment of Casanova, and especially the opening verse which sets the tone of a real life depravity, the hanging of 3 black circus workers in Duluth witnessed by Dylan's father from which post cards were made and distributed have nothing to do with those fortunate few **inside** of Desolation Row. The song is much vaster than dealing with personalities in Dylan's life in the village, unlike a song like "Positively 4th street", which very well may be.
That's all I was responding to. Most astute critics see the same thing, although I agree with you any work of any artist is important to the viewer on their own terms. As one critic put it
"Desolation Row is probably Dylan’s most misunderstood song, which is predictable given the lack of a clear narrative and the wild, surrealistic imagery. I think the source of most of the confusion centers around the assumptions made about Desolation Row. When something is called “desolate” the natural inclination is to think it must be bad and unattractive. I doubt there’s a street called Desolation Row in all of America. Who would want to live there? In this song, however, in keeping with the outsider theme of the album, Desolation Row is on the right side of the tracks. Desolation Row is the place for all right-minded persons, the place for people who have rejected the easy god-fearing morals and Hollywood ideals of glamour and success. Once the listener understands this idea, then the rest of the song falls into place.
Desolation Row is the home of the outsider, a place the narrator and his associates are comfortable in. In fact, he doesn’t even want to communicate with anyone unless they are in Desolation Row:
Don’t send me no more letters no
Not unless you mail them
From Desolation Row
The authorities are afraid of this place. Casanova is punished for going there. The Row is a target of the “riot squad” ( i.e. the police or National Guard). The authorities are actively preventing people from “escaping to Desolation Row”. It’s a dangerous place, to them anyway." Etc
I hope this clears things up
@@kenkaplan3654 The thing about the best art is that it’s often created when the artist’s subconscious is freewheelin’, so that even the artist can be mystified at times. Saeed touched on that in both his Dylan reactions and that’s the reason there are as many valid interpretations as there are listeners. Some interpretations add something to your own experience and others don’t, it’s such a personal thing. Saeed has a great journey ahead of him and I’ll be listening all the way😎
get a hold of "Visions of Johanna" & "Highlander" next, once down the dylan rabbit hole you'll 50+ years getting out; like me except its 60+ in my case, you'll love every minute too!
I reacted to Visions of Johanna before this one. Will add Highlander to my list. Thanks!
If you want some other gems that are challenges to decipher, try out Changing of the Guards, Jokerman, and/or Senor...Fewer people will recommend these, but given how much you're getting outta this and some other deep Dylan tunes, I'm sure you're gonna like 'em...No rush - I'll enjoy any Dylan you care to check out!
Just here to second Senor. A chillingly brilliant song.
Thanks for sharing these. Dont think i had seen them before.
Also the Simple Twist of Fate.
This song was partly influenced by T. S. Eliot, whom Alan Ginsburg had recently introduced him to. Eliot's 'The Waste Land' and desolation Row have similarities, but Eliot was into classical learning and Dylan decided to write something more demotic - of the ordinary people. All his references are popular cultural figures, as opposed to Eliot's Greek characters. The mermaids and the windows of the sea probably come from Eliot's 'The Love Song of Alfred J. Prufrock'. But there are more personal references, too, taken from his own life in Greenwich Village. He really is a complex, multi-layered poet, able to take the personal and expand it into a universal context that relates to us all. By the way, there really were postcards of a hanging (lynching) that took place in Duluth in the 1920s.
While the lyrics to this song are incredible (if well beyond my capacity to understand)... it's that harmonica at the end that REALLY makes my big toe jump up in my boot.
Now we have a problem. The next album is a double. Maybe Visions Of Johanna, maybe the epic Sad-eyed Lady Of The Lowlands. Maybe the tiny I Want You.
You're on the train now my friend. edit: Just seen you have done Visions. I'll see you over there.
Great analysis. I believe the verses regarding Cinderella is a metaphor for the womens libration movement at the time. There were many civil rights movements in the 60s. The Monk is jealous of Einstein for reaching more people than religion. Doctor filth is Freud who Dylan hates. I know tidbits but mainly I write my own thesis about Dylan's songs just like everyone else. The older I get I see some of his songs differently. Dylan is an obsessive reader and has books like Moby Dick completely memorized because he reads them countless times. Dylan is the best.
Thanks so much for adding your thoughts. I will definitely listen to his songs more often. There is much to be learned.
Seems i got the reading part in common with him :)
You seem to have the natural sensibilities for interpreting and appreciating Dylan.
Thanks! Appreciate that!
One of my many favourites another is a series of dreams.
My hat's off to you, brother! You're taking on a challenge, there. Not just with Dylan, but the whole ball of wax. There was a reaction guy, called Dicon Dissectional reactions, who did deep dives into songs and lyrics, and gave up after a while. It seemed that the short attention span of listeners these days was getting to him. They wanted people to react to the music with a few comments after the song, and that's about it. I hope you fare better! You're good at it, which is saying a lot. Lyrics can have so many perspectives.
Someone told me about his reactions and that they were good. Sorry to hear he is not doing them anymore. I definitely want to continue, but these songs are dense and i get it takes a lot of the brain sometimes. Especially if you want to dive in deep. I recorded a reaction to Hurricane which was a bit more straightforward storytelling and was a bit easier to digest lyrically. Hope to get that one uploaded soon.
Thanks for watching!
You asked how long it took Dylan to write Desolation Row. According to the Leonard Cohen biographer Sylvie Simmons, Cohen asked Dylan how long it took him to write 'I and I' and Dylan answered '15 minutes in the back of a cab'. Dylan then asked Cohen how long it took him to write 'Hallelujah', Cohen replied 'a couple of years' because he was embarrassed to admit it really took him five years!
Thanks for letting me know. Sometimes the words just flow and all we need to do is write them down. Sometimes you have to crack your brain to get a few out.
You got it Bro ! Something more uplifting but equally dense try ‘ Gates of Eden ‘ more recently is his epic on the Titanic called ‘ Tempest’ off the Tempest Album is epic … or even his track ‘ Mississippi ‘ or way back ‘ Chimes of Freedom ‘ is a classic in the calibre of Mr Tamborine Man you covered already . Cheers
Thanks for sharing these recommendations. Definitely want to check out some of these!
Nashville multi-instrumentalist and harmonica virtuoso Charlie McCoy providing the Spanish guitar fills with someone else's guitar. Brilliant!
So many people quote lines from Dylan songs. And I once heard of someone having a party where everyone was supposed to come dressed as a figure from a Bob Dylan song. I think they all could have used this song, heh!
top tier Dylan here! dbl ♥
As in Fine Art, Abstract Expressionism in words, like James Joyce. Art for the sake of evocation to the individual viewer or listener. "That's all" as Sister Rosetta Tharpe once sang.
Glad you cleared that up.🤔👍✌
Still a lot to clear, but i gave it a go :)
You should do Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands, probably the most beautiful love song ever written. Desolation Row is great art, so is Visions of Johanna, so is A Hard Rain is Gonna Fall, so is Tangled Up In Blue and many, many other ones, but if there is one song that got him the Nobel Prize for Literature, it is Sad-Eyed Lady of the Lowlands.
Btw, it is rumored that Ophelia in the song (Desolation Row) is not Hamlet's fiancé, but Joan Baez, whom Dylan has always (probably rightly) considered to be much more passionate than talented (her profession is her religion, her sin is her lifelessness).
Thanks for sharing some info and recommendations!
The first verse is a real event. It concerns a lynching of three black men, who were working for the circus which visited Duluth, in 1920.
The men were falsely accused of raping a young girl. The three men were arrested and placed in the local police cells. A mob entered the police station, with little or no resistance from the police. The men were beaten and then hung from a street lamp. The mob was photographed standing around the lamppost, laughing and smiling.
The alleged rape victim finally admitted that the accusation was a lie; and it was meant as a joke. The men who carried out the hangcharged with murder, but were all found not guilty.
The photographs of the dead men hanging, was later turned into postcard and sold as a souvenir in Duluth; Bob’s parents were living in Duluth at the time.
You need to do Bob Dylan and the grateful Dead slow train coming from foxboro Sullivan stadium I was there live my all-time favorite song by him but it's got to be with the grateful Dead one of the all-time best concerts I ever saw
Grateful Dead is another band I want to check out for sure!