1. Like A Rolling Stone
2. Tombstone Blues
3. It Takes A Lot To Laugh, It Takes A Train To Cry
4. From A Buick 6
5. Ballad Of A Thin Man
6. Queen Jane Approximately
7. Highway 61 Revisited
8. Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues
9. Desolation Row
Perhaps rock music's first masterpiece? Quite possibly. I suppose it'd be more fun if I defied expectations and trashed albums like this in the name of slaughtering the sacred cows of rock, but this is a cow I'm quite happy to continue feeding grass until it belches the ozone away for all I care. This is by far the most literate album of the decade, namedropping all sorts of historical figures and authors into the most bizarre situations. But what makes this album truly amazing is how, for the first time on a Dylan album, the music becomes just as important as the lyrics. He's got a great band here, who take the blues-rock songs from Dylan's last album and expand on them. And I do mean expand, there's got to be at least 3 keyboard tracks on most of these songs.
Quite a lot of words have been written about 'Like A Rolling Stone'. It's a testament to the spirit of the '60s that this 6 minute vicious diatribe of a song hit #2 on the charts, by far the longest single released at the time. It's a vehicle for Dylan's acidic bitterness, and I like to imagine it came as quite a shock to all those well dressed teenagers listening to their Dave Clark 5 and Herman's Hermits. How's the real world taste?
'Tombstone Blues' is another frantic blues-rock tune with magnificent playing from the band, especially guitarist Mike Bloomfield. His raw soloing only highlights the bizarre lyrics, with such winners like 'The sun's not yellow, it's CHICKEN!' If that isn't lyrical skill, I don't know what is.
For me, none of the lyrics can match the sheer fury and scorn of 'Ballad of a Thin Man'. This song is nothing short of intense. From the dramatic crashing piano chords at the beginning to the swirling organ part that seems to match the lyrics for emotional weight, this song is relentless. The Mr. Jones referred to throughout the song may or may not be a real person, but here he takes the place of every conventional square that's ever existed, and he's sent through a nightmare cavalcade of freaks and oddities while being absolutely skewered by Dylan. A lot of people don't really like Bob Dylan due to his voice, but it's a testament to his singing that he makes lines like "You're a cow, give me some milk or else go home!" sound positively menacing.
'Highway 61 Revisited' is a nice jolly tune that relates the story of Abraham and Isaac (Charming fellow, that God chap) and then just gets weirder and weirder. "I got forty red white and blue shoe strings, and a thousand telephones that don't ring" is a problem that I hope never to experience. He even manages to sneak in social commentary in between all the Dadaism.
'Desolation Row' is notable for being what might be the first rock song to exceed 10 minutes, during which we're taken through a circus of historical figures and god knows what else. It's not every song that has Cinderella, T.S. Elliot and Ezra Pound sharing a stage, after all. The bizarre onslaught of imagery makes me feel like I'm reading Naked Lunch or something.
Listening to the masterful lyrics and the spirited musicianship on this album nowadays makes me wonder how all those folk purists back in '65 could've possibly hated this album. Those poor, deluded fools. 10/10
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