On January 12th 1981, it was reported that the White House had expanded its record library. The library added albums by Bob Dylan, Kiss, and the Sex Pistols. I think I would bet money that the incoming president a.k.a. the orange moron will not be listening to any of those. Although “Liar” from the Sex Pistols ‘Never Mind The Bollocks’ album would be appropriate! Trump’s a “YMCA” fan, right?
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On 3rd January 1976, Bob Dylan’s song, “Hurricane”, peaked at Number 33 on the Billboard singles chart. This helped to cause enough publicity to eventually get former boxer Reuben ‘Hurricane’ Carter released from jail. The song promoted Carter’s innocence and remains possibly one of Dylan’s angriest songs. A movie about Carter’s life, starring Denzel Washington, was released in 2000.
It is time for Under The Covers With Mayhem Chapter 7. This is a cover of the Bob Dylan classic “Blowin’ In The Wind”, by Neil Young. In many ways, it stays similar to the original but has a seriously dark undercurrent and some pretty heavy guitar lines. Young’s Crazy Horse hit the heights on this version which can be found on the magnificent live album, ‘Weld’ from 1991.
I have said before that my ideal cover version has a different slant from the original rather than just a facsimile-style cover. So the generic boy bands are probably never likely to feature, but you never know, right? Feel free to recommend any songs you think should be included in Under The Covers With Mayhem. I want to stay clear of the mainstream ideally, but off-the-wall covers by major artists might work too 🙂 Oh, and there will, of course, be an Under The Covers With Mayhem Playlist soon!
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On April 24th 1961 Bob Dylan made his first officially released recording, he earned $50 for playing harmonica on the title track of Harry Belafonte’s LP, ‘The Midnight Special’. Bob made his debut recording five months previously on a record by folk singer Carolyn Hester, but this wasn’t released until after the Harry Belafonte album.
In 1968, also on 24th April, the Beatles’ new Apple record label turned down an opportunity to sign David Bowie, who had just left Deram Records. Bowie’s manager at the time, Kenneth Pitt submitted a demo tape, only to receive a letter from the company’s A&R chief, Peter Asher, stating that “Apple Records is not interested in signing David Bowie. The reason is that we don’t feel he’s what we’re looking for at the moment.” I wonder how Bowie’s career might have gone had he signed to Apple?
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It took a while but this is the second post in what is a very, very occasional series. The first was back in August 2022 and featured three songs. A metal cover of Harry Styles’ “As It Was” by OHP. Deer Scout’s version of Kate Bush’s “Suspended In Gaffa” and a cover of Radiohead’s “Let Down” by Mini Trees This time around it is a cover of Bob Dylan’s “All Along The Watchtower” by iconic and eccentric British band XTC. I adore the Jimi Hendrix version of “All Along The Watchtower”, but that was probably an obvious choice so I have gone for a more leftfield take on the song from XTC. This is bordering on weird and Devoesque and as a result, is rather splendid. What are your thoughts on this version?
My ideal cover version has a different slant from the original rather than just a facsimile-style cover. So the generic boy bands are probably never likely to feature, but you never know, right? Feel free to recommend any songs that you think should be included in Under The Covers With Mayhem. I want to stay clear of the mainstream ideally, but off-the-wall covers by major artists might work too 🙂
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On the last Mayhem Top 20 post, I mentioned that I was changing how it would be published. Instead of waiting for Obscurify to tot up listens on a seemingly random date, I will now take a snapshot at the end of each month. So the Top 20 for February is the first of those. Many of you know that I am a keen user of a site called Obscurify. It claims to tell you how obscure your listening on Spotify is. Compared to the rest of the UK I achieved a level of 100% more obscure than other users in the UK. 100%, is that even possible? Either way, I am proud of it! Anyway, regular readers will know that it also lists my most obscure artists, (the top two of which have been there since I began doing these posts) which currently are;
Woke Up Dead (One of the two bands that have been ever-present in my obscure list and an excellent band to boot!)
Promethium (This metal bunch continue to fly the flag for great British rock and like Woke Up Dead have been ever-present in this obscure team)
Black Acacias -(I have no idea how I found this lot. Their album came out in 2008 and they have 4 monthly listeners on Spotify. There seems to be no information about them online, apart from the music on Spotify. If you were in Black Acacias or know anything about them please contact me. They appear at number 13 in this week’s chart)
Folk The System – (folky protest and frankly great songs, this lot make their second appearance in the obscure list. They appear at number 27 in the extended chart)
As for the February Top 20, only Dame David and Kate Bush remain from the last chart. Other classic artists include Suede, Arctic Monkeys, Glen Campbell, Alison Moyet, Culture Club, Bob Dylan Dionne Warwick, and Frank Turner. Bruno Skibbild makes his second appearance and there will be another post about him very soon. Nine Inch Nails crash in at number one, I have just read a great book about their album ‘The Downward Spiral’, lookout for a review of that on these pages sometime soon. The rest of the top five is The Skinner Brothers, Hawksley Workman, Heartsink, and the aforementioned Kate Bush. Four of the artists who feature in the February Top 20 are current contenders for my album of the year for 2022, can you guess who they are? Who knew that there was a band called Diamond Dogs? I didn’t until now. Gonora Sounds from Africa produce some of the most uplifting music that I have heard in a long while! Here is that all-important top 20. I would love to hear your thoughts on it.
1 Nine Inch Nails 2 The Skinner Brothers 3 Hawksley Workman 4 Heartsink 5 Kate Bush 6 David Bowie 7 Glen Campbell 8 Paul Draper 9 Bob Dylan 10 Alison Moyet 11 Gonora Sounds 12 Culture Club 13 Black Acacias 14 Dionne Warwick 15 L.A.B. 16 Diamond Dogs 17 Suede 18 Arctic Monkeys 19 Frank Turner 20 Hurray For The Riff Raff
“Today and tomorrow and yesterday, too The flowers are dying like all things do”
Thus begins Bob Dylan’s 39th studio album. His first of new material since 2012.
Bob is in a biblical mood on ‘Rough And Rowdy Ways’. He comes across like some kind of preacher. Each song an atmospheric sermon delivered over a melancholically minimalist sonic architecture. That minimalism is the main theme here, sonically. Many tunes eschew percussion completely, leaving a kind of softly strummed, string-drenched soundscape. Structurally, ‘Rough And Rowdy Ways’, seems to straddle two genres in the main: Blues and a kind of spiritual gospel, which fits perfectly the preacher/sermon comparisons.
Lyrically, this is a radically different album for Dylan. Where his past works wove an entirely original literary landscape (or universe) of fictional characters with roots in American folklore, ‘Rough And Rowdy Ways’ features real people and their literary creations. Gone are the Jokers, thieves and Sad Eyed Ladies Of The Lowlands. In their place you’ll find Anne Frank, Indiana Jones, JFK and all manner of other significant personalities from the last 60 years of Western culture. “I Contain Multitudes” is named for a line in Walt Whitman poem, for example.
Dylan of old was awash with metaphors and similes. Abstract imagery and far out concepts which Dylan absorbed from the worlds of art, music and literature. When he talked about “Ezra Pound & T.S. Eliot fighting in the captain’s tower” in “Desolation Row”, this was obviously used as a metaphor for the differences between their styles and for a young Bob Dylan to signal his literary love and knowledge. When he sings, on “Mother Of Muses”: “Sing of Sherman, Montgomery, and Scott/And of Zhukov, and Patton, and the battles they fought/who cleared the path for Presley to sing/who carved the path for Martin Luther King,” he really means, literally, to thank these generals and that Elvis and MLK couldn’t have done what they did without them. There’s no artifice or alternative interpretation. On ‘Rough And Rowdy Ways’, Bob says exactly what he means and means exactly what he says.
I don’t know if anyone would agree with this interpretation, but I get a feeling of encroaching mortality and tying up of loose ends from ‘Rough And Rowdy Ways’. It’s fair to say that Dylan is no spring chicken, and he’s not getting any younger, so I think it would be more surprising if he didn’t think about his own mortality. I already wrote, in my review of “Murder Most Foul”, that I thought Dylan was singing about things which had been occupying his thoughts for some time. I imagine when JFK was assassinated, Dylan thought to himself: ”I should write about that.” “Murder Most Foul” was, in my interpretation of the Dylan mythology, the old man finally achieving the ambitions of the young man.
This review has taken me longer than it should have because I have a had a hard time getting my thoughts in order about it, but in a display of serendipity, ‘Rough And Rowdy Ways’ made the news today, Friday 26th June, one week on from release. Today the BBC reported that Dylan has broken/set the record for oldest artist to have a number one album in the UK. This only a couple of short months on from Murder Most Foul becoming his first Billboard chart number one. We might all be having a rough year, but Bob Dylan seems to be having a great year. Career-wise. And where serendipity comes into this: if I had being able to write this review quicker, I would have missed this incredibly exciting news. <and if I had published it quicker you, dear reader, would have been reading this excellent piece from Tom in June! – Bill -Editor>
Written by Tom Ray.
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Despite late-night speculation over on my Blog a couple of nights ago, Dylan today released a new single, not an album. He did, however, confirm via a Tweet that his new album, Rough and Rowdy Ways, will be released on 19th June.
“False Prophet” follows Dylan’s current trend for sparse, minimal arrangements but the sound palette is very different. Consisting of a snarling, overdriven guitar and more rock-style drumming, “False Prophet” has a sleazy, blues-rock vibe, calling to mind smoke-filled pool halls and bourbon on the rocks.
Lyrically, Dylan seems to be denying that he is the titular false prophet while framing himself as a kind of underdog hero. He declares himself “the enemy of treason” and boldly declares “you girls mean business and I do too”. He’s “first among equals/second to none/last of the best/you can bury the rest”. A sliver of the carefully choreographed arrogance of the early days of his career shines through here.
The back-half of the song seems to be an apology for dragging his loved ones into the kind of life he lives. The kind of life the lyrics to his music appear to suggest he lives, anyway. It’s unlikely that Bob is really out on the streets at nights fighting the man and righting wrongs, but that seems to be the image of himself he’s trying to project in these lyrics. This isn’t necessarily a criticism from me. Dylan, after all, is an actor who has played many parts and created many characters across his career. His latest one is particularly well written and vivid.
Written by Tom Ray
False Prophet is out now on all digital distribution platforms. Rough and Rowdy Ways is available on 19th June.
“False Prophet” – Bob Dylan – Lyrics
Another day that don’t end
Another ship goin’ out
Another day of anger, bitterness, and doubt
I know how it happened
I saw it begin
I opened my heart to the world and the world came in
Hello Mary Lou
Hello Miss Pearl
My fleet-footed guides from the underworld
No stars in the sky shine brighter than you
You girls mean business and I do too
Well I’m the enemy of treason
Enemy of strife
Enemy of the unlived meaningless life
I ain’t no false prophet
I just know what I know
I go where only the lonely can go
I’m first among equals
Second to none
Last of the best
You can bury the rest
Bury ’em naked with their silver and gold
Put them six feet under and pray for their souls
What are you lookin’ at
There’s nothing to see
Just a cool breeze that’s encircling me
Let’s go for a walk in the garden
So far and so wide
We can sit in the shade by the fountain-side
I search the world over
For the Holy Grail
I sing songs of love
I sing songs of betrayal
Don’t care what I drink
Don’t care what I eat
I climbed the mountains of swords on my bare feet
You don’t know me darlin’
You never would guess
I’m nothing like my ghostly appearance would suggest
I ain’t no false prophet
I just said what I said
I’m just here to bring vengeance on somebody’s head
Put out your hand
There’s nothing to hold
Open your mouth
I’ll stuff it with gold
Oh you poor devil look up if you will
The city of God is there on the hill
Hello stranger
A long goodbye
You ruled the land
But so do I
You lost your mule
You got a poison brain
I’ll marry you to a ball and chain
You know darlin’
The kind of life that I live
When your smile meets my smile something’s got to give
I ain’t no false prophet
No I’m nobody’s bride
Can’t remember when I was born
And I forgot when I died
The pictures were found via Google if one of them is yours and you would like it removed or would like a credit please let me know. The lyrics were sourced from Far Out Magazine.
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Hot on the heels of his epic 17-minute dissection of the J.F.K. assassination and the last 60 years of popular culture (and also his first Billboard number one), “Murder Most Foul”, Bob Dylan returns with yet another incredible new single.
“I Contain Multitudes” seems to be a more personal work than “Murder Most Foul”. Musically it is just as sparse and minimalistic as its predecessor. The arrangement seems to consist of just gently strummed guitar chords, deep and mournful cello, steel slide guitar and voice. There is no percussion. This creates a very intimate atmosphere that is both similar and radically different to “Murder Most Foul”. Where “Murder Most Foul” felt like Dylan giving a quasi-religious sermon, “I Contain Multitudes” feels warm and conversational.
Structurally however it’s a little more familiar to long term Dylan fans. It follows similar “mathematic” song structures to his earlier works. Each verse contains four lines with a simple AABB rhyming scheme followed by two lines which end in the title of the song. This type of songwriting is Dylan’s bread and butter. A quick look back at some of his most loved songs, such a “Desolation Row”, “Visions of Johanna”, “Mr. Tambourine Man”, “Like a Rolling Stone” etc. reveals this same pattern repeated in a multitude (heh) of different ways.
Lyrically, obviously, is where “I Contain Multitudes” gets really interesting. Like “Murder Most Foul”, it draws from the world of literature but where the former song looked to Shakespear, “I Contain Multitudes” takes its title from a line in ‘Song of Myself, 51’, a poem by Walt Whitman, a writer Dylan has regularly signalled his admiration for in the past. Like the Poem, the song seems to be taking a long, hard look at the artist with a nostalgic and rose-tinted view of his past. Also, like “Murder Most Foul”, it is packed with references to various cultural touchstones which are as disparate as they are iconic. Edgar Allen Poe, Anne Frank, Indiana Jones, “them British bad boys, The Rolling Stones”, William Blake, Beethoven and Chopin all find themselves in the lyrical maze. These lyrics simultaneously paint the writer as both a slightly boring everyman and an exciting and roguish outlaw. He lives on the “boulevard of crime” and carries “four pistols and two knives” but he also paints landscapes and nudes. There is also an undercurrent of awareness of mortality which is only natural, I suppose, for a man in his late seventies. As such a lot of the lyrics read as a more literate “My Way”. Lyrics like “I sleep with life and death in the same bed” certainly cut deep in this regard.
This is another strong Dylan single and we look forward to more. At this rate, we might have to set up a Bob Dylan Desk here at With Just a Hint of Mayhem!
Written by Tom Ray
“I Contain Multitudes” is available now to stream or buy from all good digital retailers and streaming services.
“I Contain Multitudes” – Lyrics
Today, and tomorrow, and yesterday, too
The flowers are dyin’ like all things do
Follow me close, I’m going to Bally-na-Lee
I’ll lose my mind if you don’t come with me
I fuss with my hair, and I fight blood feuds
I contain multitudes
Got a tell-tale heart like Mr. Poe
Got skeletons in the walls of people you know
I’ll drink to the truth and the things we said
I’ll drink to the man that shares your bed
I paint landscapes, and I paint nudes
I contain multitudes
A red Cadillac and a black mustache
Rings on my fingers that sparkle and flash
Tell me, what’s next? What shall we do?
Half my soul, baby, belongs to you
I rollick and I frolic with all the young dudes
I contain multitudes
I’m just like Anne Frank, like Indiana Jones
And them British bad boys, The Rolling Stones
I go right to the edge, I go right to the end
I go right where all things lost are made good again
I sing the songs of experience like William Blake
I have no apologies to make
Everything’s flowing all at the same time
I live on a boulevard of crime
I drive fast cars, and I eat fast foods
I contain multitudes
Pink pedal-pushers, red blue jeans
All the pretty maids, and all the old queens
All the old queens from all my past lives
I carry four pistols and two large knives
I’m a man of contradictions, I’m a man of many moods
I contain multitudes
You greedy old wolf, I’ll show you my heart
But not all of it, only the hateful part
I’ll sell you down the river, I’ll put a price on your head
What more can I tell you? I sleep with life and death in the same bed
Get lost, madame, get up off my knee
Keep your mouth away from me
I’ll keep the path open, the path in my mind
I’ll see to it that there’s no love left behind
I’ll play Beethoven’s sonatas, and Chopin’s preludes
I contain multitudes
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Bob Dylan has just had his first-ever Billboard number-one single of any kind with his recent surprise release “Murder Most Foul”. He is currently at the top of the Rock Digital Song Sales chart. Hard to believe that it has taken 55 years for it to happen. His first appearance on the Billboard chart was in 1965 with “Subterranean Homesick Blues”. “Like A Rolling Stone” and “Rainy Day Women ♯12 & 35” made it to number 2 in 1965 and 1966 respectively. The former did reach the top of the Cashbox chart in 1965, but that chart was never as popular, important or influential as Billboard. It is the first Bob Dylan single to reach the top 100 of any Billboard chart since 1993. Congratulations Robert Zimmerman.
Click here to read our earlier review of “Murder Most Foul” written by Tom Ray.
Dylan celebrates with a cup of tea 😉
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