Bob Dylan's Carnival Jukebox: Musical Textures of Blonde on Blonde (1966)

"I don't play folk rock....It's mathematical music."
Bob Dylan, San Francisco press conference, Dec. 1965​

I've been listening to Blonde on Blonde for many, many years, but the songs continue to reveal new lyrical and musical imagery to me nearly every time I play the album. Is it a masterpiece? I think so.

With the help of anyone who cares to join in, I want to try to identify some of the records that may have inspired, or at least influenced, the songs that Dylan himself was writing, performing and recording in early 1966, and trace some of the musical roots of that "wild, thin mercury" magic that he captured on Blonde on Blonde. (The crackerjack session players he used also deserve much of the credit for the way it ended up sounding, but it was bandmaster Bob who called the tunes.)

This type of thing can be a very subjective exercise, a case of "Do you hear what I hear?" Nevertheless, I'm anxious to exchange opinions about the musical stylings of Blonde on Blonde. Interpreting the lyrics of Dylan songs is generally far above my pay grade, but I usually enjoy reading those dissections, so if you so desire, please go for it.

Hopefully, we can also discuss the outtakes and live recordings of Dylan from early '66 that have surfaced, since they share elements of the songs on the released album -- I surely couldn't imagine leaving out treasures like She's You're Lover Now and Tell Me Momma.

To foreshadow a bit, and lay some cards on the table, here is a playlist of some of the recordings that I believe could have had some influence on the music Dylan made during the Blonde on Blonde era. Note that all of these tracks either pre-dated the album sessions, or were contemporary hits at that time. If you don't own any of these titles, shame on you, but most, if not all, of them are up on YouTube:

TEXAS MEDICINE & RAILROAD GIN:
A Blonde on Blonde-Style Musical Cocktail

COME ON IN MY KITCHEN (Robert Johnson)
ME AND MY CHAUFFEUR (Memphis Minnie)
IT HURTS ME TOO (Tampa Red) [substitute: Elmore James version]
AS TIME GOES BY (Dooley Wilson)
EARTH ANGEL (Penguins, Jan. 1955)
MYSTERY TRAIN (Elvis Presley, Nov. 1955)
PEGGY SUE (Buddy Holly, Sept. 1957)
MAYBE BABY (Crickets, Mar. 1958)
TEARS ON MY PILLOW (Little Anthony & the Imperials, Sept. 1958)
EL PASO (Marty Robbins, Nov. 1959)
WATCH YOUR STEP (Bobby Parker, July 1961)
THE BLACK WIDOW (Link Wray, 1963)
I FEEL FINE (Beatles, Dec. 1964)
SHE'S ABOUT A MOVER (Sir Douglas Quintet, Mar. 1965)
YOU CAN'T CATCH ME (Rolling Stones, Apr. 1965)
I WASHED MY HANDS IN MUDDY WATER (Charlie Rich, 1965)
TRACKS OF MY TEARS (Miracles, July 1965)
ROCK ME BABY (Otis Redding, Oct. 1965)
MELLOW DOWN EASY (Butterfield Blues Band, 1965)
WHO DO YOU LOVE (John Hammond Jr., 1965)
I CAN'T GO ON (Charlie Rich, 1965)
BUCKAROO (Buck Owens & His Buckaroos, Nov. 1965)
NORWEGIAN WOOD (Beatles, Dec. 1965)
CRYING TIME (Ray Charles, Dec. 1965)
UP TIGHT (Stevie Wonder, Dec. 1965)
BARBARA ANN (Beach Boys, Jan. 1966)
THESE BOOTS ARE MADE FOR WALKIN' (Nancy Sinatra, Jan. 1966)
BALLAD OF THE GREEN BERETS (Sgt. Barry Sadler, Feb. 1966)
ONE MORE HEARTACHE (Marvin Gaye, Feb. 1966)
HOMEWARD BOUND (Simon & Garfunkel, Feb. 1966)
LET'S GO GET STONED (Ray Charles, Mar. 1966)
Special mention: HARPOON MAN b/w I'M READY (Charlie McCoy & the Escorts, Jan. 1965)

How to proceed from here? Willy-nilly-dogpile-style, or in an orderly, logical fashion? I figure that going through the fourteen songs on the album track-by-track, in their original sequence, and then examining the live tracks and outtakes, would probably be the simplest course of action.

Okay, next post: Track 1.

(And Happy 74th Birthday to Bob Dylan. Thanks for Blonde on Blonde.)

 

Cool thread! Will definitely be following this one.

 

BLONDE ON BLONDE: Side 1./Track 1.

RAINY DAY WOMEN #12 & 35
Dylan dropped a lot of things into the blender on this zany track, but I think that a Ray Charles recording, Let's Go Get Stoned, set the wheels in motion. Ray's version of the Ashford & Simpson song* was first released on the Crying Time album, which just so happened to hit the Billboard Top LP charts on March 12th, during the very same week that Dylan recorded his own "stoned" song in Nashville, in the wee wee hours of March 10th. Rainy Day Women #12 & 35 and Let's Go Get Stoned share no musical or lyrical similarities whatsoever, but the Ray Charles track may have served as a point of departure for Dylan's comical lament, which Clinton Heylin called his "first drug song," and also connected the idea of being stoned (punished) for your "sins" to the Book of Proverbs.

Dylan's recording captured a hooting, hollering, Salvation Army marching band in the studio (supposedly it was producer Bob Johnston's idea) complete with bass drum, slide trombone and tambourine, while a rinky-tink piano plays cornball blues licks and Dylan giggles and howls the words of the song, blowing a wobbly, shrill harmonica after each verse. Screwball rock 'n roll attitude at its finest.

"Party" records like this went back to the early 1900s, of course, but Dylan may have also been spoofing all of the Live-at-the-Club/Live-at-the-Go-Go records that were all over the charts during the first half of the '60s. Some examples: Mickey's Monkey by the Miracles; Quarter to Three by Gary US Bonds; If I Had A Hammer and Lemon Tree by Trini Lopez; Memphis, Midnight Special, and Seventh Son by Johnny Rivers; and one of the biggest hits of 1965, the Ramsey Lewis Trio's "live" version of The "In" Crowd. Well into 1966, even Roy Orbison jumped on the bandwagon with his psuedo-live Twinkle Toes, and the Swinging Medalions put out their rowdy Frat-Rock classic, Double Shot of My Baby's Love.

Personally, I think that the record Dylan and company may have been mocking was the Beach Boys ad-lib "live" version of Barbara Ann, from their Party! album. It was released as a single and hit the Billboard charts on January 1, 1966, remaining there all the way into March. Hearing the record occasionally can be a pleasant enough experience even today, but to hear it played on the radio continuously for three months may have taken some of the shine off it.

The march tempo of Rainy Day Women may have also been a send-up of another hit single that was flooding the radio airwaves in early 1966: The Ballad of the Green Berets, by Sgt. Barry Sadler, an earnest, patriotic march that entered the Billboard charts in early February, and stayed through April. (It was before my time, so I'm not sure how the song was received during that era, but I like it.)

For all we know, other marches -- The Mickey Mouse Club theme, or even 76 Trombones from The Music Man -- may have inspired the madcap tempo of Rainy Day Women #12 & 35, as well. In any event, Dylan's record (edited down to 2:26 from the full 4:34 version later released on the LP) became a hit single in April 1966, and made it all the way to #2 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.

Over that summer of '66, it seemed like novelty records were all the rage on the singles chart, including I'm A Nut (Leroy Pullens), Everybody Loves A Nut (Johnny Cash!!) and You Can't Roller Skate In A Buffalo Herd (Roger Miller). But one of the biggest hits of all turned out to be another loony march: They're Coming To Take Me Away, Ha-Ha!, an obvious Rainy Day Women soundalike, credited to one Napoleon XIV. The record was a huge hit that July, reaching #3 in Billboard. In August, The Beatles put out Yellow Submarine, replete with laughing, shouting and a marching band interlude (the Fab Four had, or course, been making simlar Christmas recordings for their fan club for several years by this time) and in November, Dylan's old pal Donovan followed suit with his Mellow Yellow, another party-atmosphere piece, but far removed from Rainy Day Women #12 & 35, the record from which it probably sprang.

Although Rainy Day Women was also a big hit in the U.K., and entered the Top 20 in May 1966, Dylan and the Hawks never played it live during their tour of England that same month. It's interesting to try and imagine what that might have sounded like. When he did finally give it its live debut, at the Isle of Wight in 1969, Dylan and The Band played it in a straight blues tempo, which they repeated on the '74 tour, and which, to my knowledge, Dylan has used ever since, never reverting to the goofy, ragtag march tempo he and the Nashville cats cooked up back in '66.

*NOTE: The Coasters were the first act to release a version of Let's Go Get Stoned, back in mid-1965, but the single went nowhere, so it's unlikely that Dylan ever heard it.

 

That's what I'm talking about...we'll add it into the Obviously 5 Believers category when we get there. Thanks!

 

I tried to find the original edited 45 version of Rainy Day Women on youtube, but no luck.

I did find this. I love Flatt & Scruggs, but their version of the song is kind of a buzzkill.

 

No doubt Dylan was inspired by earlier music that he had heard, but I think that literature was at least as important an influence as music. My take is that literature was the driving force starting with Bringing it All...; musical influences were secondary. But I always appreciate being lectured on why I don't listen to something:

Over and out.

 

Great thread idea.

When I was a little kid, early 50's and 60's, somebody who was stoned, was drunk as in stoned drunk or drunk as a stone. This before the hipster grab it for being loaded after smoking some weed.

The horn gives it a Salvation Army Band feel.

Allegedly The Stones were cranking this song when they were tripping and got busted at Keith Richards Redlands house.

 

Great idea for a thread! I dunno how much I'll contribute but I'll definitely be watching this unfold. (And, by the way, good call on the Charlie Rich numbers. I'd never before heard the connection.)

 

Awww, c'mon, relax. The shame-on-you line was tongue in cheek, and I'm sure that you do own at least ONE of the songs that I listed. Also, poetry and literature are obviously key to Dylan's work, but I purposely wanted to explore the MUSICAL influences on Blonde, as I said in the thread title. I'll try to keep the "lecturing" in my posts to a minimum, if that'll make you feel better. But, really, what do you hear when you listen to Rainy Day Women, presuming, of course, that you do?

 

No hard feelings - I know it was tongue in cheek. That doesn't mean I can't bristle a bit, right (in true Dylan fashion, of course)? As for Rainy Day Women, I'd put it a notch or two below Joey. But I get the irony. To me, he was mocking the genre that he was mocked for. The whole eternal circle and all that cal.

 

"Charlie Rich, he's a good poet..." (Dylan, San Francisco press conference, Dec. 1965)

Taking Bob at his word, I recently bought a great Charlie Rich collection on CD that contains all of the tracks on this 1965 LP, and it is fantastic stuff. It may have been what Bob was referring to.

 

I will be reading this thread with interest. Not much to add about "Rainy Day Women."

My only contribution to this thread will be, interested parties must seek out Charlie Rich's Complete Smash Sessions, from 1965 and 66, and give them a listen!

I don't have the disc handy, but the author of the 1992 CD actually points it out in the liner notes, that Charlie Rich was an influence on Blonde on Blonde. At the time, I thought, yeah right, okay, whatever -- but when I first put in the disc and heard these songs back in 1992, it was like a light bulb went on over my head, that's been there ever since.

You'd have to investigate the release dates of the songs, in relation to various sessions or cutoff dates for BOB, whether Dylan heard and ingested them or not, I have no idea. But to my ears, pound for pound, penny for penny....you put The Smash Sessions (or those two original albums from '65 and '66) on the speakers ,and THIS is an aural blueprint or template for virtually everything happening on Blonde On Blonde, and much of the whole electric Dylan period in general.

I'm no Dylanologist, and due to time constraints I'm only able to speak in generalities -- the sound of the band, the arrangements, the energy level, the twangy guitars, the barrelhouse piano flourishes, the playfulness, the naughtiness, the sort of self-referential irony or humor -- it's basically ALL THERE in Charlie Rich, in slightly different form. Plus the fact that Dylan's suddenly deciding to scrap everything so far and continue recording in Nashville, it always felt to me like an epiphany -- like Dylan got frustrated and said, I want to DO THAT instead.

Songs like "Let's Do The Dance of Love," "Mohair Sam," "Hog Jaw," it all just reeks of the same aura or vibe found on Blonde on Blonde. At least it does to me.

 

Interesting, I will certainly check it out.

 

I'm not sure you can ever take Dylan at his word. Certainly he may have been speaking genuinely, but it's just as likely that he was taking the Michael. That said, I'll have to check out Charlie Rich, which is something that I didn't expect to say when I woke up this morning.

 

OK, I am in for the ride. Thanks for your insight, HominyRhodes!

 

Wow, thanks for that. The CD that I bought was:


Here's the recording/release data that I found for the 1965 material:

Charlie Rich
SMASH SINGLES recorded May-August 1965
S-1993 MOHAIR SAM / I WASHED MY HANDS IN MUDDY WATER
S-2012 I CAN'T GO ON / DANCE OF LOVE

THE MANY NEW SIDES OF CHARLIE RICH
Smash Records SRS 67070 stereo LP
(rel'd post-August 1965)
Mohair Sam May 1965 [Hot 100 August 1965]
I Can't Go On August 1965 I
Dance Of Love August 1965 II
A Field Of Yellow Daisies August 1965 II
I Washed My Hands In Muddy Water May 1965
Everything I Do Is Wrong August 1965 I
She's A Yum Yum August 1965 I
It Ain't Gonna Be That Way May 1965
Just A Little Bit Of You August 1965 II
Moonshine Minnie August 1965 II
Down And Out August 1965 I
Lonely Weekends August 1965 II

 

Agreed! on both counts.

 

Oh, he kids!, he kids!, but in that same press conference he mentioned W. C. Fields, Arthur Rimbaud, Allen Ginsberg and Smokey Robinson as other "good poets," and I have to agree with him on all counts.

 

He also said that he thinks of himself as more of a song and dance man.

 

and if I remember right he also mentions something about the trapeze artists in the circus.

 

Another possible inspiration for the Rainy Day Women march? This show debuted in 1963, and I remember watching it.

Starts at 0:12 seconds:

 

I think the inspiration came from the reception that his electric music received when his folkie diehards felt abandoned. Poor Bob dragging the cross while being pelted for being true to himself. Any Salvation Army band could of inspired the good time sounds that followed him on his journey to Calvary.

 

He did feel that the criticism was unwarranted, and as he lamented to Nat Hentoff in Playboy, "I'll bet Tony Bennett doesn't have to go through this kind of thing."

 

Great idea for a thread, and I'm certainly "in" for the whole ride. You've done such a comprehensive job in this first post, I'm not sure I can think of something important to add. But I'll do my best to come up with something.