Favorite Bob Dylan Lyrics

ket_the_jet

Love him or hate him, the guy is a poet and helped define a generation*.

I will post a few of my particular favorites here and then post a few more after some responses. Feel free to include your favorite album and song as well if you feel so inclined.

My favorite Dylan album is Another Side of Bob Dylan. I honestly can't pick my favorite lyric from the album, but it might be:
"Your cracked country lips, I still wish to kiss as to be by the strength of your skin."
- "To Ramona," Another Side of Bob Dylan

Other great ones:
"Take what you have gathered from coincidence."
- "It's All Over Now, Baby Blue," Bringing It All Back Home

"I'll let you be in my dream if I can be in yours."
- "Talking World War III Blues," The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan

My favorite Dylan song is "Visions of Johanna" and I think this is my favorite line:
"Mona Lisa must've had the highway blues--you can tell by the way she smiles."
- "Visions of Johanna," Blonde on Blonde

In fairness to his later stuff, I will throw on some lyrics from his later albums too after a few replies. Anyways, have fun everyone.
-wtk



* Arguably, more than one.

sculptcha

Beauty walks a razor's edge, someday I'll make it mine

KLo924

Ooh great thread

Probably my fav. songs are Tangled up in Blue, Hard Rain's Gonna Fall and Forever Young (the faster version, preferably). And fav. lyrics? Lemme go listen to some tunes and I'll get back to you....

Forensic

My current favorite... Tombstone Blues: "The sun's not yellow, it's chicken!"

C'mon, that's awesome. Other contenders:

Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues: "Up on Housing Project Hill, it's either fortune or fame. You must pick one or the other though neither of them are to be what they claim."

Black Diamond Bay: "'I've got to talk to someone quick', but the Greek said 'Go Away!' and kicked the chair to the floor."

Dignity: "I went down where the vultures feed,I would've got deeper, but there wasn't any need.Heard the tongues of angels and the tongues of men. Wasn't any difference to me."

Positively 4th St: "I wish that for just one time you could stand inside my shoes. And just for that one moment I could be you. Yes, I wish that for just one time you could stand inside my shoes. You'd know what a drag it is to see you."

Last one (promise): Desolation Row: "Cinderella, she seems so easy “It takes one to know one,” she smiles. And puts her hands in her back pockets Bette Davis style."

almonds1

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
Here comes the blind commissioner
They’ve got him in a trance
One hand is tied to the tight-rope walker
The other is in his pants
And the riot squad they’re restless
They need somewhere to go
As Lady and I look out tonight
From Desolation Row

Cinderella, she seems so easy
“It takes one to know one,” she smiles
And puts her hands in her back pockets
Bette Davis style
And in comes Romeo, he’s moaning
“You Belong to Me I Believe”
And someone says, “You’re in the wrong place my friend
You better leave”
And the only sound that’s left
After the ambulances go
Is Cinderella sweeping up
On Desolation Row

Now the moon is almost hidden
The stars are beginning to hide
The fortune-telling lady
Has even taken all her things inside
All except for Cain and Abel
And the hunchback of Notre Dame
Everybody is making love
Or else expecting rain
And the Good Samaritan, he’s dressing
He’s getting ready for the show
He’s going to the carnival tonight
On Desolation Row

Now Ophelia, she’s ’neath the window
For her I feel so afraid
On her twenty-second birthday
She already is an old maid
To her, death is quite romantic
She wears an iron vest
Her profession’s her religion
Her sin is her lifelessness
And though her eyes are fixed upon
Noah’s great rainbow
She spends her time peeking
Into Desolation Row

Einstein, disguised as Robin Hood
With his memories in a trunk
Passed this way an hour ago
With his friend, a jealous monk
He looked so immaculately frightful
As he bummed a cigarette
Then he went off sniffing drainpipes
And reciting the alphabet
Now you would not think to look at him
But he was famous long ago
For playing the electric violin
On Desolation Row

Dr. Filth, he keeps his world
Inside of a leather cup
But all his sexless patients
They’re trying to blow it up
Now his nurse, some local loser
She’s in charge of the cyanide hole
And she also keeps the cards that read
“Have Mercy on His Soul”
They all play on pennywhistles
You can hear them blow
If you lean your head out far enough
From Desolation Row

Across the street they’ve nailed the curtains
They’re getting ready for the feast
The Phantom of the Opera
A perfect image of a priest
They’re spoonfeeding Casanova
To get him to feel more assured
Then they’ll kill him with self-confidence
After poisoning him with words
And the Phantom’s shouting to skinny girls
“Get Outa Here If You Don’t Know
Casanova is just being punished for going
To Desolation Row”

Now at midnight all the agents
And the superhuman crew
Come out and round up everyone
That knows more than they do
Then they bring them to the factory
Where the heart-attack machine
Is strapped across their shoulders
And then the kerosene
Is brought down from the castles
By insurance men who go
Check to see that nobody is escaping
To Desolation Row

Praise be to Nero’s Neptune
The Titanic sails at dawn
And everybody’s shouting
“Which Side Are You On?”
And Ezra Pound and T. S. Eliot
Fighting in the captain’s tower
While calypso singers laugh at them
And fishermen hold flowers
Between the windows of the sea
Where lovely mermaids flow
And nobody has to think too much
About Desolation Row

Yes, I received your letter yesterday
(About the time the doorknob broke)
When you asked how I was doing
Was that some kind of joke?
All these people that you mention
Yes, I know them, they’re quite lame
I had to rearrange their faces
And give them all another name
Right now I can’t read too good
Don’t send me no more letters, no
Not unless you mail them
From Desolation Row

ket_the_jet

Hard Rain's Gonna Fall

"And I'll tell it and think it and speak it and breathe it and reflect it from the mountain so all souls can see it."

@Forensic: Thanks for adding a few. I love the song "Positively 4th Street."
@almonds1: Thanks for the addition; I was afraid that people would post entire songs as most people don't want to read through it and end up discarding the topic.

I'll throw out a few more:

"Steal a little and they throw you in jail, steal a lot and they make you King,"
- "Sweetheart Like You," Infidels

"I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now."
- "My Back Pages," Another Side of Bob Dylan

By the way, pick up the Bob Dylan Mono Anthology. It is just absolutely fantastic.
-wtk

california_peach

Great thread. My favorite all time Dylan lyric is from Isis which is on Desire. Actually I love ever word in the song, but my favorites line is 'blinded by sleep and in need of a bed'. I always loved that line, but as a parent who has spent many a sleepless night with a child, the sentiment brings a whole new meaning. Also love the line, 'what drives me to your is what drives me insane.' Because isn't that was love and marriage are all about. LOL

avalonms

Steal a little and they throw you in jail,
Steal a lot and they make you king.

milanks

I get all melty when he says "Your loyalty is not to me, but to the stars above." in One More Cup of Coffee.

However, Nashville Skyline is my favorite Dylan album. I know it's not the most classic, but we have no control over what/who our love decides to sink its claws into and somewhere along the way, that's the one that I latched onto.

lady_jojo

His clothes are dirty but his hands are clean,
And you're the best thing that he's ever seen.

-Lay Lady Lay

(great thread!)

cain777

"She was married when we first met, soon to be divorced. I helped her out of a jam I guess, but I used a little too much force."

Tangled up in Blue

My Favorite overall song though is probably The Story of the Hurricane.

Forensic

One more: Stuck Inside of Mobile With the Memphis Blues Again:
"Grandpa died last week and now he’s buried in the rock, but everybody still talks about how badly they were shocked. But me, I expected it to happen I knew he’d lost control when he built a fire on Main Street and shot it full of holes."

ket_the_jet

"I gave her my heart but she wanted my soul."
- "Don't Think Twice, It's Alright," The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan

"If not for you, winter would hold no spring; I couldn't hear a robin sing."
- "If Not For You," New Morning (covered by George Harrison on All Things Must Pass as well)

Apparently the original version of Like a Rolling Stone had fifty verses. How much would you pay for the original notes?
-wtk

AtticusFinch

"Hear this Robert Zinnerman, I wrote a song for you,
About a strange young man called Dylan, with a voice like sand and glue"

D.Bowie

deckerp

I got an email this morning from Wolfgang's Vault wishing Happy Birthday to Bob Dylan. If you're a fan I guess you probably already know it's his birthday. Check out the site: http://www.wolfgangsvault.com/bob-dylan

sillygoose1977

It is just about impossible to pick favorite lyrics from the best American poet of the last 100 years.

"I was born here and I'll die here against my will
I know it looks like I'm movin' but I'm standin' still
Every nerve in my body is so naked and numb
I can't even remember what it was I came here to get away from
Don't even hear the murmur of a prayer
It's not dark yet but it's gettin' there."- from Not Dark Yet

Subterranean Homesick Blues is so great and random "the pump don't work cause the vandals took the handle"

RoadDog

Pistols shots ring out in the barroom night
Enter Patty Valentine from the upper hall
She sees the bartender in a pool of blood
Cries out "My God they killed them all"
Here comes the story of the Hurricane
The man the authorities came to blame
For something that he never done
Put him in a prison cell but one time he could-a been
The champion of the world.

Three bodies lying there does Patty see
And another man named Bello moving around mysteriously
"I didn't do it" he says and he throws up his hands
"I was only robbing the register I hope you understand
I saw them leaving" he says and he stops
"One of us had better call up the cops"
And so Patty calls the cops
And they arrive on the scene with their red lights flashing
In the hot New Jersey night.

Meanwhile far away in another part of town
Rubin Carter and a couple of friends are driving around
Number one contender for the middleweight crown
Had no idea what kinda **** was about to go down
When a cop pulled him over to the side of the road
Just like the time before and the time before that
In Patterson that's just the way things go
If you're black you might as well not shown up on the street
'Less you wanna draw the heat.

Alfred Bello had a partner and he had a rap for the corps
Him and Arthur Dexter Bradley were just out prowling around
He said "I saw two men running out they looked like middleweights
They jumped into a white car with out-of-state plates"
And Miss Patty Valentine just nodded her head
Cop said "Wait a minute boys this one's not dead"
So they took him to the infirmary
And though this man could hardly see
They told him that he could identify the guilty men.

Four in the morning and they haul Rubin in
Take him to the hospital and they bring him upstairs
The wounded man looks up through his one dying eye
Says "Wha'd you bring him in here for ? He ain't the guy !"
Yes here comes the story of the Hurricane
The man the authorities came to blame
For something that he never done
Put in a prison cell but one time he could-a been
The champion of the world.

Four months later the ghettos are in flame
Rubin's in South America fighting for his name
While Arthur Dexter Bradley's still in the robbery game
And the cops are putting the screws to him looking for somebody to blame
"Remember that murder that happened in a bar ?"
"Remember you said you saw the getaway car?"
"You think you'd like to play ball with the law ?"
"Think it might-a been that fighter you saw running that night ?"
"Don't forget that you are white".

Arthur Dexter Bradley said "I'm really not sure"
Cops said "A boy like you could use a break
We got you for the motel job and we're talking to your friend Bello
Now you don't wanta have to go back to jail be a nice fellow
You'll be doing society a favor
That sonofa***** is brave and getting braver
We want to put his *kitten* in stir
We want to pin this triple murder on him
He ain't no Gentleman Jim".

Rubin could take a man out with just one punch
But he never did like to talk about it all that much
It's my work he'd say and I do it for pay
And when it's over I'd just as soon go on my way
Up to some paradise
Where the trout streams flow and the air is nice
And ride a horse along a trail
But then they took him to the jailhouse
Where they try to turn a man into a mouse.

All of Rubin's cards were marked in advance
The trial was a pig-circus he never had a chance
The judge made Rubin's witnesses drunkards from the slums
To the white folks who watched he was a revolutionary bum
And to the black folks he was just a crazy ******
No one doubted that he pulled the trigger
And though they could not produce the gun
The DA said he was the one who did the deed
And the all-white jury agreed.

Rubin Carter was falsely tried
The crime was murder 'one' guess who testified
Bello and Bradley and they both baldly lied
And the newspapers they all went along for the ride
How can the life of such a man
Be in the palm of some fool's hand ?
To see him obviously framed
Couldn't help but make me feel ashamed to live in a land
Where justice is a game.

Now all the criminals in their coats and their ties
Are free to drink martinis and watch the sun rise
While Rubin sits like Buddha in a ten-foot cell
An innocent man in a living hell
That's the story of the Hurricane
But it won't be over till they clear his name
And give him back the time he's done
Put him in a prison cell but one time he could-a been
The champion of the world.

ket_the_jet

Here are two from the same song:

"Myself, for what I did, I cannot be excused/
The changes I was going through can't even be used/
For the lies that I told her in hopes not to lose/
The could-be dream-lover of my lifetime"

"My friends from the prison, they ask unto me/
'How good, how good does it feel to be free?' /
And I answer them most mysteriously /
'Are birds free from the chains of the skyway?'"

- "Ballad in Plain D," Another Side of Bob Dylan

Sorry to flood the board with Another Side of Bob Dylan lyrics. P.S., rest in peace Suze Rotolo.
-wtk

ket_the_jet

I guess this one came and went with Bobby's birthday?
-wtk

kapeluza

bump