But whatever it’s about, “Rainy Day Women” is sneakily brilliant. It’s cheeky, and considering that it’s the first taste of the album given to listeners, it’s unbelievably daring. Upon further inspection, past the pun that correlates the punishment of stoning with, well, getting stoned, the lyrics sound confrontative, maybe a bite back at the folkies Dylan disavowed when he went electric. Just the plodding drums and bass, the tambourine slightly out of sync, inebriated, rinky-dink piano, and the dissonant, mournful howls of the harmonica and a muted trumpet, all seemingly detached from Dylan’s near-sobbed vocals and the egging-on of the audience. I actually double-checked my headphones to see if they were broken. Which is why the opening track, “Rainy Day Women #12 & 35”, shocked me more than the frigid hellhole of Minnesota ever could. I was aware of the prolificness of Dylan’s 60’s output, so I went into the record assuming that I’d hear the apex of his sound, something streamlined and focused beyond all measure. Some sort of convoluted sentiment was involved, noting that Dylan was indeed a Minnesotan, and listening to a Minnesotan artist in Minnesota would be poetic in my pretentious mind. It was that story that first inspired me to find Blonde On Blonde on Apple Music, an act mostly done in boredom due to the fact that my flight from Minnesota had broken down, stranding me in a city where the highest temperature of the day was negative. There, he reached out to some members of the thriving music scene, drafting a ramshackle band of musicians into the sessions of what would become his magnum opus. After frustrations reached fever pitch and productivity plummeted, Dylan packed up his equipment, took his band, and dragged them all the way down to the Columbia session studio down in Nashville, Tennessee. Dylan, coming off of touring for the equally magnificent Highway 61 Revisited, took some of the Hawks, his touring crew, and went into the Columbia Studio in New York to create his next musical work.
The original featured a shot of Claudia Cardinale (who, believe it or not, some speculated was Dylan in drag) but the photo was used without her permission, so it was removed.The story behind Bob Dylan’s masterpiece, Blonde On Blonde, is one of the most iconic in all of popular music. There was a curious change to the album sleeve a couple of year's after its release when, in 1968, Columbia revised the album cover's inside gatefold. So, if you like your Dylan rocking, the lyrics surreal and inventive, the guitar riffs cutting, Blonde On Blonde will be a must buy. Mostly I've been driving at a combination of guitar, harmonica, and organ."īlonde On Blonde saw the end of Bob Dylan's rock & roll period, and he soon moved to the quieter, country-style of John Wesley Harding and Nashville Skyline. I haven't been able to succeed in getting it all the time. It's metallic and bright gold, with whatever that conjures up. "It's that thin, that wild mercury sound. Master takes of nine of the tracks that made it to the final album were made In one mammoth session covering a couple of days from March 8, 1966, to the early morning hours of March 10 a phenomenal work rate.ĭylan was very pleased with this Nashville session, so much so he found after mixing it he had enough material for a double-album.īob Dylan's own critique was positive and he, of course, should know better than anyone: "The closest I ever got to the sound I hear in my mind was on individual bands in the Blonde on Blonde album," he said over a decade later. Much of the album was written in hotel rooms, equipped with a piano, as Bob Dylan was still touring. Yes, there are still some lightweight numbers such as I Want You, but there are also touching ballads, notably Visions Of Johanna, with its surreal lyrics, and stunners like Just Like A Woman and Sad Eyed Lady Of The Lowlands. Not only that, there's more than 70 minutes of poetic observation to savour. While it's preceding album Highway 61 was wonderful rock & roll, Blond On Blond is more blues orientated and soon established its reputation as being a Bob Dylan masterpiece.
BOB DYLAN BLONDE ON BLONDE ALBUM LYRICS FREE
Blonde On Blonde was Dylan's first double album and came soon after the 'electric concert' in Manchester's Free Trade Hall.