At number 8 in Rolling Stone Magazine’s 10 best Bob Dylan songs is “Mr. Tambourine Man”, which was on his 1965 album “Bringing It All Back Home”. The song itself was actually written in 1964, and when later recorded by The Byrds, it became a massive hit reaching number 1 in both the US and the Disunited Kingdom. It also brought Bob Dylan’s music to a new audience, once people found out that he was the original composer; and led to the birth of so-called “folk rock”, with The Byrds’ version of the song being an electric version of Dylan’s original acoustic version. It may also have helped influence Dylan to “go electric” himself, although it is also fair to say he was moving in that direction anyway, even before The Byrds’ version of his song.
I first heard this song when I was about 15 or 16, and one of the things which struck me most forcibly was the complex internal rhyming; something which reminded me of much of the Welsh poetry I had read, particularly poetry written in cynghanedd (which I explain here). The song is obviously about drugs, and the surrealistic imagery in this song became a hallmark of Dylan’s songwriting during this 1964-66 period of his career.
Hey! Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me
I’m not sleepy and there is no place I’m going to
Hey! Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me
In the jingle jangle morning I’ll come followin’ youThough I know that evenin’s empire has returned into sand
Vanished from my hand
Left me blindly here to stand but still not sleeping
My weariness amazes me, I’m branded on my feet
I have no one to meet
And the ancient empty street’s too dead for dreamingHey! Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me
I’m not sleepy and there is no place I’m going to
Hey! Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me
In the jingle jangle morning I’ll come followin’ youTake me on a trip upon your magic swirlin’ ship
My senses have been stripped, my hands can’t feel to grip
My toes too numb to step
Wait only for my boot heels to be wanderin’
I’m ready to go anywhere, I’m ready for to fade
Into my own parade, cast your dancing spell my way
I promise to go under itHey! Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me
I’m not sleepy and there is no place I’m going to
Hey! Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me
In the jingle jangle morning I’ll come followin’ youThough you might hear laughin’, spinnin’, swingin’ madly across the sun
It’s not aimed at anyone, it’s just escapin’ on the run
And but for the sky there are no fences facin’
And if you hear vague traces of skippin’ reels of rhyme
To your tambourine in time, it’s just a ragged clown behind
I wouldn’t pay it any mind
It’s just a shadow you’re seein’ that he’s chasingHey! Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me
I’m not sleepy and there is no place I’m going to
Hey! Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me
In the jingle jangle morning I’ll come followin’ youThen take me disappearin’ through the smoke rings of my mind
Down the foggy ruins of time, far past the frozen leaves
The haunted, frightened trees, out to the windy beach
Far from the twisted reach of crazy sorrow
Yes, to dance beneath the diamond sky with one hand waving free
Silhouetted by the sea, circled by the circus sands
With all memory and fate driven deep beneath the waves
Let me forget about today until tomorrowHey! Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me
I’m not sleepy and there is no place I’m going to
Hey! Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me
In the jingle jangle morning I’ll come followin’ you
This song is one of my favourite Dylan songs, and is on one of my favourite albums of his. I highly recommend listening to “Brining It All Back Home”, it is one of the great albums of the 1960s, and has been referred to as one of the most influential albums of its era. There is a great variety of songs on “Brining It All Back Home”, from the “early-rap” “Subterranean Homesick Blues” to the apocalyptic “It’s Alright Ma (I’m Only Bleeding)” to the beautifully cutting “It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue”.
For once, I have managed to find a wonderful version of this song, so difficult to do with most of Dylan’s songs which get removed from YouTube. This version is from the Newport Folk Festival in 1964, many months before the song was released in its recorded version. Enjoy!
One of my favourites, not just by Dylan but one of my all-time favourites. I really like Bob’s lyrics from this period, as well as the music (the latter basic but effective; the former quite good—he really should get the Nobel Prize for literature). But obviously about drugs? Are you sure?
I agree with the Nobel Prize for literature comment.
Um, if it’s not about drugs then what else? It was common knowledge that he was heavily into dope in 64/65, as well as heroin by 65/66 he’s recently revealed.
True, but that doesn’t mean that all he wrote then was about drugs. Yes, it could be, but not obviously like, say, “Sister Morphine” or “White Line Feaver”.
John Denver complained about people seeing his “Rocky Mountain High” as a drug song. Yes, he did smoke pot when he wrote it, but that doesn’t mean that this is what the song is about.
Ian Anderson had “flying so high” in a song and, as someone who doesn’t use driugs, was surprised when people saw this as a drug reference.
I’ve always interpreted lines like
“Take me disappearing through the smoke rings of my mind
Down the foggy ruins of time”
as being about a drug trip. But maybe not. Whether some of the song is about drugs or not, the imagery is superb 😉
What is very probably drug-inspired (who knows what drugs!) is William Shatner’s take on “Mr. Tambourine Man”. Yes, that William Shatner. Beam me up, Scotty!
I’ve heard that version. Hearing it was like being on drugs 😉
Sorry, http://vimeo.com/66878020