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Rating: 'Blonde on Blonde' is the first true work of art of rock.
The peak of creativity in young music, the moment when rock elevated itself to art, culture of the last century. Legend has it that Dylan birthed it entirely during a long, feverish night of brilliant inspiration. Listening to it, even today, this album truly feels like a continuous and unstoppable flow of words, poetry, and music encapsulated in a lysergic and mystical sigh.
Nervous, feverish, elusive, intangible yet material, Dylan is there singing to us with his harsh and edgy voice, a true flood that elevates us to Homeric latitudes. Dylan is in a superlative creative moment, exuding charisma without uttering a word, he is "a column of air" whose breeze is the breath and inspiration for his art: a symbiotic union with it. From the first song to the last, the album is pervaded by a dreamlike sound, never again heard in the history of rock: it is the "wild mercury sound" that will forever make this album unique. Among the many masterpieces contained in this album, Visions of Johanna stands out above all, "le visioni di Giovanna", true and real crimson flames emanating from the mind of our genius. Here, the symbolist poetry of our artist unleashes, literally soaring in an acid and nebulous flight punctuated by indelible and immeasurable value phrases: "... an electricity ghost moaned between the bones of her face.." or "...the harmonicas play a rainy skeleton key..".
The album also contains lighter passages, such as the splendid ballad Just Like A Woman or Absolutely Sweet Marie or even the tender I Want You. There is also room for melancholic songs laden with emotional tension like One of Us Must Know, divine in its melodic surge, or Stuck Inside of Mobile With The Memphis Blues Again, equally grand in its fervent pace. And there's no shortage of Dylan's customary biting sarcasm in R&B tracks of the caliber of Leopard-Skin Pill-Box Hat or Most Likely You Go Your Way and I'll Go Mine. But the best is yet to come. At the end of the album, Dylan gives us first Fourth Time Around, a caressing, sweet, and moving ballad sung with a more seductive voice than usual, and then Sad-Eyed Lady of the Lowland, a masterpiece within a masterpiece, a standalone work of art, the crystalline dedication to his wife Sara. Splendid in both text and music, it is one of the highest peaks of rock music.
Thank you, Bob.
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
03 Visions of Johanna (07:33)
Ain't it just like the night to play tricks
When you're tryin' to be so quiet?
We'll sit here stranded, though were all doin' our best to deny it.
And Louise holds a handful of rain temptin' you to defy it.
The lights flicker from the opposite loft.
In this room the heat pipes just cough.
The country music station plays soft,
But theres nothing, really nothing, to turn off.
Just Louise and her lover so entwined
And these visions of Johanna that conquer my mind.
In the empty lot where the ladies play
Blindman's bluff with the key chain,
And the all-night girls they whisper of escapades out on the D train.
We can hear the night watchman click his flashlight,
Ask himself if its him or them that's insane.
Louise she's all right, she's just near,
She's delicate and seems like the mirror,
But she just makes it all too concise and too clear
That Johanna's not here.
The ghost of electricity howls in the bones of her face.
Where these visions of Johanna have now taken my place.
Now, little boy lost, he takes himself so seriously.
He brags of his misery, he likes to live dangerously,
And when bringing her name up he speaks of her farewell kiss to me.
He's sure got a lot of gall to be so useless and all,
Muttering small talk at the wall while I'm in the hall.
Oh, how can I explain? its so hard to get on
And these visions of Johanna, they've kept me up past the dawn.
Inside the museums infinity goes up on trial
Voices echo this is what salvation must be like after a while.
But Mona Lisa must have had the highway blues,
You can tell by the way she smiles
See the primitive wallflower freeze.
When the jelly-faced women all sneeze,
And the one with the mustache say jeez, I can't find my knees.
Both jewels and binoculars hang from the head of the mule,
But these visions of Johanna they make it all seem so cruel.
The peddler now speaks to the countess who's pretending to care for him.
Saying name me someone thats not a parasite and I'll go out
And say a prayer for him.
But like Louise always says, ya can't look at much can ya man
As she herself prepares for him
My Madonna she still has not showed,
We see this empty cage now corrode,
Where her cape of the stage once had flowed,
The fiddler, he now steps to the road,
He writes everything's been returned which was owed
On the back of the fish truck that loads
While my conscience explodes.
The harmonicas play the skeleton keys and the rain
And these visions of Johanna are now all that remain.
07 Leopard-Skin Pill-Box Hat (03:58)
Well, I see you got your brand new leopard-skin pill-box hat
Yes, I see you got your brand new leopard-skin pill-box hat
Well, you must tell me, baby
How your head feels under somethin' like that
Under your brand new leopard-skin pill-box hat
Well, you look so pretty in it
Honey, can I jump on it sometime?
Yes, I just wanna see
If it's really that expensive kind
You know it balances on your head
Just like a mattress balances
On a bottle of wine
Your brand new leopard-skin pill-box hat
Well, if you wanna see the sun rise
Honey, I know where
We'll go out and see it sometime
We'll both just sit there and stare
Me with my belt
Wrapped around my head
And you just sittin' there
In your brand new leopard-skin pill-box hat
Well, I asked the doctor if I could see you
It's bad for your health, he said
Yes, I disobeyed his orders
I came to see you
But I found him there instead
You know, I don't mind him cheatin' on me
But I sure wish he'd take that off his head
Your brand new leopard-skin pill-box hat
Well, I see you got a new boyfriend
No, I never seen him before
Well, I saw you
Makin' love with him
You forgot to close the garage door
You might think he loves you for your money
But I know what he really loves you for
It's your brand new leopard-skin pill-box hat
08 Just Like a Woman (04:50)
Nobody feels any pain
Tonight as I stand inside the rain
Ev'rybody knows
That Baby's got new clothes
But lately I see her ribbons and her bows
Have fallen from her curls.
She takes just like a woman, yes, she does
She makes love just like a woman, yes, she does
And she aches just like a woman
But she breaks just like a little girl.
Queen Mary, she's my friend
Yes, I believe I'll go see her again
Nobody has to guess
That Baby can't be blessed
Till she finally sees that she's like all the rest
With her fog, her amphetamine and her pearls.
She takes just like a woman, yes,
She makes love just like a woman, yes, she does
And she aches just like a woman
But she breaks just like a little girl.
It was raining from the first
And I was dying there of thirst
So I came in here
And your long-time curse hurts
But what's worse
Is this pain in here
I can't stay in here
Ain't it clear that--
I just can't fit
Yes, I believe it's time for us to quit
But when we meet again
Introduced as friends
Please don't let on that you knew me when
I was hungry and it was your world.
Ah, you fake just like a woman, yes, you do
You make love just like a woman, yes, you do
Then you ache just like a woman
But you break just like a little girl.
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Other reviews
By NicholasRodneyDrake
In 'Blonde on Blonde,' blues, country, rock, and folk are astonishingly blended: bizarre, absurd, visionary, passionate, poetic, and romantic lyrics blend with a new sound... richer and more complex than anything Dylan had done before.
Many at the time considered his 'electric turn' a 'betrayal,' a 'retreat' from the battlefield, but Dylan just wanted to do something new, something different.
By Viva Lì
"Blonde on Blonde is a monumental work combining multiple genres into a single, innovative sound still relevant today."
"It is from this awareness, that redemption is born: the redemption of doing only and exactly what he wanted, regardless of everything and everyone."
By insolito
If Christ were alive today, he would play the harmonica, the perfect image of a hobo; he would have a crumbled, rough, even messy voice if you like. But it would be as seductive as few.
'Blonde on Blonde,' the destination Highway 61 leads to.
By dashell
"With 'Blonde on Blonde' Dylan becomes a fire thief and ignites the arid prairies of poetry."
"An essential album to understand who we are and where we come from."
By luludia
The well of that grating and iron voice…a voice that’s beautiful because it’s ugly and ugly because it’s beautiful.
Blonde on Blonde isn’t necessarily the most beautiful, but it’s the one closing the circle, and it’s the most visionary.
