Definitely Dylan

In this week's Bob Dylan Hotline, we're talking about "Love is Just a Four Letter Word", a song written but never recorded by Bob Dylan, before it was then popularised by Joan Baez.

What was it about this song that Dylan might have made Dylan shy to release it? Could it have been a little too personal?

If you're interested in the Patreon episode about Dylan the Ghostwriter, you can find that here.

You can see “Love is Just A Four Letter Word” in the Dont Look Back songbook here.

You can support Definitely Dylan on Patreon or with a one-off donation at http://buymeacoffee.com/definitelydylan.

Book your Bob Dylan Walking Tour of NYC with Rebecca on http://ramblintours.com/.

Get your Definitely Dylan baseball cap here.

Rebecca’s bootleg version is here.

In his memoir, Chronicles Volume One (2004), Bob Dylan reveals that he suffered a severe hand injury in the late 1980s. Little is known about the circumstances of his incident that Bob Dylan seems to ascribe a symbolic meaning. One of our listeners was intrigued and so were we, so let's talk about it.

The Fred Bals article we refer to a few times can be found here.

You can support Definitely Dylan on Patreon or with a one-off donation at http://buymeacoffee.com/definitelydylan.

Book your Bob Dylan Walking Tour of NYC with Rebecca on http://ramblintours.com/.

Get your Definitely Dylan baseball cap here.

Rebecca’s bootleg version is here.

Laura talks to Graley Herren about his new book, Dylan in Cincinnati, the challenges of writing about performance, and our shared love for Paul Williams.

Order his new book Dylan in Cincinnati here.

His book Dreams and Dialogues in Dylan’s "Time Out of Mind" can be found here.

Some essays of his that I love and mention in the episode:

"Young Goodman Dylan: Chronicles at the Crossroads”

"Gender Performance in Dylan’s The Philosophy of Modern Song"

“Dylan and the Kennedy Assassination”

For more, head to his Substack Shadow Chasing.

You can support Definitely Dylan on Patreon or with a one-off donation at http://buymeacoffee.com/definitelydylan.

Get your Definitely Dylan baseball cap here.

In today’s Bob Dylan Hotline we talk about Bob Dylan and gospel music – the ties he had to the genre before his conversion to Christianity, and the enduring impact it had in the decades that followed.

Check out the trailer for the documentary Say Amen, Somebody here.

You can support Definitely Dylan on Patreon or with a one-off donation at http://buymeacoffee.com/definitelydylan.

Book your Bob Dylan Walking Tour of NYC with Rebecca on http://ramblintours.com.

Get your Definitely Dylan baseball cap here.

Rebecca’s bootleg version is here.

Happy Equinox! What better day to look back on summer and that's exactly what we're doing in this conversation. What do you think? What are your favourite Bob Dylan summer songs? Or do you associate his music with another season entirely?

And of course we had to talk about the new upcoming Rolling Thunder Live 1976 box set!

One correction: Fort Collins is in COLORADO, I have no idea why I said Florida. I’m sorry about that.

You can support Definitely Dylan on Patreon or with a one-off donation at http://buymeacoffee.com/definitelydylan.

Book your Bob Dylan Walking Tour of NYC with Rebecca on http://ramblintours.com.

Get your Definitely Dylan baseball cap here.

Rebecca’s bootleg version is here.

In this episode of the Bob Dylan Hotline, we give our opinion on Bob Dylan ~as women~. Is that different from other episodes, you might ask? Not really, but this time we're talking about talking about Bob Dylan as women. The conversation took us in many different directions because we had a lot to say.

You can find our earlier conversation on Women and Dylan here.

A few notes:

00:18 - A note on the almost impossible popularity of Dolly Parton. The phenomenon of a woman becoming very popular very quickly until the public turns on her and starts tearing her down has now been dubbed as “getting womaned”, since it rarely happens to men to this extent.

00:22 - There are luckily a few examples for “kookie” women, from Björk to Kate Bush to Erykah Badu to name just a few, but I think Rebecca’s point was more regarding how willing the public is to accept that kookiness as part of Bob Dylan's character, while female artists are more likely to be reduced to their kookiness.

00:35 - I’m really interested in how some of Dylan’s early songs challenge the conventional gender dynamic. “It Ain’t Me Babe” is a rejection of romantic stereotypes, but songs like “Hero Blues” and “John Brown” are about women encouraging a harmful masculinity rooted in violence and aggression. For more on this, check out my talk on Bob Dylan’s Heroic Masculinity here.

00:51 - In this context, also consider the re-written lyrics to “To Be Alone With You”, where he sings about wishing to be back in his “true love’s arms / She likes older men, they can’t resist her charms”. Here he directly writes from the place of an “older man”. The same is true for “Spirit on the Water” where he resist the accusation that he’s “over the hill” or past his prime and insists that, given a chance, he’s show her a “whoppin’ good time”.

You can support Definitely Dylan on Patreon or with a one-off donation at http://buymeacoffee.com/definitelydylan.

Book your Bob Dylan Walking Tour of NYC with Rebecca on https://www.ramblintours.com/.

Get your Definitely Dylan baseball cap here.

Rebecca’s bootleg version is here.

In this episode Laura talks to Jake Xerxes Fussell about Bob Dylan the folksinger, and the albums Good As I Been to You (1992) and World Gone Wrong (1993). We discuss the song selection, their textured beauty, and what they can retroactively tell us about that moment in Dylan’s career.

Jake Xerxes Fussell is a guitarist and singer from Columbus, Georgia, who arranges and performs traditional folksongs. He has released five studio albums and recently co-composed (with James Elkington) a feature length soundtrack film score.

He tours regularly in the United States, Canada, and Europe. His sixth and forthcoming album, “The Old Beloved Path,” will be released by Fat Possum Records on September 18th.

You can support Definitely Dylan on Patreon or with a one-off donation at http://buymeacoffee.com/definitelydylan.

Get your Definitely Dylan baseball cap here.

Today we're talking about Bob Dylan's fashion through the years!

What's your favourite outfit Bob Dylan has worn, or which style do you most associate with him?

You can read Graley Herren's excellent essay on gender performance in Bob Dylan's The Philosophy of Modern Song here.

And the other essay we mention about Gorgeous George can be found on Graley's Substack.

Check out Ray's interview with JJ Holiday, who played with Bob Dylan on Letterman in 1984 and lent him his outfit here.

Around 01:13, I'm talking about the chapter on "There Stands the Glass" in The Philosophy of Modern Song, where Dylan writes about the history of tailors Nuta Kotlyarenko, or Nudie Cohn, and Manuel Cuevas.

Follow Britt Eisnor on Instagram for great in depth research in to a lot of Dylan and The Band related topics, but also content on Bob's fashion.

Shot_of_love_69 – whose name is Alaina – who made the beautiful jacket for Britt is also a must-follow.

You can support Definitely Dylan on Patreon or with a one-off donation at http://buymeacoffee.com/definitelydylan.

Book your Bob Dylan Walking Tour of NYC with Rebecca on https://www.ramblintours.com/.

Get your Definitely Dylan baseball cap here.

Rebecca’s bootleg version is here.

In this week's Bob Dylan Hotline, we're talking about Bob Dylan's vocals! What do YOU think his sexiest, spookiest, and most moving vocals are?

This question comes from Graley Herren, one of the most referenced people on this podcast because we think he's great, and he has a new book coming out in September, which traces Dylan's career through the lens of his performances in just one city! Pre-order your copy of Dylan in Cincinnati here.

Also check out Graley's Substack.

You can support Definitely Dylan on Patreon or with a one-off donation at http://buymeacoffee.com/definitelydylan.

Book your Bob Dylan Walking Tour of NYC with Rebecca on https://www.ramblintours.com/.

Get your Definitely Dylan baseball cap here.

Rebecca’s bootleg version is here.

In this week’s Bob Dylan Hotline we talk about the state of Dylanology, Dylan Studies, whatever you may call it, as well as the groundwork laid by fans. Plus, Rebecca reports back from when Bob Dylan Long Hot Summer stopped at Forest Hills, Queens!

Check out the Dylan Review here.

You can download the pdf of Bob Dylan Interviews by Artur Jarosinski here.

The Olof Bjorner site I mentioned is now part of BobServe.

If you have a question for us, send us a voice memo to bobdylanhotline[at]gmail.com.

For anything else get in touch at itsdefinitelydylan[at]gmail.com

You can support Definitely Dylan on Patreon or with a one-off donation at http://buymeacoffee.com/definitelydylan.

Book your Bob Dylan Walking Tour of NYC with Rebecca on https://www.ramblintours.com/.

Get your Definitely Dylan baseball cap here.

Rebecca’s bootleg version is here.

When Bob Dylan began his career, murder ballads were having a bit of a moment. In this episode, we’ll look into the influence these songs had on the young artist, and how they inspired a particular subset of his own early songs.

You can support Definitely Dylan on Patreon or with a one-off donation at http://buymeacoffee.com/definitelydylan.

Get your Definitely Dylan baseball cap here.

This week on the Bob Dylan Hotline Laura and Rebecca are talking about Bob Dylan's pronouns!

In 1978, Bob Dylan told Craig McGregor,

"Tangled Up In Blue [was] the first [song] I ever wrote that I felt free enough to change all the... what is it, the tenses around, is that what it is? [...] The he and the she and the I and the you, and the we and the us–I figured it was all the same anyway – I could throw them all in where they floated right – and it works on that level."

How does this changing around of pronouns affect how we hear the song? And why does Dylan favour writing in the second person rather than the first? Joni Mitchell has something to say about that.

You can listen to Rebecca talk about "Like a Rolling Stone" on the Pod Dylan podcast here.

Find the Substack version of Graley Herren's essay on "Sweetheart Like You" here.

In case anyone's interested in what I did end up talking about at the conference about Bob Dylan and Masculinity conference, you can watch my talk here.

The line from "I Contain Multitudes" about "four pistols and two large knives" is from Shelby Foote's history of the Civil War, as James Adams (bob_notes on Twitter/X) noted here.

If you have a question for us, send us a voice memo to bobdylanhotline[at]gmail.com.

For anything else get in touch at itsdefinitelydylan[at]gmail.com

You can support Definitely Dylan on Patreon or with a one-off donation at http://buymeacoffee.com/definitelydylan.

Book your Bob Dylan Walking Tour of NYC with Rebecca on https://www.ramblintours.com/.

Get your Definitely Dylan baseball cap here.

Rebecca’s bootleg version is here.

This week Laura talks to writer, editor, and musician Sam Sodomsky about the trilogy of Great American Songbook albums, Shadows in the Night (2015), Fallen Angels (2016), and Triplicate (2017) – a move that for some legacy artists might be predictable, but that for Bob Dylan was a real curveball.

You can support Definitely Dylan on Patreon or with a one-off donation at http://buymeacoffee.com/definitelydylan.

Get your Definitely Dylan baseball cap here.

In this week’s Bob Dylan Hotline Laura and Rebecca about the way we listen to music – how do shifts in technology affect the way artists present their work and does that change the way we relate to it? Is the album still relevant or on its way out? And how does all this affect what we consider to be part of the Bob Dylan canon?

I barely ended up quoting from it, but do yourself a favour and read Graley Herren's excellent essay on Bob Dylan's 1980 San Francisco Residency.

If you have a question for us, send us a voice memo to bobdylanhotline@gmail.com.
For anything else get in touch at itsdefinitelydylan@gmail.com

You can support Definitely Dylan on Patreon or with a one-off donation at http://buymeacoffee.com/definitelydylan.

Book your Bob Dylan Walking Tour of NYC with Rebecca on https://www.ramblintours.com/.

Get your Definitely Dylan baseball cap here.

This week on the Bob Dylan Hotline we're talking about Bob Dylan and Paul McCartney – two extraordinary artists whose paths have crossed several times over the decade, and whose influence on the other has been significant. They're similar in some ways, very different in others – let's talk about it!

Watch the video of this conversation on YouTube.

Check out Dean's radio show the TEN AM here:

If you have a question for us, send us a voice memo to bobdylanhotline@gmail.com.
For anything else get in touch at itsdefinitelydylan@gmail.com

You can support Definitely Dylan on Patreon or with a one-off donation at http://buymeacoffee.com/definitelydylan.

Book your Bob Dylan Walking Tour of NYC with Rebecca on https://www.ramblintours.com/.

Get your Definitely Dylan baseball cap here.

In this episode, Laura talks to history professor Court Carney about Bob Dylan and Nostalgia – Dylan’s relationship to the past and the future, The Odyssey, and Don Draper.

Here are a few things we reference that you might want to check out:

Eric Lott’s book, Love and Theft: Blackface Minstrelsy and the American Working Class, from which Dylan took the title of his 2001 album.

Mad Men - Carousel pitch

Mad Men - Don’t Think Twice scene

You can buy The Politics and Power of Bob Dylan’s Live Performances: “Play a Song for Me”, edited by Court and Erin C Callahan here.

You can read my essay in this collection, “Today and Tomorrow and Yesterday Too”, about Bob Dylan and Time in the 2020s –which I think is highly relevant in the context of this conversation–for free over on Patreon.

And you can watch the talk I gave in Miami about film, painting, and making time stand still over here:

Court’s Substack and website: https://www.courtcarney.com/

You can support Definitely Dylan on Patreon or with a one-off donation at http://buymeacoffee.com/definitelydylan.

Get your Definitely Dylan baseball cap here.

In today's Bob Dylan Hotline, Laura and Rebecca get a little mystical. Bob Dylan himself has often described the creative process as magical, and through the years has also been drawn to mysticism like the Tarot. We talk about creativity as alchemy, which Tarot card Bob Dylan most identified with, and the spell that music can cast.

The Tarot deck we’re referring to is the Rider-Waite-Smith deck from 1909, illustrated by Pamela Coleman Smith.

Listen to the podcast episode about Creation and Creativity in "My Own Version of You" and "Mother of Muses" here.

If you have a question for us, send us a voice memo to bobdylanhotline@gmail.com.
For anything else get in touch at itsdefinitelydylan@gmail.com

You can support Definitely Dylan on Patreon or with a one-off donation at http://buymeacoffee.com/definitelydylan.

Book your Bob Dylan Walking Tour of NYC with Rebecca on https://www.ramblintours.com/.

Get your Definitely Dylan baseball cap here.

Buried on one of Bob Dylan's lesser 80s albums, "Brownsville Girl" is consistently cited as one of his greatest and most ambitious songs. Co-written by playwright/screenwriter/director/actor Sam Shepard, the song originally came to life as "New Danville Girl”. It was recorded, put aside, and then ultimately rewritten and overdubbed before finally seeing the light of day.

Laura and Rebecca talk about creative collaboration, the alchemy of the songwriting process, and what we love about "Brownsville Girl"

Find the video of this conversation over on YouTube

Read Bill Lattanzi’s essay that we’re referring to over at the Dylan Review.

Find out more about Mason Moreno’s research into the Dylan/Shepard Tapes over on the Infinity Goes Up on Trialpodcast.

Read Sam Shepard’s play True Dylan over on Esquire.

Watch Gregory Peck’s entire speech introducing Bob Dylan here.

If you have a question for us, send us a voice memo to bobdylanhotline@gmail.com.
For anything else get in touch at itsdefinitelydylan@gmail.com

Get your Definitely Dylan baseball cap here.
You can support Definitely Dylan on Patreon or with a one-off donation at http://buymeacoffee.com/definitelydylan.

This week on the Bob Dylan Hotline, Laura and Rebecca brainstorm the best songs and albums to introduce someone to Bob Dylan’s music.

Send us your question to bobdylanhotline@gmail.com (itsdefinitelydylan@gmail.com for all other inquiries)

Get your Definitely Dylan baseball cap here.

You can support Definitely Dylan on Patreon or with a one-off donation at http://buymeacoffee.com/definitelydylan.

Laura talks to Jim Windolf, music journalist and features editor at the New York Times, about his new book Where the Music Had to Go: How Bob Dylan and the Beatles Changed Each Other – and the World, out now with Scribner (US) and White Rabbit (UK).

You can support Definitely Dylan on Patreon or with a one-off donation at http://buymeacoffee.com/definitelydylan.