Podcast: Bob Dylan's "I Contain Multitudes" - What Does It All Mean?

On the 17 April, Bob Dylan released his second surprise song in one month, "I Contain Multitudes". Borrowing more than just the title from Walt Whitman's poem "Song of Myself", Bob Dylan paints a vivid modern portrait of a country divided.

Laura takes a close look at the new song and asks the hard hitting questions: is “I Contain Multitudes” Bob Dylan’s own take on Song of Myself? Is this Dylan’s way of finally embracing the responsibility of being a thought leader and voice of his generation? Listen and find out more!

Bob Dylan's "Murder Most Foul": JFK, Conspiracy Theories, and the Soul of America

In the midst of a terrifying pandemic, Bob Dylan has released his first original song in eight years. “Murder Most Foul” is a 17 minute long epic about the assassination of John F. Kennedy. But as with much of Dylan’s work, a closer look reveals much more. I have tried to put my initial thoughts into words, but unravelling all the cultural references alone could take hours!

So this episode is a reflection not only on this song, but also on what it means to be a Bob Dylan fan in this day and age.

I hope you enjoy it, and if you do, please share!

Here’s the Spotify playlist with all the music referenced in “Murder Most Foul”:

Also, here’s the link to the Tom Paine award speech and the apology letter, and you might be interested in these Kennedy poems, which Dylan wrote shortly after the JFK assassination.

I hope you’re holding up out there and taking care of yourself both physically and mentally.

Laura

Definitely Dylan Podcast Trailer

Definitely Dylan is now also a podcast!

Definitely Dylan Live - 15 March 2020

This week we’re bringing you Definitely Dylan’s belated International Women’s Day episode (after all, every day is Women’s Day)!

On this occasion we’re dedicating the hour to the many women that have sung Bob Dylan’s songs over the years by playing a small selection of songs from the Spotify playlist I’ve put together! Join us in celebrating these artists and the contributions they have made to our understanding of Dylan’s work, by reframing the songs and often showing us a different and new dimension to the song’s meaning.

If you’re interested in checking out the IWD episodes from previous years, here’s the “Women & Dylan” episode from 2018, where I make a case for importance of female perspectives in the discussion of Dylan’s songs, especially in their treatment of women. And here’s the one from last year, with requests from female Dylan fans.

If you’d like to check out the episode in which I analyse the song She Belongs To Me, you can listen to that here.

One version that we didn’t have time for and that I couldn’t include in the playlist because it’s not on Spotify, is Ren Harvieu’s gorgeous Just Like A Woman, which she recorded for Definitely Dylan the other week. If you haven’t heard that yet, I urge you to check it out!

Below you can find the Spotify playlist that I’ve put together of some fantastic Dylan covers sung by women. I hope you’ll enjoy it and maybe discover some new favourites. I’d love to know your thoughts!

Let me know what your favourite version of a Dylan song interpreted by a female artist is by leaving a comment below - I’m always up for discovering more!

Correction: the Jackie DeShannon version of Don’t Think Twice (It’s All Right) that we played in this episode id not the one that appeared on her 1965 album, but rather one that she recorded in 1973 (this version remained unrelased until 2015, when it appeared on the compilation All the Love: The Lost Atlantic Recordings). The actual 1965 version has a much more mid-60s folk pop accompaniment, and you can listen to it here.

Playlist:

1. Like A Rolling Stone - Maxine Weldon

2. Clothes Line Saga - Suzzy & Maggie Roche

3. Ain’t Talkin’ - Bettye LaVette

4. Covenant Woman - Hannah Cohen

5. Don’t Think Twice (It’s All Right) - Jackie DeShannon

6. She Belongs To Me - Ane Brun

7. Gotta Serve Somebody Etta James

Definitely Dylan Live - 1 March 2020

On this week’s Definitely Dylan Live, we are discussing some very fine live performances from different points of Bob Dylan’s career, ranging from the confident folk troubadour to the Never Ending Tour.

I’d love to know - when did you last listen to Live at Budokan? Do you agree with us that it’s better or at least more interesting than people give it credit for? And what do you think of the year 1994 in terms of Dylan’s live performances? If you have some shows in mind that we should check out, please leave us a comment.

Lastly, I mentioned that I uploaded Ren Harvieu’s performance of Just Like A Woman to youtube, so if you’d like to listen to that again, you can do that here, while Romeo’s Dylan anecdote can be found here. I’ll be uploading Romeo’s video of Most Of The Time as well, I just haven’t finished it yet.

Playlist:

1. Wade In The Water (Minnesota Hotel Tape)

2. She Belongs to Me (Live at the Savoy Hotel, London, UK, 8 May, 1965)

3. To Ramona (Live at the Isle of Wight Festival, 31 August, 1969)

4. Oh Sister (Live at Budokan)

5. Shelter From The Storm (Live at the Roseland Ballroom, NYC, Oct 19, 1994)

6. Cocaine Blues (Live, August 24, 1997, Vienna, VA)