Desolation Row
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| “Desolation Row” | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Song by Bob Dylan | |||||
| Album | Highway 61 Revisited | ||||
| Released | August 30, 1965 | ||||
| Recorded | Columbia Studios, New York, August 4, 1965 | ||||
| Genre | Rock Folk rock |
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| Length | 11:21 | ||||
| Label | Columbia | ||||
| Writer | Bob Dylan | ||||
| Producer | Bob Johnston | ||||
| Highway 61 Revisited track listing | |||||
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"Desolation Row" is the closing track of Bob Dylan's sixth studio album, Highway 61 Revisited. It is noted for its length (11:21) and surreal lyrics. It was recorded on August 4, 1965, in Columbia's Studio A in New York City. The two takes spliced for the album were the second and third time Dylan had sung the song. Charlie McCoy played acoustic guitar for the record, making it the album's only track not to feature an electric guitar.
Dylan's work from this period has received considerable critical acclaim. In the New Oxford Companion to Music, Gammond described Desolation Row as an example of Dylan's work that achieved a "high level of poetical lyricism."[citation needed]
[edit] Origins and influences of "Desolation Row"
The use of the word "Desolation" is a strong indication that Dylan was referring to Jack Kerouac's novel Desolation Angels. Kerouac spent the summer of 1956 as a fire lookout on Desolation Peak, and wrote The Dharma Bums and Desolation Angels from his life transforming experiences on the peak. On the other hand, John Steinbeck's Cannery Row is a place where the outcasts of society found a home (as in "Skid Row"). A further indication that Dylan was inspired by Steinbeck is found in his reference to Cain and Abel. In one of Steinbeck's most famous novels East of Eden he makes several references to the Book of Genesis and particularly to Cain and Abel. In a television press conference on December 3, 1965, Dylan responded to an interviewer's question about the location of Desolation Row by saying it was 'someplace in Mexico'. [1] However, the vagueness of Dylan's response undermines it's credibility, especially taking into account his notoriety for being non-cooperative and deviant during interviews.
Al Kooper, who played organ and piano on the album, claimed in his autobiography that "Desolation Row" was Eighth Avenue in New York City. At the time, this was a very dangerous part of town, and it is likely that Dylan's experiences in Greenwich Village had a powerful influence on him. However, it's much more likely that Desolation Row isn't a specific place at all, but rather a metaphor for a desolate state of mind.
There is also a strong suggestion that the image and content of "Desolation Row" was influenced by Dylan's native town of Duluth, Minnesota, located at the northern end of Highway 61. The opening lines of the song, "They're selling postcards of the hanging... The circus is in town", appear to have been drawn from the Duluth lynchings, which occurred in Duluth.
Lastly, T. S. Eliot's The Waste Land also appears to have influenced "Desolation Row." T. S. Eliot had died earlier in 1965.
[edit] References
- ^ Dylan on Dylan, page 61. Wenner Media, 2006
