I used to wonder what constitutes the fascination of Bob Dylan songs. In my early 20s I used to sing and play songs at camp fires from time to time, more or less poorly. A couple of Dylan songs were among my favorites, including It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue (Bringing It All Back Home, 1965). I felt like so many others: while I didn’t really “get” the song, it struck me as something magical.
I never dared to try and play the monumental Like a Rolling Stone (Highway 61 Revisited, 1965). However, when listening to it, shivers ran down my spine.
This is how I see it today: Bob Dylan possesses a rare ability to address knowledge hidden deep within people – a knowledge that cannot be explained by experiences made in the current incarnation. I believe we carry experiences of many lives within us – not in terms of concrete details, but in essence. For example, some people know all too well that taking their own life is not an option, however tragic their life may turn out. The immortal part of their being has already made that experience at least once; intuitively, they know that this is not a means of escaping from suffering. They have to accept it and deal with it as best they can in their current life.
This relates to how I feel about Like a Rolling Stone: a story about a person, presumably a woman, who was at the top and lost everything. Contrary to many popular songs and stories, there is no consolation, no appeasement, no happy end – just a pure exploration of a primal human feeling. How could this hit me so hard as a teenager? I grew up well protected – for sure I have not experienced anything like this in my life, yet I could relate to it instantly. Apparently, a lot of people felt similarly. Dylan’s classic song was ranked no. 1 in the Top 500 Songs of Rolling Stone Magazine in 2004 and 2010. In the revised lists of 2021 and 2024 it dropped to no. 4.
Bruce Springsteen on Bob Dylan’s Like a Rolling Stone
Bruce Springsteen described listening to the song as a 15-year-old:
It sounded like somebody kicked open the door to your mind.
Like Elvis Presley had freed the body, Dylan had freed the mind. There was someone who could take on the whole world, and he gave him, Springsteen, the feeling he could do it, too.
Bruce Springsteen inducts Bob Dylan in the R&R Hall of Fame, 1988
German singer Wolfgang Niedecken on Bob Dylan’s Like a Rolling Stone
Wolfgang Niedecken, founder of the German band BAP, also first heard the song at age 15.
That song really hit me like lightning. It was so incredibly different to anything I had known.
I chose Like A Rolling Stone [when asked about his 7 favorite songs, placing it at no. 1] because it changed my life. From the moment I listened to it, nothing was as it had been before. I quit playing bass and tried to write songs.
Here’s a version I particularly like musically, by Polish artists Stanisław Soyka und Janusz Iwanski a.k.a. Yanina – for anyone not too much into Dylan’s voice:
In Lord Protect My Child (recorded for Infidels 1983, but only published on The Bootleg Series Volumes 1-3 (Rare & Unreleased) 1961-1991), Dylan testifies to a view extending far beyond one human life. He observes his little boy, wishing him to be protected by the lord. While his youth unfolds, he sees him as centuries old at the same time.
More stuff (note: paid links):
Bob Dylan – Highway 61 Revisited
Rolling Thunder Revue: A Bob Dylan Story by Martin Scorsese
Greil Marcus: Like a Rolling Stone: Bob Dylan at the Crossroads