Dylan and the Beats: part two

As I noted in yesterday's posting - Dylan and the Beats: Part One - the exploration of the politics of ecstasy is a common denominator for both Allen Ginsberg and Bob Dylan. To be sure, Ginsberg celebrated the importance of Kerouac as the key to the maturation of young Dylan's vision - and there is a real 'on the road' legacy happening with him - but it is clearly Ginsberg who showed Dylan a way through the wilderness into his true potential as a poet. Kerouac had a groove - and the jazz poetry of "Mexico City Blues" is foundational - but without the passion, insight and bold imagery of "Howl," well...

Apparently the two artists met sometime in late 1963: Ginsberg once suggested that the two encountered one another during the Tom Paine awards ceremony of the Emergency Civil Liberties Committee - a wildass affair in which Dylan spoke of identifying with Lee Harvey Oswald in addition to ranting and spewing against the artistic straight-jacket he felt within the oppressive political correctness of the New York progressive world - but this is unlikely. Rather it was most likely at a party in the 8th Street Book Shop in Greenwich Village in December 1963. Dylan proposed that Ginsberg join him on tour - a fascinating idea that never came to pass - but marks the start of a lifelong friendship for both poets.

Dylan had explored the Beats during his stint at the University of Minnesota - reading "Howl" and other works in college - but there was no Beat influence on his first three albums:

+ The 1962 release of "Bob Dylan" was rooted in the blues/folk tradition of Woody Guthrie. Only two songs were originals - "Song to Woody" and "Talkin' New York" - and both were odes to Guthrie in style and content while the rest were reworkings of country and blues songs.

+ The 1963 album, "The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan," showed the artist moving deeper into a contemporary take on Guthrie's topical/political material including songs like "Blowin' in the Wind," "Masters of War" and "A Hard Rain's a-Gonna Fall." Ginsberg has said that upon returning from Europe someone played him this album and he was moved to tears by the beauty, depth and power of Dylan's lyric poetry.

+ And the 1964 debut of record number three, "The Times They Are a-Changin," shows no Beat influence either. In fact, this album builds on ethos of album number two - some have suggested in a sometimes heavy handed way - with songs like the title cut as well as "Only a Pawn in Their Game" and "With God on Our Side." It was a bleak and pessimistic collection of tunes - and when Dylan was finished he seriously considered getting out of music - but three inter-related events - and probably LOTS more - bring the spirit of the Beats back into Dylan's conscious creativity:

+ First, he meets Ginsberg in December 1963 and is reconnected to the Beat vision and the politics of ecstasy just before leaving on his "on the road" trip through America.

+ During this February/March 1964 road trip, Dylan returns to the poetry of Arthur Rimbaud - AND - discovers the joy and energy of the Beatles while in Colorado declaring, "did you hear that? That was fucking great!"

+ By April 1964 Dylan had started experimenting with LSD. During his folk music concert in Europe he meets Nico - later of the Velvet Underground fame - who travels with him throughout the tour. They take time off at the end of the tour during which time Dylan completes the songs for album number four in a small village in Greece.

What a difference some Ginsberg, a road trip, the Beatles, a wild woman and some acid made! Clearly something was going on here and almost NOBODY knew what it was, did we, Mr. Jones? Album number four, "Another Side of Bob Dylan" - a title he HATED but hadn't yet cultivated the inner strength or artistic clout to fight the "suits" of Columbia Records - was a radical departure from everything to date: the songs were introspective, the spirit was upbeat, wild and optimistic while sound has been described as Dylan's first rock and roll record albeit without a band!

+ The liner notes read like a 60s reincarnation of the Beat poets at their best and pointed to a style of song writing yet to come (watch out: Subterranean Homesick Blues is just around the corner!)

baby black's
been had
ain't bad
smokestacked
chicken shacked
dressed in black
silver monkey
on her back
mammy ma
juiced pa
janitored
between the law
brothers ten
rat-faced
gravestoned
ditch dug
firescaped an' substroked
choked
baby black
hits back
robs, pawns
lives by trade
sits an' waits on fire plug
digs the heat
eyes meet
picket line
across the street
head rings
of bed springs
freedom's holler
you ask of order
she'd hock
the world
for a dollar an' a quarter
baby black
dressed in black
gunny sack
about t' crack
been gone
carry on
i'm givin' you
myself t' pawn

+ Sometimes Dylan whoops like Little Richard - his early love - or maybe it's like the singing brakeman, Jimmie Rogers, on "All I Really Want to Do."

+ "My Back Pages" keeps telling us in the refrain: "oh but I was so much older then I'm younger than that now."

+ "And there are NO finger pointing songs on this record," as Dylan told Nat Hentoff of the Village Voice.

None - which made the cultural commissar of the American Left, Irwin Silber of Sing Out Magazine, write that Dylan had lost touch with the common people. Not only was he lost in introspection and dangerously adrift in a culture of consumption, but he was flirting with wasting the gift of his muse. Which was ideological and cultural bullshit, but carried a lot of weight with the folk music Stalinists of the day. No wonder Dylan had to hit the road and take acid! These people were stealing his soul!

This was the season, too, when "Mr. Tambourine Man," "Lay Down Your Weary Tune" and what eventually became "Outlaw Blues" were written... and they were only the tip of the iceberg that fused the spirit and sound of "Howl" with the sound of rock and roll and the new connections unlocked by LSD. The songs came out and were highlighted during the Newport Folk Festival in July 1964. Johnny Cash loved the new Dylan sound and started incorporating his tunes into his road show. The Byrds got wind of "Tambourine Man" and eventually made it a hit a year later. Even ultra-pop bands like The Turtles and Sonny and Cher were making hay with tunes from this album while the critics panned it.

They didn't know what to make of this "other side" of Bob Dylan - so he told them 11 months later when "Bringing It All Back Home" hit the world in May 1965. (Take a moment - or 7 - to dig Springsteen's great take on a song from this time in Dylan's development.)