Like Christ, he refers to the personal suffering involved in his role of saviour as a ‘cup’. The imagery in the second verse serves a number of purposes.įirst, to establish the narrator’s lack of spiritual commitment, it presents him as a parody of Christ. Having been forced to accept his own responsibility for alleviating suffering, he welcomes procrastination as a means of escape. He must wait for them to be old enough to shoulder their share of the burden. He and the saviours can work together – but not yet. Instead, he responds by making an excuse for his own lack of action: Unfortunately, he seems not to notice that this puts him on a par with God, pointing the way to the spiritual union he wants. If neither the political authorities, nor the next generation are in a position to help, then God must intervene.Īt this point the narrator seems to realise that ‘you’ could equally refer to himself. Not only are these ‘saviours’ asleep, but since the expression ‘fast asleep’ normally applies only to young children, he must realise that looking to them would be futile.īut who is ‘you’? The narrator seems to be putting the ball back in God’s court.
Instead he looks to an equally impotent source of help: Yet he does nothing, despite recognising from the drunkenness and perverse leaping of the politician that there can be no political solution to their plight: Those in need of help are represented by the weeping mothers of the second verse. This leads him to ignore the suffering of others. From the start he at least shows some willingness to resist the pressure:Īnd in the fifth verse, he comes closest to experiencing the spiritual union he craves, albeit at second-hand.Īlthough the song ends with the narrator still yearning, that’s because he associates the spiritual solely with an external God, the ‘you’ of the title, rather than with selfless action. In deliberately ignoring the plight of those around him, he’s unconsciously destroying any chance of spiritual fulfilment.Īlthough the song ends with his behaviour increasingly at odds with his spiritual longing, there have nevertheless been signs of hope. 1 The narrator finds himself under pressure to ‘refuse you’ – God – the object of his spiritual quest: Spiritual death abounds, first in the guise of the guilty undertaker, and then as a lonesome organ grinder – the latter suggestive of a dreary and otherwise empty church. The narrator’s apparent yearning for romance is in fact a yearning for something more spiritual. Perfect.A guilty undertaker, saxophones that speak, weeping mothers, a broken cup, and – above all – the mysterious Queen of Spades! A surreal nightmare? No, but neither is it just the love song implied by the title.
It’s like a great reprise at the end of a film while the credits role and there’s a sense of reflection and completion, with perhaps just a hint of sadness. The whole song sounds like something coming to an end. You just happened to be there, that’s all”
The song, which is about a relationship that has come to its end, is perfectly placed on the album, closing the first side. My current number one favourite track from Blonde on Blonde, however, has to be One Of Us Must Know (Sooner or Later). There’s a novel just waiting to be written about him! I particularly enjoy the idea of a “guilty undertaker”. I love the determined chorus of “I want you” amongst the madness of the verses and the huge cast of characters we encounter, from the “dancing child with his Chinese suit” to the “drunken politician”. In second place is I Want You, which was released as a single in 1966 with this fantastic cover: Just Like A Woman is probably the most well-known track on the album and is currently at number three in my list of favourite Blonde on Blonde tracks (a list which, admittedly, I only formed in my head a few hours ago). It has ‘classic’ status and Dylan described it as “the closest I ever got to the sound I hear in my mind… that thin, that wild-mercury sound”.
Blonde on Blonde, Bob Dylan’s seventh studio album, is frequently found in the top ten of ‘Best Albums of All Time’ lists.
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