Fifty years after showing up in Greenwich Village with an acoustic guitar, Bob Dylan has been busy. Here are my top Fifty Dylan songs. Mojo Magazine ranked Dylan’s 100 best songs a few years ago. Those rankings are indicated in parenthesis. (NM) equals no Mojo: not on their list. After a brief comment or lyric, I reveal my favorite version of each tune.
50 Years of Creation: Dylan’s Top Fifty
1. Like a Rolling Stone (1)…twenty pages of vomit condensed…Highway 61 Revisited
2. Mr. Tambourine Man (14)…sonic and lyrical ecstasy …Bringing It ALL Back Home
3. A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall (23)…eternal prophecy,…Freewheelin” Bob Dylan
4. Idiot Wind (19)…Paranoia blowing in the wind…The Bootleg Series Vol. 1-3
5. Desolation Row (4)…A vacation destination…11-09-06 Portland, Maine
6. Blind Willie McTell (5)…Nothing but the blues…Bootleg Series Volume 1-3
7. Visions of Johanna (21)…The heat pipes just cough…Blonde on Blonde
8. Positively 4th Street (2)…What a drag it is to see you… Memphis 4-24-06
9. Stuck Inside of Mobile (59)…Oh mama, smoke eyeballs and punch my cigarette…Blonde on Blonde
10. Mississippi (9)…Chock full of mantras….Tell Tale Signs, bonus disc number three
11. Simple Twist Fate(73)…Flicked on the Dylan switch in my brain…Blood on the Tracks
12. Just Like a Woman (10)…You ache you take and you bake…Concert for Bangladesh, MSG 1971
13. It’s Alright Ma (8)…Dylan’s Commandments…Bringing It All Back Home
14. Hurricane (25)…Greatest Story Ever Told…Desire
15. It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue (7)… Forget the Dead you left, they will not follow you…Blonde on Blonde
16. I Shall Be Released (24)…I shall eat greased meat…Live at Budokhan
17. Tangled up in Blue (15)…music in the cafes at night, revolution in the air…Real Live
18. She Belongs To Me (53)…buy her a trumpet and give her a drum...Bringing It All Back Home
19. Every Grain of Sand (17)…hanging in the balance of the reality of man…Shot of Love
20. Thunder on the Mountain (NM)… powder keg of Dylan, welcome to Modern Times…7-04-07 Montreal
21. Tough Mama (NM)…Can I blow a little smoke on you?...Planet Waves
22. Tombstone Blues (94)…Mike Bloomfield’s licks between Dylan’s teeth…Highway 61 Revisited
23. Nettie Moore (NM) …the bible, love, devotion, Americana, and the world of research gone berserk…The Borgota, Atlantic City, 6-23-07
24. Where Are You Tonight? (NM) …Pain amplified, hey, hey, hey-hey…Street Legal
25. Subterranean Homesick Blues (18)… mixing up the medicine…Bringing It All Back Home
26. Ballad of a Thin Man (20)…Contacts among the lumberjacks, geeks and freaks…7-12-87 Dylan and the Dead
27. One More Cup of Coffee (57)…a cup Joe, before I go, to the valley bellow…Desire
28. Chimes of Freedom (93)…Ring them bells…Another Side of Bob Dylan
29. Girl from the Red River Shore (NM)…I adore this pearl from Tell Tale Signs
30. Master of War (16)…Make Love not war…Lake Compounce 1988
31. Man in the Long Black Coat (31)…a rumbling force…Oh Mercy!
32. I Want You (28)…Dancing child in his Chinese suit…Blonde on Blonde or 7-24-87 Dylan/ Dead
33. Not Dark Yet (41)…my sense of humanity, has gone down the drain…Time Out Of Mind
34. Workingman’s Blues (NM)…I can live on rice and beans…Modern Times
35. All Along the Watchtower (27)…This is not our fate, the hour’s getting late…7-12-87 Dylan and the Dead
36. The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll (11)…The ladder of law has no top and no bottom…Radio City Music Hall 10-20-1988
37. Senor (Tales of Yankee Power)(90)…I can smell the tail of the dragon, this place don’t make sense to me no more…1-17-98 MSG
38. Don’t Fall Apart On Me Tonight (NM)…Yesterday’s gone but the past lives on…Infidels outtake
39. Things Have Changed (74)…People are crazy, times are strange…4-6-2007 Las Vegas
40. It Ain’t Me Babe (6)…no no no…Lake Compounce 1988
41. Ballad of Frankie Lee and Judas Priest (NM)…Don’t go mistaking paradise for that home across the road…John Wesley Harding
42. It Takes a Lot to Laugh, It Takes a Train to Cry (87)…Blues to the bone, finger snapping, foot stomping…No Direction Home Soundtrack
43. The Time’s They Are-A Changin’ (22)…Admit that the waters around you have grown…Waters around you have grown…The Times They Are A-Changin’
44. Isis (35)…”This is a song about marriage, this is for Sam Peckinpah, if he’s still here” said Dylan…11-21-75, Boston Music Hall, but the best version is on Desire
45. Love Minus Zero (32)…even the pawn must hold a grudge…Brining It All Back Home
46. Love Sick (12)…I hear the clock tick (boink, boink, boink) I’m Love Sick…1998 Grammys, Soy Bomb
47. Ain’t Talkin’ (NM)…still yearnin’ and burnin’, colossal…Modern Times
48. Don’t Think Twice, It’s Alright (46)…Love Lessons 1963…6-21-91 Munich, Germany
49. You’re a Big Girl Now (77)…Love Lessons 1974…Blood on the Tracks
50. A tie…Shooting Star Oh Mercy, Knockin On Heaven’s Door, 1986 Hard to Handle Soundtrack…Selah
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