you too shall burn

[really real]

Rollin' and Tumblin' came up on my bobPod today and this line jumped out
at me:

"Well, I got up this mornin', see the rising sun return
Sooner or later, you too shall burn "


What a dumb line. There's something very clumsy about "Sooner or later,
you too shall burn."

I like it when Bob does a parody of the god of wrath, but he did it so
much better in Things Have Changed:

"I've been walkin' forty miles of bad road
If the Bible is right the world will explode"


That "Sooner or later, you too shall burn " line feels like it should
have been eliminated a few demos before the finished product. In this
latest creative period, Dylan is undeniably spewing out songs and
couplets at a furious rate, and he's got enough good ones to keep his
Nobel Prize hopes alive. But there are the occasional duds.

[Dr_dudley]

might've worked better:

"Sooner or later, one of us must burn"

or not

[Just Walkin']

Depends.

Only if Bob believes there are winners and losers.

But not if he believes we all burn in the end ("you too" I take to
mean "we.")

Do you think Bob believes in the shared fate of death or that there
are winners and losers in dying?

[Dr_dudley]

Good question. I don't know what bob believes. Certainly if he has a
lick of sense he believes in the shared fate of death, a consequence
of birth, busy or other.

Probably we could comb his lyrics with double-aught grit to determine
his consternation with winning and losing, never being sure if he was
straight ahead or sidestepping.

That said, given sir real's discomfiture with things religioso/
spiritwise, we'd probably need to have input from, say, Br'er Jumbo to
cast light on "rising sun (Son) return". or conjecture that bob's
simply talking about sunbathing.

( we can't posit that "you too" is all-inclusive; a brimstoner might
include sinners while excluding the sanctified )

but again, rr might be right, the lyric might better have been
excised. in the folk blues tradition it might be one time but not the
other. how many songs suggest that the singer would rather sleep in a
hollow log than every to see her face again, but in the next iteration
he'd rather be where the sun would never shine?

but why focus on that verse? in the verse prior bob sings of warm
weather coming, in verse after long dead souls.

so i look up "greenwood glen", thinking it might be an oldtimey or
literary reference such as to cast light. find two things. one is an
apparently gated community, or at least one with an HOA, in Virginia.
also an outfit Boys of Greenwood Glen, a semi trad drinking band with
an irish problem:
http://www.myspace.com/boysofgreenwoodglen

(there's still a myspace?)

they do a decent "More Pretty Girls than One"

that's about it really
___
woody did it purty good too, with Cisco & Sonny, but not Leadbelly
More Pretty Girls Than One
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w5STw5HQpWY

(just a reminder)
Rollin' and Tumblin' Part 1 and 2 - MUDDY WATERS
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c2GiCKKO390

severally others out there too

[M. Rick]

> That said, given sir real's discomfiture with things religioso/ spiritwise, we'd probably need to have input from, say, Br'er Jumbo to cast light on "rising sun (Son) return". or conjecture that bob's simply talking about sunbathing.

Sun > Sun Records > Memphis > Elvis > Dylan > Jesus. Sooner >
Oklahoma > Wanda Jackson > Elvis > Dylan > Jesus. All roads lead to
the Son.

[M. Rick]

>But not if he believes we all burn in the end ("you too" I take to mean "we.")

Much like the career of the music star, the sun will expand, shrink
and die. The expansion phase will consume the earth, but by that time
Dylan and his fans should be well acclimated to intense heat.

[M. Rick]

>Dylan is undeniably spewing out songs and couplets at a furious rate, and he's got enough good ones to keep his Nobel Prize hopes alive.

Kate Upton's couplets are more prize-worthy.

[Dr_dudley]

doesn't Jack White belong in there somewhere?

> All roads lead to
> the Son.

or, put another way, if you don't know where you're going, any road
will take you there.

[m'lyah]

If you don't know where you are going, simply remember that "all those
who wander are not lost". Also. that sometimes one must be willing to
lose (parts of self) before new ones can be found and added to the sum
In other words, even badly damaged cars could be repaired once they
get found.

[nate]

...or get photographed in their wild beauty and win a art show ribbon.


- nate

[Emoticonal Nickname]

... or salute the XT International Brigade, climb on board and simply
take it from there, in good joy.

- melia


(thanks for playing, more fun that way)