Remarks:
Bob Dylan wrote it and Jimi Hendrix played and sang it at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967. Monterey was where Hendrix made his name in America, more for his guitar playing than for any particular song.
Lyrics:
[Well right now we like to dedicate this song to everybody here with heart, hearts and ears… Goes somethin’ like this]
[Yeah… When I say now…]
[Yes as I said before it’s really groovy… Like to bore you for about six or seven minutes, and do a little thing]
[Yeah could ya ‘scuse me for a minute, just lemme play my guitar alright?]
[right now, different thing by Bob Dylan, that’s his gramma over there, this little thing called “Like a Rolling Stone”]
Once upon a time you dressed so fine,
Threw the bums a dime in your prime, didn’t you?
People’d call, say, “Beware doll, you’re bound to fall,”
You thought they all were a’kiddin’ you.
You used to laugh about
Everybody that was uh hangin’ out.
Look atcha
But now you don’t talk so loud,
Now you don’t, baby, seem so proud,
About having to be scrounging your next meal…
Yeah
How does it feel?
Oh, how does it feel, baby?
To be on your own?
No direction home
Look atcha…
A complete unknown
Like a rolling stone
Gone to the finest school all right, Miss Lonely,
But you know you only used to get juiced in it.
Nobody here-a taught you how to live in the streets,
And now you just gonna have to get used to it
You say you never, never compromise
With a mystery tramp, but now you, you got to realize
He’s not selling any alibis
As you stare into the vacuum of his eyes
And he says, “Hey baby would you like to make a deal?
How does it feel, baby?
How does it feel?
To be on your own?
No direction home
A complete unknown
Look atcha, like a rolling stone
Princess on the steeple and all the pretty people,
They all laugh and drinkin’ thinkin’ that they
Got it made
Exchanging all precious gifts and things,
But you’d better take your diamond ring, I think you’d better, you’d better pawn it babe.
Yes I know I missed the verse, don’t worry
You used to be so amused
At Napoleon in rags and the sweet talk that he used.
Go to him now, he calls you, you can’t refuse.
When you ain’t got nothing, you’ve got-a nothing to lose
You’re invisible now, you’ve got no secrets to conceal…
How does it feel?
Oh, how does it feel, baby?
To be on your own?
No direction home
A complete unknown
Look at ya, like a rolling stone
Today some boneheads say black guys can’t play rock. Duh? Who invented it? Jimi was something!
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Good post. Hendrix was a huge Dylan fan. His arrangement of Dylan’s “All along the Watchtower” was so influential that Dylan started playing it Hendrix style.
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I like it.
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Jimi!
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I love this song – hell, I love pretty much anything that Jimi did…he was a legend. 😎
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Jimi was probably the most influential and important rock guitarist in history. He transcended being merely a musician. He literally transformed the way in which the guitar is played as an instrument, single-handedly creating a new genre for the guitar. Like Segovia for classical guitar or Reinhardt for Hot Club style jazz, Hendrix is the bedrock on which all modern rock guitar is built.
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Hendrix did Bob Dylan very well. One of the few male artists (if not the only) who was able to bring his own mood and feeling to the Dylan material.
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