100 Funny Bob Dylan Moments

1. "I looked at my waaaatch, I looked at my wriiiist/I punched myself in the faaaace with my fiiist."

2. "I'm gonna save all my money and rip it up."

3. "She says, 'You can't repeat the past'/I say, 'You can't? What do you mean, you can't? Of course you can.'"

(YMMV, obv.)

4. The way he sings on "Lay Lady Lay"

that took less time than I expected, good job everyone

5. "Whoever it is, I wish they'd cut it out quick/But when they will I can only guuessss."

6. PLAYBOY: Mistake or not, what made you decide to go the rock-'n'-roll route?

DYLAN: Carelessness. I lost my one true love. I started drinking. The first thing I know, I'm in a card game. Then I'm in a crap game. I wake up in a pool hall. Then this big Mexican lady drags me off the table, takes me to Philadelphia. She leaves me alone in her house, and it burns down. I wind up in Phoenix. I get a job as a Chinaman. I start working in a dime store, and move in with a 13-year-old girl. Then this big Mexican lady from Philadelphia comes in and burns the house down. I go down to Dallas. I get a job as a "before" in a Charles Atlas "before and after" ad. I move in with a delivery boy who can cook fantastic chili and hot dogs. Then this 13-year-old girl from Phoenix comes and burns the house down. The delivery boy - he ain't so mild: He gives her the knife, and the next thing I know I'm in Omaha. It's so cold there, by this time I'm robbing my own bicycles and frying my own fish. I stumble onto some luck and get a job as a carburetor out at the hot-rod races every Thursday night. I move in with a high school teacher who also does a little plumbing on the side, who ain't much to look at, but who's built a special kind of refrigerator that can turn newspaper into lettuce. Everything's going good until that delivery boy shows up and tries to knife me. Needless to say, he burned the house down, and I hit the road. The first guy that picked me up asked me if I wanted to be a star. What could I say?

PLAYBOY: And that's how you became a rock-'n'-roll singer?

DYLAN: No, that's how I got tuberculosis.

goddammit I still haven't come up with a better screen name? *sigh* xp

7. "They asked me for some collateral and I pulled down my pants."

When he auditioned to play with Bobby Vee as an organist (despite lack of any sort of mastery of the instrument), Vee asked the scrawny Minnesotan what his name was. "Elston Gunn," replied the then-Bobby Zimmerman. Laughing at the absurdity of it, Vee asked him, "Is that "Gun" with one "n" or "Gunn" with two "ns?"

"Three," replied Elston.

9. It ain't that I'm wantin'
Anything you never gave before.
It's just that I'll be sleepin' soon,
It'll be too dark for you to find the door.

10.

11. "Pack up your money, pull up your tent, McGuinn, you ain't going nowhere,"

12. [mumble mumble mumble] ". . . If only you just wouldn't clap so hard."

13. angle dupin looooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo -- austin city limits festival 2007

15. The part in the Halloween 1964 Philharmonic Hall concert where he has a member of the audience prompt the first words of I Don't Believe You for him

16. I said "They refused Jesus too."
"you're not him!"

17. The cover of Empire Burlesque

18. Well, my telephone rang it would not stop,
It's President Kennedy callin' me up.
He said, "My friend, Bob, what do we need to make the country grow?"
I said, "My friend, John, Brigitte Bardot,
Anita Ekberg,
Sophia Loren."
(Put 'em all in the same room with Ernest Borgnine!)

please come crawl out your window
use your hands and kegs it won't ruin you
how can you say he will haunt you
when you can go back to him any time that you want to

legs

20. "I'm sittin' on my watch so I can be on time."

21. "Well, I saw him makin' love to you, you forgot to close the garage door"

such a lewd song but this line is so overt that I bust out laughing everytime

22.

Well, she's got jet pilot eyes from her hips on down
All the bombardiers are trying to force her out of town
She's five feet nine and she carries a monkey wrench
She weighs more by the foot than she does by the inch

She got all the downtown boys, all at her command
But you've got to watch her closely, 'cause
she ain't no woman, she's a man.

23. What he's wearing for the Empire Burlesque sleeve

http://ec2.images-amazon.com/images/I/615ptwSwJpL._SL500_AA240_.jpg

24. "I like Fidel Castro and his beard!"

25. I'm in Boston town in some restaurant
I got no idea what I want
or maybe I do but I'm just really not sure
Waitress comes over, nobody in the place but me and her

Well it must be a holiday, there's nobody around
She studies me closely as I sit down
She got a pretty face and long white shiny legs
I said "Tell me what I want"
She say "You probably want hard boiled eggs"

I said "That's right, bring me some"
She says "We ain't got any, you picked the wrong time to come"
then she says "I know you're an artist, draw a picture of me"
I said "I would if I could but
I don't do sketches from memory"

Well she's?? near she says "I'm right here in front of you or haven't you looked"
I say "All right I know but I don't have my drawin' book"
She gives me a napkin, she say "You can do it on that"
I say "Yes I could but I don't know where my pencil is at"

She pulls one out from behind her ear
She says "Alright now go ahead draw me I'm stayin' right here"
I make a few lines and I show it for her to see
Well she takes the napkin and throws it back and says
"That don't look a thing like me"

I said "Oh kind miss, it most certainly does"
She say "You must be joking", I said "I wish I was"
She says "You don't read women authors do ya?"
at least that's what I think I hear her say
Well I say "How would you know, and what would it matter anyway"

Well she says "Ya just don't seem like ya do", I said "You're way wrong"
She says "Which ones have you read then?", I say "Read Erica Jong"
She goes away for a minute, and I slide out, out of my chair
I step outside back to the busy street, but nobody's goin' anywhere

26.

You know it balances on your head
Just like a mattress balances
On a bottle of wine
Your brand new leopard-skin pill-box hat

Such an arresting image.

27. Oh God said to Abraham, "Kill me a son"
Abe says, "Man, you must be puttin' me on"

28. Per Roger Ebert on "Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid" in 1973: "Bob Dylan plays a character named Alias, and should have used one. His screen presence makes him look as if he's the victim of a practical jokes involving itching powder."

29. You promise to love me, but what do I see? Just you comin' in and spilling juice over me.

30. Hell's my wife's home town.

Well, I run right down ’n’ bought a ticket
To this bear mountain picnic.
But little did I realize
I was in for a picnic surprise.
Had nothin’ to do with mountains.
I didn’t even come close to a bear.

31^

I wrote this a couple years back for the AV Club:
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_IgB0JLKO15Q/RqDvomie9UI/AAAAAAAACBo/EjOWWXUB9fg/s1600-h/den+feat+2+4329.jpg

oops, did that not work? http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_IgB0JLKO15Q/RqDvomie9UI/AAAAAAAACBo/EjOWWXUB9fg/s1600-h/den+feat+2+4329.jpg

Just noticed what I quickly c&p got the punchline wrong.

32. I took my potatoes down to be mashed

33. I was shadow-boxing earlier in the day
I figured I was ready for Cassius Clay
I said "Fee, fie, fo, fum, Cassius Clay, here I come
26, 27, 28, 29, I'm gonna make your face look just like mine
Five, four, three, two, one, Cassius Clay you'd better run
99, 100, 101, 102, your ma won't even recognize you
14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, gonna knock him clean right out of his spleen."

34. Now, I'm liberal, but to a degree
I want ev'rybody to be free
But if you think that I'll let Barry Goldwater
Move in next door and marry my daughter
You must think I'm crazy!
I wouldn't let him do it for all the farms in Cuba.

35. Well, I set my monkey on the log
And ordered him to do the Dog
He wagged his tail and shook his head
And he went and did the Cat instead
He's a weird monkey, very funky.

I sat with my high-heeled sneakers on
Waiting to play tennis in the noonday sun
I had my white shorts rolled up past my waist
And my wig-hat was falling in my face
But they wouldn't let me on the tennis court.

God said "No"
Abe say "What??"

matos's PLAYBOY quote sounds very funny read in a Terry Tibbs voice.

creepy orange skin and black eyeliner:

number them plz!

39. "Ladies and gentlemen please welcome the poet laureate of rock 'n' roll. The voice of the promise of the '60s counterculture. The guy who forced folk into bed with rock. Who donned makeup in the '70s and disappeared into a haze of substance abuse. Who emerged to find Jesus. Who was written off as a has-been by the end of the '80s, and who suddenly shifted gears releasing some of the strongest music of his career beginning in the late '90s. Ladies and gentlemen - Columbia recording artist Bob Dylan!"

40.

41.

42.

43. He love your sexy body, he loves your dirty mind
He loves when you hold him when you grab him from behind
Oh baby, you're such a pretty thing
I can't wait to introduce you to the other members of my gang

You don't need no wax job, you're smooth enough for me
If you need you oil changed I'll do it for you free
Oh baby, the pleasure would be all mine
If you let me drive your pickup truck and park it where the sun don't shine

Every time he touches you his hair stands up on end
His legs begin to quiver and his mind begins to bend
Oh baby, you're such a tasty treat
But I'm under doctor's orders, I'm afraid to overeat

He love your sense of humor, your disposition too
There's absolutely nothing that he don't love about you
Oh baby, I'm on my hands and knees
Life would be so simple if I only had you to please

Oh baby, turn around and say goodbye
You go to the airport now and I'm going home to cry

(Chorus)
He loves your...
Electric dumplings
Red bell peppers
Fuel injection
Service charge
Five-speed gearbox
Long indurance
Quest for junk food
Big refrigerator
Trembling wilbury
Marble earrings
Porky curtains
Power steering
Bottled water
Parts and services

(Bridge)
Dirty world, a dirty world, it's a ...ing dirty world

oh man, I forgot "Dirty World," well played

haha awesome. Cosign.

"big refrigerator"

Does he really say "porky curtains"? That's disgusting!

44. John Wesley Harding was a friend to the poor, he traveled with a gun in every hand

45.
http://blog.kir.com/archives/images/dylan_newport_2002.jpg

46. Dylan says today's recordings sound "atrocious"
Legend fine with illegal downloads because "it ain’t worth nothing anyway"

(moreso for the sub-header)

John Wesley Harding was a friend to the poor, he traveled with a gun in every hand

Ha, I'd forgotten that one.

His Buckwheat impersonation on "We Are The World"

48. No mention of SOY BOMB?

(maybe this doesn't fit the thread, since it wasn't a moment that was actually instigated by Dylan)

49. Sorry about the terrible video quality:

"Well, my daddy he didn't leave me too much, he was a very simple man, and he didn't leave me a lot but he did say this he did say SON ... he said, ...

...

...

...

he said so many things you know ..."

50. And a personal favourite of mine ... Dylan inducting Gordon Lightfoot into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame.

http://archives.cbc.ca/arts_entertainment/music/topics/743-4679/
http://www.lightfoot.ca/dylangl.htm

We could make a whole separate thread of ridiculousness based on just that clip, with everything from Anne Murray's hairdo, to Dylan missing his cues, to the spotlights furiously circling the auditorium waiting for Dylan to appear, to Dylan's sequined jacket and black leather gloves, to Dylan being too distracted to speak because he was watching himself on the video monitors behind him, to Lightfoot's rambling speech, to ...

51. Some old David Letterman anniversary show from Radio City Music Hall, where they gave him a tremendous build up and recruited a huge all-star band, and he came out and sang the laziest, slurriest "Like a Rolling Stone" ever. I'm pretty sure he just sang the vowels.

52. After a while we took in the clothes,
Nobody said very much.
Just some old wild shirts and a couple pairs of pants
Which nobody really wanted to touch.
Mama come in and picked up a book
An' Papa asked her what it was.
Someone else asked, "What do you care?"
Papa said, "Well, just because."
Then they started to take back their clothes,
Hang 'em on the line.
It was January the thirtieth
And everybody was feelin' fine.

The next day everybody got up
Seein' if the clothes were dry.
The dogs were barking, a neighbor passed,
Mama, of course, she said, "Hi!"
"Have you heard the news?" he said, with a grin,
"The Vice-President's gone mad!"
"Where?" "Downtown." "When?" "Last night."
"Hmm, say, that's too bad!"
"Well, there's nothin' we can do about it," said the neighbor,
"It's just somethin' we're gonna have to forget."
"Yes, I guess so," said Ma,
Then she asked me if the clothes was still wet.

I reached up, touched my shirt,
And the neighbor said, "Are those clothes yours?"
I said, "Some of 'em, not all of 'em."
He said, "Ya always help out around here with the chores?"
I said, "Sometime, not all the time."
Then my neighbor, he blew his nose
Just as papa yelled outside,
"Mama wants you t' come back in the house and bring them clothes."
Well, I just do what I'm told,
So, I did it, of course.
I went back in the house and Mama met me
And then I shut all the doors.

53:

BF: Who are some of your favorite songwriters?

BD: Buffett I guess. Lightfoot. Warren Zevon. Randy. John Prine. Guy Clark. Those kinds of writers.

BF: What songs do you like of Buffett's?

BD: "Death of an Unpopular Poet." There's another one called "He Went to Paris."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/04/15/bob-dylan-exclusive-inter_n_187216.html

54.

"I'm a better singer than Caruso"

and lot's of DLB, of course.

"Give the Anarchist a cigarette", etc...

also, "I'm glad I'm not me!"

There's 100 just in that film!

"Have you heard the news?" he said, with a grin,
"The Vice-President's gone mad!"
"Where?" "Downtown." "When?" "Last night."
"Hmm, say, that's too bad!"

cosign!

58. "I never could learn to drink that blood and to call it wine/I never could learn to hold you, love, and to call you mine"

The bit at 0.50 especially :

59, sorry

60. Hearts of Fire

61. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA

HAHAHOHOHO

HEH

"Start again."

62. Well, out comes a farmer,
He must have thought that I was nuts.
He immediately looked at me
And stuck a gun into my guts.

I fell down
To my bended knees,
Saying, "I dig farmers,
Don't shoot me, please!"

63. There's a woman in my lap and she's/drinking champagne

as someone who has barely heard any of these songs, this thread is absolutely hysterical. makes me wish i owned more than 1 dylan album.

64.Feel like falling in love with the first woman I meet
Putting her in a wheel barrow and wheeling her down the street

65. Othello told Desdemona, "I'm cold, cover me with a blanket.
By the way, what happened to that poison wine?"
She says, "I gave it to you, you drank it."

66. ('cause we needed more wilburys, plus lol springsteen)

Tweeter and the monkey man were hard up for cash
They stayed up all night selling cocaine and hash
To an undercover cop who had a sister named jan
For reasons unexplained she loved the monkey man

Tweeter was a boy scout before she went to vietnam
And found out the hard way nobody gives a damn
They knew that they found freedom just across the jersey line
So they hopped into a stolen car took highway 99

(chorus)
And the walls came down all the way to hell
Never saw them when theyre standing
Never saw them when they fell

The undercover cop never liked the monkey man
Even back in childhood he wanted to see him in the can
Jan got married at fourteen to a rackateer named bill
She made secret calls to the monkey man from a mansion on the hill

It was out on thunder road - tweeter at the wheel
They crashed into paradise - they could hear them tires squeal
The undercover cop pulled up and said everyone of yous a liar
If you dont surrender now its gonna go down to the wire

(chorus)

An ambulance rolled up - a state trooper close behind
Tweeter took his gun away and messed up his mind
The undercover cop was left tied up to a tree
Near the souvenir stand by the old abandoned factory

Next day the undercover cop was hot in pursuit
He was taking the whole thing personal
He didnt care about the loot
Jan had told him many times it was you to me who taught
In jersey anythings legal as long as you dont get caught

(chorus)

Someplace by rahway prison they ran out of gas
The undercover cop had cornered them said boy, you didnt
Think that this could last
Jan jumped out of bed said theres someplace I gotta go
She took a gun out of the drawer and said its best if you dont know

The undercover cop was found face down in a field
The monkey man was on the river bridge using tweeter as a shield
Jan said to the monkey man Im not fooled by tweeters curl
I knew him long before he ever became a jersey girl

(chorus)

Now the town of jersey city is quieting down again
Im sitting in a gambling club called the lions den
The tv set been blown up, every bit of it is gone
Ever since the nightly news show that the monkey man was on

I guess Ill to to florida and get myself some sun
There aint no more opportunity here, everythings been done
Sometime I think of tweeter, sometime I think of jan
Sometime I dont think about nothing but the monkey man

(chorus)

ha Tweeter always puts me in stitches

yeah ill takedown of springsteen

67. Romeo, he said to Juliet, "You got a poor complexion.
It doesn't give your appearance a very youthful touch!"
Juliet said back to Romeo, "Why don't you just shove off
If it bothers you so much."

x-post What's funny is that it references at least one then-unreleased track ("Lion's Den") and then one that Springsteen didn't write ("Jersey Girl").

Love that song. Always wondered about Dylan's personal relationship with Springsteen.

68. Bob Dylan's 115th Dream

I was riding on the Mayflower
When I thought I spied some land
I yelled for Captain Arab
I have yuh understand
Who came running to the deck
Said, "Boys, forget the whale
Look on over yonder
Cut the engines
Change the sail
Haul on the bowline"
We sang that melody
Like all tough sailors do
When they are far away at sea

"I think I'll call it America"
I said as we hit land
I took a deep breath
I fell down, I could not stand
Captain Arab he started
Writing up some deeds
He said, "Let's set up a fort
And start buying the place with beads"
Just then this cop comes down the street
Crazy as a loon
He throw us all in jail
For carryin' harpoons

Ah me I busted out
Don't even ask me how
I went to get some help
I walked by a Guernsey cow
Who directed me down
To the Bowery slums
Where people carried signs around
Saying, "Ban the bums"
I jumped right into line
Sayin', "I hope that I'm not late"
When I realized I hadn't eaten
For five days straight

I went into a restaurant
Lookin' for the cook
I told them I was the editor
Of a famous etiquette book
The waitress he was handsome
He wore a powder blue cape
I ordered some suzette, I said
"Could you please make that crepe"
Just then the whole kitchen exploded
From boilin' fat
Food was flying everywhere
And I left without my hat

Now, I didn't mean to be nosy
But I went into a bank
To get some bail for Arab
And all the boys back in the tank
They asked me for some collateral
And I pulled down my pants
They threw me in the alley
When up comes this girl from France
Who invited me to her house
I went, but she had a friend
Who knocked me out
And robbed my boots
And I was on the street again

Well, I rapped upon a house
With the U.S. flag upon display
I said, "Could you help me out
I got some friends down the way"
The man says, "Get out of here
I'll tear you limb from limb"
I said, "You know they refused Jesus, too"
He said, "You're not Him
Get out of here before I break your bones
I ain't your pop"
I decided to have him arrested
And I went looking for a cop

I ran right outside
And I hopped inside a cab
I went out the other door
This Englishman said, "Fab"
As he saw me leap a hot dog stand
And a chariot that stood
Parked across from a building
Advertising brotherhood
I ran right through the front door
Like a hobo sailor does
But it was just a funeral parlor
And the man asked me who I was

I repeated that my friends
Were all in jail, with a sigh
He gave me his card
He said, "Call me if they die"
I shook his hand and said goodbye
Ran out to the street
When a bowling ball came down the road
And knocked me off my feet
A pay phone was ringing
It just about blew my mind
When I picked it up and said hello
This foot came through the line

Well, by this time I was fed up
At tryin' to make a stab
At bringin' back any help
For my friends and Captain Arab
I decided to flip a coin
Like either heads or tails
Would let me know if I should go
Back to ship or back to jail
So I hocked my sailor suit
And I got a coin to flip
It came up tails
It rhymed with sails
So I made it back to the ship

Well, I got back and took
The parkin' ticket off the mast
I was ripping it to shreds
When this coastguard boat went past
They asked me my name
And I said, "Captain Kidd"
They believed me but
They wanted to know
What exactly that I did
I said for the Pope of Eruke
I was employed
They let me go right away
They were very paranoid

Well, the last I heard of Arab
He was stuck on a whale
That was married to the deputy
Sheriff of the jail
But the funniest thing was
When I was leavin' the bay
I saw three ships a-sailin'
They were all heading my way
I asked the captain what his name was
And how come he didn't drive a truck
He said his name was Columbus
I just said, "Good luck."

They asked me for some collateral
And I pulled down my pants

The Commander-in-Chief answers him while chasing a fly
Saying, "Death to all those who would whimper and cry"
And dropping a bar bell he points to the sky
Saving, "The sun's not yellow it's chicken"

69.
It must be a holiday, there's nobody around
She studies me closely as I sit down
She got a pretty face and long white shiny legs
She says, "What'll it be?"
I say, "I don't know, you got any soft boiled eggs?"

She looks at me, Says "I'd bring you some
but we're out of 'm, you picked the wrong time to come"
Then she says, "I know you're an artist, draw a picture of me!"
I say, "I would if I could, but,
I don't do sketches from memory."

"Well", she says, "I'm right here in front of you, or haven't you looked?"
I say," all right, I know, but I don't have my drawing book!"
She gives me a napkin, she says, "you can do it on that"
I say, "yes I could but,
I don't know where my pencil is at!"

She pulls one out from behind her ear
She says "all right now, go ahead, draw me, I'm standing right here"
I make a few lines, and I show it for her to see
Well she takes a napkin and throws it back
And says "that don't look a thing like me!"

I said, "Oh, kind miss, it most certainly does"
She says, "you must be jokin.'" I say, "I wish I was!"
Then she says, "you don't read women authors, do you?"
Least that's what I think I hear her say,
"Well", I say, "how would you know and what would it matter anyway?"

"Well", she says, "you just don't seem like you do!"
I said, "you're way wrong."
She says, "which ones have you read then?" I say, "I read Erica Jong!"
She goes away for a minute and I slide up out of my chair
I step outside back to the busy street, but nobody's going anywhere

that was 25

70.

Reporter circa 1966: How many other folk singers are there?
Dylan: 134.

sorry dude!

71. I got a cravin' love for blazing speed
Got a hopped up Mustang Ford
Jump into the wagon, love, throw your panties overboard

72. The liner notes for Planet Waves, esp.

"Furious gals with garters & Smeared Lips
on bar stools that stank from sweating
pussy - doing the Hula - perfect,
priests in OVERhauls, glassy eyed,
Insomnia! Space guys off duty with
big dicks & ducktails All wired up &
voting for Eisenhower, waving flags &
jumping off of fire engines, getting
killed on motorcycles whatever -"

http://theband.hiof.no/albums/ln_planet_waves.html

73. Heck, his liner notes for the New World Singers:

"Bob Cohen's quiet - I first seen him at a City College folksong hall an' thought he was some sort of a Spanish gypsy by the way he wore his sideburns an' moustache an' eyebrows - but he didn't talk so I couldn't tell - I must a sat an hour next to him waitin' to hear some gypsy language - he never said a word - he laughed a few times but all folks no matter what race laughs in the same tongue - I seen him sing later that night an' it didn't bother my thoughts no more as to if he was gypsy or gigolo - he tol' me more about my new world in that ten minutes time than the pop radio station did all that week." And so on.

Basically, we can quote every lyric he penned for the Wilburys.

74. From his theme time radio show about nothing. "Nothing is usually the best thing to do, and always the smart thing to say."

75. Also from the radio show, on baseball: "This is a song from Damn Yankees--and I don't mean that band with Ted Nugent and those guys from Styx."

That's "Diamonds are a Girl's Best Friend" --and they are-- from the film "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes" --and they do.

77. Singing "Froggie Went a Courtin'", but singing it like Gonzo the Great not Kermit

78." I got shoved down 'n' pushed around,
All I could hear there was a screamin' sound,
Don't remember one thing more,
Just remember walkin' up on a little shore,
Head busted, stomach cracked,
Feet splintered, I was bald, naked. . .
Quite lucky to be alive though."

79. "Well, the comic book and me, just us, we caught the bus.
The poor little chauffeur, though, she was back in bed
On the very next day, with a nose full of pus.
Yea! Heavy and a bottle of bread
Yea! Heavy and a bottle of bread
Yea! Heavy and a bottle of bread"

80. all of "tombstone blues," obv., but the first two stanzas used to go through my head a lot when i was covering city council meetings and the like:

The sweet pretty things are in bed now of course
The city fathers they're trying to endorse
The reincarnation of Paul Revere's horse
But the town has no need to be nervous

The ghost of Belle Starr she hands down her wits
To Jezebel the nun she violently knits
A bald wig for Jack the Ripper who sits
At the head of the chamber of commerce

81. "You may be workin' in a barbershop, you may know how to cut hair,
You may be somebody's mistress, may be somebody's heir"

The Basement Tapes sure are fertile ground for this sort of thing.

82. Last night, 'cross the alley, there was a pounding on the wall
It must have been Don Pasquale making a 2 a.m. booty call

83. What's the lightbulb for?

Oh, I usually carry a lightbulb.

84. And you know there was somethin about you baby that I liked that was always too good for this world ... Just like you always said there was something about me you liked that I left behind in the french quarter.

Brownsville Girl is full of these. Underrated record as well.

85. Well, they were looking for somebody with a pompadour.
I was crossin' the street when shots rang out.
I didn't know whether to duck or to run, so I ran.

Aw man I'd clicked to post lyrics to "115th Dream," but I'd been beat to it.

Instead this one from "Tombstone Blues":

Screaming she moans, "I've just been made"
Then sends out for the doctor who pulls down the shade
Says, "My advice is to not let the boys in"

Ouch. Ok, thanks, Doc! Asshole.

Maybe it's not so "ha ha" funny. But it's funny.

86.Wiggle, wiggle, wiggle like a gypsy queen,
Wiggle, wiggle, wiggle all dressed in green,
Wiggle, wiggle, wiggle 'til the moon is blue,
Wiggle 'til the moon sees you.

Wiggle, wiggle, wiggle in your boots and shoes,
Wiggle, wiggle, wiggle, you got nothing to lose,
Wiggle, wiggle, wiggle, like a swarm of bees,
Wiggle on your hands and knees.

Wiggle to the front, wiggle to the rear,
Wiggle 'til you wiggle right out of here,
Wiggle 'til it opens, wiggle 'til it shuts,
Wiggle 'til it bites, wiggle 'til it cuts.

Wiggle, wiggle, wiggle like a bowl of soup,
Wiggle, wiggle, wiggle like a rolling hoop,
Wiggle, wiggle, wiggle like a ton of lead,
Wiggle - you can raise the dead.

Wiggle 'til you're high, wiggle 'til you're higher,
Wiggle 'til you vomit fire,
Wiggle 'til it whispers, wiggle 'til it hums,
Wiggle 'til it answers, wiggle 'til it comes.

Wiggle, wiggle, wiggle like satin and silk,
Wiggle, wiggle, wiggle like a pail of milk,
Wiggle, wiggle, wiggle, rattle and shake,
Wiggle like a big fat snake.

87.
They say I shot a man named Gray and took his wife to Italy,
She inherited a million bucks and when she died it came to me.
I can't help it if I'm lucky.

one thing about a lot of these lines i think is they're the unreliable-narrator side of dylan. which imo has always been the better dylan. when he's head-on, either in early protest mode or later christian mode or still-later moody-moony mode, he's often either too much or too little (or both at the same time). he's at his best coming at things from the side, where it's not always clear where the ricochet is going until it's gone. he's a great bank-shot lyricist.

88. "There didn’t seem to be any general consensus among my listeners. Some people preferred my first period songs. Some, the second. Some, the Christian period. Some, the post Colombian. Some, the Pre-Raphaelite. Some people prefer my songs from the nineties. I see that my audience now doesn’t particular care what period the songs are from. They feel style and substance in a more visceral way and let it go at that. Images don’t hang anybody up. Like if there’s an astrologer with a criminal record in one of my songs it’s not going to make anybody wonder if the human race is doomed."

Dylan otm.

89. "We got an e-mail here from Johnny Depp from Paris, France, who wants to know: 'Who was the father of modern communism?' Well, Johnny, Karl Marx was the father of modern communism. He also fathered seven children, four of whom survived to adulthood. His only son, Frederick Demuth, was illegitimate. I wonder if he calls his daddy on Father's Day."

omg

Source plz

(That one was from an episode of Theme Time Radio Hour.)

90. "He saw an animal as smooth as glass
Slithering his way through the grass
Saw him disappear by a tree near a lake..." [End of song.]

(Also I love the theory that the snake is the one who subsequently shows up at the end of "Wiggle Wiggle," ten years later.)

I seriously don't know how much he's kidding about "pre-Raphaelite" Dylan.

91.
He went to get the hangin' judge but the hangin' judge was drunk
As the leading actor hurried by the costume of a monk

91.
I went to the wedding of Mary-Lou
She said "I don't want nobody see me talkin' to you"
Said she could get killed if she told me what she knew
About dignity

...[some unfunny verses]...

Met Prince Phillip at the home of the blues
Said he'd give me information if his name wasn't used
He wanted money up front, said he was abused
By dignity

(er, 91. and 92.)

(Too late to be typing.
"As the leading actor hurried by in the costume of a monk")

Met Prince Phillip at the home of the blues HOUSE OF BLUES

Then had burgers at the Hard Rock Cafe nearby.

So House of blues does bad burgers?

93. the "World's Greatest Grandpa" bumper sticker he purchases in Chronicles Volume One

(less ha-ha funny than endearing-funny, if that makes sense)

94. Handy dandy, if every bone in his body was broken he would never admit it
He got an all girl orchestra and when he says strike up the band, they hit it

96.
PLAYBOY: Mistake or not, what made you decide to go the rock-'n'-roll route?

DYLAN: Carelessness. I lost my one true love. I started drinking. The first thing I know, I'm in a card game. Then I'm in a crap game. I wake up in a pool hall. Then this big Mexican lady drags me off the table, takes me to Philadelphia. She leaves me alone in her house, and it burns down. I wind up in Phoenix. I get a job as a Chinaman. I start working in a dime store, and move in with a 13-year-old girl. Then this big Mexican lady from Philadelphia comes in and burns the house down. I go down to Dallas. I get a job as a "before" in a Charles Atlas "before and after" ad. I move in with a delivery boy who can cook fantastic chili and hot dogs. Then this 13-year-old girl from Phoenix comes and burns the house down. The delivery boy - he ain't so mild: He gives her the knife, and the next thing I know I'm in Omaha. It's so cold there, by this time I'm robbing my own bicycles and frying my own fish. I stumble onto some luck and get a job as a carburetor out at the hot-rod races every Thursday night. I move in with a high school teacher who also does a little plumbing on the side, who ain't much to look at, but who's built a special kind of refrigerator that can turn newspaper into lettuce. Everything's going good until that delivery boy shows up and tries to knife me. Needless to say, he burned the house down, and I hit the road. The first guy that picked me up asked me if I wanted to be a star. What could I say?

PLAYBOY: And that's how you became a rock-'n'-roll singer?

DYLAN: No, that's how I got tuberculosis.

Good one, though #96 = #6.

haha, my bad ... here's another good one from the same interview

DYLAN: The thing that most people don't realize is that it's warmer to have long hair. Everybody wants to be warm. People with short hair freeze easily. Then they try to hide their coldness, and they get jealous of everybody that's warm. Then they become either barbers or Congressmen. A lot of prison wardens have short hair. Have you ever noticed that Abraham Lincoln's hair was much longer than John Wilkes Booth's?

PLAYBOY: Do you think Lincoln wore his hair long to keep his head warm?

DYLAN: Actually, I think it was for medical reasons, which are none of my business.

97. "See the primitive wallflower freeze
When the jelly-faced women all sneeze
Hear the one with the mustache say, "Jeeze
I can't find my knees""

come on ppl, just three more

j/k

98. Weberman interview http://www.interferenza.com/bcs/interw/weberman.htm
DYLAN: (breath) **Le** those two sentences, man. I don't get them at all. I don't understand them, even --

WEBERMAN: -- why, if you do, I might gain a soul --

DYLAN: Yeah, well, that's shit -- those last two sentences. I don't think I said that.

WEBERMAN: Yes, you did. That's just what you said, man. You said, You re not gonna get into my life -- I said, 'Why?' -- * then you said, 'If you do, I might gain a soul.'

DYLAN: I don't understand that, do you?

WEBERMAN: (pause) Uhh -- I don't know -- I don't know -- it could be looked at in a number of ways, man -- you could *** --

DYLAN: Yeah, why don't you -- d'why don t you take it out of your article and look at it in a number of ways -- and let s d'uh -- you know, and -- and roll it around awhile -- and then when you -- when we know what it means -- why don't you tell me, and then -- ah, let's see if it's worth putting in an article --

WEBERMAN: (pause) Uh** --

99.

100. Three decades later, A.J., now fifty-five, his once-wild
mane receded to silver fringe (but still talking very fast),
recalls the incident, one of the more colorful in the often
drearily hagiographic Dylanological chronicles: "I'd agreed
not to hassle Dylan anymore, but I was a publicity-hungry
motherfucker. . . . I went to MacDougal Street, and Dylan's
wife comes out and starts screaming about me going through
the garbage. Dylan said if I ever fucked with his wife, he'd
beat the shit out of me. A couple of days later, I'm on
Elizabeth Street and someone jumps me, starts punching me.

"I turn around and it's like -- Dylan. I'm thinking, 'Can
you believe this? I'm getting the crap beat out of me by Bob
Dylan!' I said, 'Hey, man, how you doin'?' But he keeps
knocking my head against the sidewalk. He's little, but he's
strong. He works out. I wouldn't fight back, you know,
because I knew I was wrong. He gets up, rips off my 'Free
Bob Dylan' button and walks away. Never says a word.

"The Bowery bums were coming over, asking, 'How much he
get?' Like I got rolled. . . . I guess you got to hand it to
Dylan, coming over himself, not sending some fucking lawyer.
That was the last time I ever saw him, except once with one
of his kids, maybe Jakob, and he said, 'A.J. is so ashamed
of his Jewishness, he got a nose job,' which was true -- at
least in the fact that I got a nose job. . . ."

"The sun's not yellow/it's chicken"

101. http://consequenceofsound.net/2009/05/13/bob-dylan-makes-surprise-appearance-on-beatles-tour/

^^^^^Apparently he also visited Neil Young's boyhood home when he was in Canada recently.

Peter Grant: Mr. Dylan, my name is Peter Grant. I'm Led Zeppelin's manager.
Dylan: I don't come to you with MY problems, do I?

- at a party or backstage or somewhere, mid-'70s

103. "Mona tried to tell me
To stay away from the train line.
She said that all the railroad men
Just drink up your blood like wine.
An' I said, "Oh, I didn't know that,
But then again, there's only one I've met
An' he just smoked my eyelids
An' punched my cigarette."'

http://www.expectingrain.com/jokes.html

I think about the Elston Gunnn anecdote once a week

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0RPkJeziNyI&feature=kp

'i sucked the milk out of a thousand cows'

(onscreen, dylan, cow)

Roseanne (Barr) is onstage at the end of Frank Sinatra 80th birthday TV special, and Dylan comes up to her and says "I really liked the way you sang the National Anthem."

bob dylan crisps

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DUdAL0_X0AA3GeK.jpg

"Professor Longhair—I got nothin’ to say about him. We told you about him before, and you know how to look him up in Wikipedia. That’s where he lives – Wikipedia, Louisiana."

"The Three Wise Men–Caspar, Balthazar, and Melchior...three names you don’t hear much any more…well, except for Balthazar."

"Gerry Goffin and Carole King wrote no shortage of good songs. Here's one you might not know. It's performed by that archetypical New York group that kept Atlantic records afloat for many a year, a group that had a number of famous lead singers, and easily made the transition from 50's R&B to 60's soul...of course, I'm talking about Yes. Naw, I'm talking about the Drifters!"

For The New Basement Tapes, T Bone Burnett put together a group with Elvis Costello, Rhiannon Giddens, Jim James, Marcus Mumford and Taylor Goldsmith, to finish songs based on old lyrics of yours. Did you hear any of those songs and say, “I don’t remember writing that?”

Did you say Taylor Swift?

Taylor Goldsmith.

Yeah, OK. No, I don’t remember writing any of those songs.

“How about Ratt?”

https://youtu.be/cntGcbU3nM8

"Fan of Bobby's for a long time...."

"All wrestlers are."

"My wife and I were happy for thirty years. And then we met."

I wrote this awhile back, playing off some things in the newz at the time (posting it here on a quiet Saturday night, to minimize claims of self-promotion): http://kimgordonsrealage.tumblr.com/post/5810288062/bob-dylan-ive-battled-25-a-day-addictions-all

haha those TTRH quotes are hilarious, wish I had the patience to listen through all those episodes

51. Some old David Letterman anniversary show from Radio City Music Hall, where they gave him a tremendous build up and recruited a huge all-star band, and he came out and sang the laziest, slurriest "Like a Rolling Stone" ever. I'm pretty sure he just sang the vowels.

I think it's more kind of lol but mostly sad territory...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YedNVVw8LD0

^ Bob probably had some bad sushi before the show. (What a band, btw!)

i saw bob dylan in the mid-2000s and that was pretty much how he sang all his songs

1987:

At one of the first rehearsals, Dylan showed up late. The band was only able to rehearse some ninety minutes before Stan Lynch let Petty know he had to leave. "Tom was like, 'Fuck. Where do you need to be?'" says Lynch. "And I told him, 'I'm going to see Frank and Sammy tonight at the Greek.' The whole band just starts backing away from me. I mean, literally, it was like 'we don't know him'. This might have even been the first rehearsal. Bob's got his shades on, kind of noticing the conversation but not a part of it. Two minutes later Bob says, "Frank and Sammy?' The room's still dead quiet. 'I love those guys,' he says. I go, 'Well, I have two tickets. Fourth row. And I don't have a date.'" Lynch and Dylan left in the drummer's Jaguar XJS, a twelve-cylinder two-seater. There wasn't room for Dylan to bring security. "I thought Stan was getting brownie points with the new boss," says Mike Campbell. "I was kind of jealous."

Lynch continues: "Then we get to the Greek Theatre, and he tightens his sweatshirt hood around his face. We make our way down to the fourth row. He looks like the Unabomber. But by that point, a few people are realizing that Bob Dylan is there. You can sort of feel the energy. The show starts, and its fucking great. But I kinda got one eye on Bob, one eye on Sammy. Like, 'How's Bob reacting to this? How's Bob reacting to me loving Sammy so much? What's happening here?' The whole thing is odd, with the people around us reacting to how Bob is reacting to Sammy."

At the end of the set, after a standing ovation, Dylan made to leave. Perhaps all the talk about Sammy Davis Jr. had confused things. Lynch, not knowing what to do, grabbed Dylan by the back of his sweatshirt as he started heading toward the aisle, reminding him that Frank was still due to perform. "But now its the intermission," says Lynch, "and I'm pressed for more conversation. Then Cheryl Tiegs, the supermodel, walks by, and its a perfect opener. She's hot! Musicians can only talk about a few things, right? I go 'Cheryl Tiegs, man.' He goes 'Huh? Who?' I say, 'Right there in front of you.' ... And this is where I knew we were going to be friends. He says 'That's way after my time.' I go, 'What?' He says to me, 'I like Ann Margret, Elizabeth Taylor.' He starts naming chicks like that. I say 'Really?' He looks at me, takes his sunglasses off, and says 'Really'".

when bob dylan looks at you and takes off his sunglasses, get ready for a moment

Larry Charles' telling the story of the HBO slapstick comedy series he and Dylan wrote is the best, so many funny parts:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JQDTSu8v8QI

I say "I want a hot beverage" in Bob's voice to my wife about once a week.

And she says "You ain't him..."

More like rolls her eyelids and punches my cigarette.

In the same category, there's Carrie Fisher's story about how she met Dylan: he calls her up out of the blue and she assumes it's to ask her out, but no, it's because a company has asked him to endorse a cologne and he thinks she might have some good ideas for cologne names. "Do I look like somebody who would be walking around with a bunch of cologne names rattling around in my head? Well, tragically, I did." He also tells her he's thinking about opening a beauty salon.

That's a great story

That Letterman performance upthread is pretty bad, but it's absolutely hamstrung by the shitty video recording. Here's a far better version without the flutter on the audio ("like a bee singing into a fan" as one comment put it):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5LaNXwqLFnc

I guarantee you won’t see this one coming pic.twitter.com/wygC15Qcpy

— Jordan Hoffman (@jhoffman) January 13, 2021

In his new WTF interview, Rick Rubin tells a story where Bob Dylan, George Harrison, and Tom Petty are writing a Traveling Wilburys' song together. Harrison leaves for a minute, and Dylan leans over to Petty and whispers, completely seriously, "You know, he was in the Beatles."

— Luke Epplin (@LukeEpplin) July 19, 2021

Also the Modern Lovers

Peter Grant: Mr. Dylan, my name is Peter Grant. I'm Led Zeppelin's manager.
Dylan: I don't come to you with MY problems, do I?

- at a party or backstage or somewhere, mid-'70s

― I wish he hadn't adapted my critique of his "ilxor" moniker (Myonga Vön Bontee), Wednesday, May 13, 2009 4:09 PM (twelve years ago) bookmarkflaglink

That’s the greatest thing I’ve ever heard.

Dylan clearly channeling Groucho Marx there.

...or maybe George in A Hard Day's Night. something in that vein.

it's all in the mind

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2g-RDQ-2AaE

Pet Shop Bob

"Doesn't sound a bit like cagney!"

finally got around to this new yorker piece and I nearly spit out my coffee laughing at this little scene between Mavis and Dylan in 2016. truly the one who got away. pic.twitter.com/OG0DDU3i7O

— Allison Rapp (@allisonrapp22) July 11, 2022

More of a Dylan-adjacent moment, but when David Lynch and Peter Wolf were roomies in Boston in the late-60's, both wound up at a Dylan show. Halfway through Wolf notices Lynch getting up and leaving, and angrily confronts him in the apartment later that evening. "Nobody walks out on Bob Dylan!" "Fuck you, I walk out of Bob Dylan!"

Would've been the 1964-1965 school year...probably would've been a solo acoustic show, and to be fair, except for the few new songs released on Bringing It All Back Home, Dylan generally would have sounded bored with the old material that formed the bulk of his sets around this time.

LOL at that Dylan-Staples story.

meeting Archibald MacLeish (from Chronicles):

He reiterates a few things he said in his letter. (In his letter, he made mention of some lines in a song of mine that places T. S. Eliot and Ezra Pound symbolically fighting in a captain’s tower.) “Pound and Eliot were too scholastic, weren’t they?” he says. What I know about Pound is that he was a Nazi sympathizer in World War II and did anti-American broadcasts from Italy. I never did read him. I liked T. S. Eliot. He was worth reading. Archie says, “I knew them both. Hard men. We have to go through them. But I know what you mean when you say they are fighting in a captain’s tower.”

I'll tell you this one funny story about them in the Warfield Theatre in 1995. We were getting ready to do the show. I'm getting my clothes on. I see my wife in the green room, and I don't see my daughter. I said, "Deb where's Marcella?" She looks at me, the color drains from her face. She's like, "Isn't she with you?" I go into a panic. At one point, one of our guys sees me and I said, "I'm looking for my kid. Have you seen her?" They're like, "No, man, we'll help you look."

Everybody helped. At one point, I'd looked everywhere except Bob’s dressing room. I go up and knock on the door real quick. His assistant opens it or whatever and there she is.

We were already five minutes late going onstage, and the two of them were holding the show up. I said, "Babe, come on. Bob's got to go to work now." She says, 'Oh, okay." He says, "I want to talk a little more about that later, okay?" She's like, "Okay, Bob." And she grabs her drink and comes out and meets my wife.

At that point, I go to stand with the band and wait for him. They bring the house lights down. Bob stops me with his arm. He says, "We got to do something about that girl."

I said, "Oh man, I'm sorry, she just loves you. I didn't want her to disturb your show." He goes. "No, that girl in art class. She's real mean. We got to do something about her."

We’d gotten Marcella these cowboy boots and there was this mean little girl in her art class who splashed paint on them. Bob asked her, "How'd you get that paint on your cowboy boots?" So while I'm looking for my daughter, she's telling Bob that story, and they're holding the show up. He stops me and says, "Hey, we got to do something about that girl." [laughs]

From: https://dylanlive.substack.com/p/winston-watson-talks-drumming-for?

I'll tell you this one funny story about them in the Warfield Theatre in 1995. We were getting ready to do the show. I'm getting my clothes on. I see my wife in the green room, and I don't see my daughter. I said, "Deb where's Marcella?" She looks at me, the color drains from her face. She's like, "Isn't she with you?" I go into a panic. At one point, one of our guys sees me and I said, "I'm looking for my kid. Have you seen her?" They're like, "No, man, we'll help you look."

Everybody helped. At one point, I'd looked everywhere except Bob’s dressing room. I go up and knock on the door real quick. His assistant opens it or whatever and there she is.

We were already five minutes late going onstage, and the two of them were holding the show up. I said, "Babe, come on. Bob's got to go to work now." She says, 'Oh, okay." He says, "I want to talk a little more about that later, okay?" She's like, "Okay, Bob." And she grabs her drink and comes out and meets my wife.

At that point, I go to stand with the band and wait for him. They bring the house lights down. Bob stops me with his arm. He says, "We got to do something about that girl."

I said, "Oh man, I'm sorry, she just loves you. I didn't want her to disturb your show." He goes. "No, that girl in art class. She's real mean. We got to do something about her."

We’d gotten Marcella these cowboy boots and there was this mean little girl in her art class who splashed paint on them. Bob asked her, "How'd you get that paint on your cowboy boots?" So while I'm looking for my daughter, she's telling Bob that story, and they're holding the show up. He stops me and says, "Hey, we got to do something about that girl." [laughs]

From: https://dylanlive.substack.com/p/winston-watson-talks-drumming-for?

picturing an ill-conceived 90s family comedy... well-meaning, but bumbling dads (inexplicably led by Bob Dylan), try to solve their daughters' problems at school.

the Mike Love diss in his rrhof acceptance speech is hilarious
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TyqFL9m2odg

the mike love speech was pretty insane so v good idea to take the piss
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oZSAQX2uuUY

Love apparently likes to take off his shoes when he performs, and during that night’s all-star jam, Mick Jagger stole his shoes.

cracking up this morning hearing "sign language," a song Dylan donated to Eric Clapton ...

’Twas there by the bakery

Surrounded by fakery

HBD Bob!

haha that's a gorgeous lyric