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

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.