Monday, July 6, 2015

Man on the Street

Man dies in the street.
A cop kicks his corpse one time.
Tough city, New York.

I understand from Eyolf Ostrem on the Dylanchords.info website that the music to this song came from a song called "Young man who wouldn't hoe corn." The lyrics come straight from the heart of New York City. The song appeared in 1991, 30 years after its recording, on the first edition of the Bootleg Series.

Well I'll sing you a song, ain't very long,
'Bout an old man who never done wrong.
How he died nobody can say,
They found him dead in the street one day.
Well, the crowd, they gathered one fine morn,
At the man whose clothes 'n' shoes were torn.
There on the sidewalk he did lay,
They stopped 'n' stared and they went their way.
Well, the p'liceman come and he looked around,
"Get up, old man, or I'm a-takin' you down."
He jabbed him once with his bully club,
the old man then rolled off the curb.
Well, he jabbed him again and loudly said:
"Call the wagon; this man is dead."
The wagon come, they loaded him in,
I never saw the man again.
I've sung you my song, it ain't very long,
'Bout an old man who never done wrong.
How he died no body could say,
They found him dead in the street one day.



1 comment:

  1. Hello there Robert, Thank you for posting this analysis of a song from Bob Dylan's Music Box http://thebobdylanproject.com/Song/id/396/Man-on-the-Street Join us inside and listen to every song composed, recorded or performed by Bob Dylan streaming on YouTube, Spotify, Deezer and SoundCloud.

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