32-20 Blues

Gonna shoot my gal.
My gun's bigger than hers is.
(She has a new boyfriend)

The "32-20 Blues" is about a gun, which of course an angry man uses to shoot his woman because he's upset with her yet again. It's based on the "22-20 Blues" about the same thing. Robert Johnson performed the former, Skip James the latter. Bob Dylan's version appears on the eighth volume of the Bootleg Series.

If I send for my baby
and she don't come
If I send for my baby
man, and she don't come
All the doctors in Hot Springs
sure can't help her none
And if she gets unruly
thinks she don't wan do
If she gets unruly
thinks she don't wan do
Take my 32-20 now and
cut her half in two
She got a 38 special but I believe its much too light
She got a 38 special but I believe its much too light
I got a 32-20, got to make the camps alright
If I send for my baby
and she don't come
If I send for my baby
man, and she don't come
All the doctors in Hot Springs
sure can't help her none
I'm gonna shoot my pistol, gonna shoot my Gatlin gun
I'm gonna shoot my pistol, gotta shoot my Gatlin gun
You made me love you
now your man has come
Ah-oh
baby where you stay last night
Ah-ah
baby where you stayed last night
You got your hair all tangled
and you ain't talkin right
Got a 38 special boys, it do very well

Tell Ol' Bill

Bob's beset by doubts.
He can't sleep, she's not helping.
Someone's after him.

This is a dark and stormy night song, which was included on volume 8 of the Bootleg Series, which collects unreleased and alternate track recordings from 1989 to 2006. I can't get at the heart of what this song is about, and I wonder if it even has a center. It appeared on the soundtrack to "North Country," starring Charlize Theron.

- River whispers, heavens near, body glowing, not a penny.
- I sing to myself, wondering if the tempest will drown me. (Feels like a nod to Prospero)
- Stranded in a foreign place, can't sleep, can't find a smile.
- Why do you torture me?
- Remember me. I wish we could share our emotions.
- You trampled me and left me a cold comfort kiss. But I'm not afraid anymore so I have no reason to talk to you.
- I can't sleep. I walk by tranquil lakes and streams.
- The ground's hard and the stars cold as you speak. It's going to be a long night.
- Bleak rocks, bare trees, iron clouds, snow, gray and stormy sky.
- Sundown. Dark woods, dark town, you're going to get dragged down.
- Tell ol' Bill (a reference to another song, recorded by Dylan as "This Evening So Soon") that anything is worth trying, and that Bob isn't alone. It's time to do or die.
- "All the world I would defy, Let me make it plain as day, I look at you now and I sigh: How could it be any other way?"

Miss the Mississippi

He'd rather be home
On the big river with you
Than in the city.

This is an old Bill Halley song made famous by Jimmie Rodgers in 1932. Bob Dylan recorded it in 1992, but it didn't appear until volume 8 of the Bootleg Series, which compiles hard-to-find, unreleased and live tracks that Dylan performed between 1989 and 2006. 

I'm growing tired of these big city nights
Tired of the glamour and tired of the sights
In all my dreams, I am roving once more
Back to my home on the old river shore

I am sad and weary,
far away from home
Miss the Mississippi and you, dear.
Nights are dark and dreary
Everywhere I roam
Miss the Mississippi and you.
Rolling this wide world over
Always alone and blue, blue
Nothing seems to cheer me
Under heaven's dome
Miss the Mississippi and you

Memories are bringing
happy days of yore
Missing Mississippi and you
Mockingbirds are singing
around the cabin door
Miss the Mississippi and you
Rolling this wide world over
Always alone and blue, so blue
Longing for my homeland
Muddy water shore
Miss the Mississippi and you

The song has been done by plenty of famous singers. I've included Dylan's version first, then Jimmie Rodgers's, then Crystal Gale's.

The Girl on the Greenbriar Shore

Go with Greenbriar gal?
You'll be sorry, Mama said.
She wasn't lying.

This song, which I think was performed first by the Carter Family, is the simple tale of what happens when a boy chooses a girl against his mother's wishes. Dylan performed the song live in 1992, and you can find it in volume 8 of the Bootleg Series.

'Twas in the year of '82, 
In the springtime of the year, 
I left my mother and a home so dear 
'Twas in the year of '82,
In the springtime of the year,
I left my mother and a home so dear
All for that girl on the Greenbriar shore.
My mother, she says, "Son, don't go.
Don't leave me here alone.
Don't leave your mother and a home so dear.
Never trust a girl on the Greenbriar shore."

But I was young and reckless too,
And I craved a reckless life.
I left my mother and a home so dear
And I took that girl to be my wife.

Her hair was dark and curly too
And her lovin' eyes were blue;
Her cheeks were like the red red rose
That girl I loved from the Greenbriar shore.

The years rolled on and the months rolled by;
She left me all alone.
Now I remember what my momma said,
"Never trust the girl on the Greenbriar shore."

'Cross the Green Mountain

Civil war soldiers

Die on the battlefield.

Brothers fight brothers.

I've never been a big fan of Civil War movies, though to pan them for poor quality, especially when they are the Ted Turner-produced giant productions, is to take a churlish stance. They are more impressive than affecting to me, mainly because they expect the viewer to feel that unique feeling that Americans are supposed to have watching noble, proud tragic figures from one country shoot, hack and bomb each other to death in the name of preserving and overthrowing traditions both proud and base. Civil War buffs are a funny gang, and I've never understood or reacted to the feeling that they seek. I know there's pride, tragedy and a view toward the epic in any war, but reverence for the events that killed more than half a million people of the same country starts to look like Dungeons and Dragons fans embarking on their next dress-up adventure with the half orcs. I feel the same way about Bob Dylan's song "'Cross the Green Mountain," which appeared on the 2003 soundtrack to the film "Gods and Generals," and made its commercial appearance under Dylan's name on the eighth volume in the Bootleg Series a few years later. It's a song about the tragedy and waste of war, and is affecting and moving, but it leaves me unmoved even as I write this. It also makes the unfortunate choice of relying on the marcher's drum roll and a few of those melodic quirks of songs of the time that Robert Burns did to death on his documentary. There's a world of people out there who react to that fake nouveau 19th century Americana melancholy sound with great pleasure; I'm not one of those people. To me it's cliche. But wow, those last two verses... they're the only lines that show the emotion and beauty:

I'm ten miles outside the city
And I'm lifted away
In an ancient light
That is not of day

They were calm, they were blunt
We knew them all too well
We loved each other more than

We ever dared to tell