We have been thinking of possible band names for the last few days. How about:
- The Taliband
- Fractal Mode or Fractal Chords
- Mortuary Beserck
- Phantom of the Oprah
Enough. I was also thinking about a Bob Dylan song from “John Wesley Harding” (1967), and album which may well be his finest. The song is “As I Went Out One Morning”.
Like all of the songs on that album, the arrangement is clear, sparse, simple, economical, and crisp: drums, bass, and acoustic guitar, and harmonica. Dylan’s nasal voice is confident and nuanced.
As I went out one morning
To breathe the air around Tom Paine’s
I spied the fairest damsel
That ever did walk in chains
Tom Paine was a celebrated pamphleteer at the time of the U.S. war for independence, best known for his tract “Common Sense”, written in 1776, which advocated an end to the British Monarchy. Paine provided Franklin and Jefferson with some of the inspiration for their own theories about the state and authority and the individual, and these worked their way into the U.S. constitution and Bill of Rights. Paine himself later returned to England where, among other things, he advocated the creation of pension plans, and progressive taxation. The man was ahead of his time.
I offered her my hand
She took me by the arm
I knew that very instant
She meant to do me harm.
The girl seems to represent religion. She is enticing, with promises of spiritual reward, and he offers her his hand. But then she demands more: she takes his arm. In the economy of this song, we waste no time: he immediately suspects she is up to no good.
“Depart from me this moment,”
I told her with my voice
Said she, “But I don’t wish to.”
Said I, “But you have no choice.”
“I beg you sir,” she pleaded
From the corners of her mouth
“I will secretly accept you
And together we’ll fly south.”
Religion? Or utopianism? Does she represent Dylan’s brief faith in the idea of human progress? Unfortunately, we’re not likely to get a straight answer from Dylan anytime soon, so our only clue is her suggestion they “fly” south. To paradise?
I love the amazingly stripped down lines, especially the first four of the verse above, with that inverted “said I”.
Tom Paine comes to his rescue. The spirit of liberty himself? Or the spirit of “common sense”, of a kind of rational agnosticism?
Just then Tom Paine himself
Came running from across the fields
Shouting at this lovely girl
And commanding her to yield
Why did I think the girl represented religion? I believe it was a review by Greil Marcus that came out shortly after the album that first made that suggestion. That makes less sense to me now, and given subsequent developments in Dylan’s religious views, it does seem more likely, now, that the girl embodies utopianism or socialism. Alluring, but basically a means of enslaving the individual in favor of the collective.
On the other hand, “ever did walk in chains”, suggests that her true spirit was constrained in some way, shackled by something. That is more suggestive of religion, strait-jacketed by the spirit of conformity and collective ennui, though it could also evoke the idea that a socialist utopia is always accompanied by the chains of authoritarianism. Tom Paine represents just plain old common sense: the illusion of utopia is contrary to what we see and know about human nature.
And as she was letting go her grip,
Up Tom Paine did run
“I’m sorry sir,” he said to me.
“I’m sorry for what she’s done.”
It’s a strange, very beautiful song. If you’ve never heard it… you haven’t, have you?
Modestly revised Februrary, 2007.
The entire lyric of “As I Went Out One Morning”.
