7 ms·

“Murder Most Foul” and the haunting of America

49 points by tintinnabula 7y ago

neonate 7y ago
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3NbQkyvbw18 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3NbQkyvbw18
blast 7y ago
I love how ever-enigmatic Bob releases this now even though it was "an unreleased song we recorded a while back".
- rst 7y ago
  Dylan's notorious for leaving brilliant songs on the shelf, sometimes for decades. Some of them leak and circulate among collectors/rabid fans, but some of them don't.
  - blast 7y ago
    Oh indeed. That's part of what makes the timing of this release enigmatic. Do you have any favorites that were released this way? I've fallen off the bobwagon in recent decades.
adaisadais 7y ago
Darkness at the break of noon Shadows even the silver spoon The handmade blade, the child’s balloon Eclipses both the sun and moon To understand you know too soon There is no sense in trying -Bob Dylan The music Dylan was making in the 60s is just as relevant today as ever before. “Murder Most Foul” hit me in the gut. Truly an epic.
ericzawo 7y ago
An important song for today from a legendary American artist.
AndrewBissell 7y ago
From a good Twitter reaction thread by a longtime JFK assassination commentator: "there's a continuous thread of reference to mostly-black pre-rock music as knowledge of just what happened to JFK and mostly white pop/rock as a kind of rebellious sublimation or, if you like, extrovert denial, acting out the rage but not admitting what happened" https://twitter.com/corpseinorbit/status/1243409386262810625 https://twitter.com/corpseinorbit/status/1243409386262810625 One theory is that the lyric "howl Wolfman, howl" may be a reference to George H. W. Bush, whose CIA codename was Timberwolf and who claimed for years not to remember where he was the day JFK was assassinated.
- ratww 7y ago
  Wolfman is most certainly Wolfman Jack, the 50s/60s DJ and cultural icon, immortalised in George Lucas' American Graffiti. His whole name is mentioned in the fourth verse, and he did start his broadcasts by howling.
  - AndrewBissell 7y ago
    If the theory is right it wouldn't be the only name in the song Dylan uses as a play on words or with double meaning. The first reference is sandwiched right up against a bunch of rumination on the nature of Kennedy's murder and the people who carried it out.
pc2g4d 7y ago
"The small towns of Faulkner, the paranoid communities of Pynchon, the tangled but discrete “cases” of Raymond Chandler, all reflect beyond themselves onto the guilt, corruption, and greed that power our national political “progress” and economic “growth.”" I really hate cynicism. It's considered hip nowadays to think everything is degraded, monstrous, corrupt garbage. It's like people have forgotten that there's more to humans than the murderous. Must we blind ourselves to the good in order to recognize the bad? How about the respect for human dignity, the love of family and country, the sacrifice, the self-restraint, the growth and change, the reform that we've seen through human history, and American history in particular? Was the Civil Rights Act powered by "guilt, corruption, and greed"? Was the establishment of drug safety standards? Was the abolition of slavery? People are so blithe in proclaiming everything horrible. I just worry it's a self-fulfilling prophecy.
- darkerside 7y ago
  This is a fine point, but it is totally orthogonal to the point of this essay, which is specifically about a tragic and evil event that reverberates through American history (the good and the bad) ever since.
- svara 7y ago
  Nothing wrong with recognizing that few things are all black or all white. In fact, I suspect those beautiful things that you mention happened at least in part because people were motivated by the darkness they saw.
- 0_gravitas 7y ago
  Just because you see a ray of sunshine does not mean that the night does not exist
- mmsimanga 7y ago
  I fully agree. I was astonished at how polite and helpful people were in the US for my week long first ever visit beginning of this year. The sentence you quote seems to be typically of most news/social media we are exposed to. Luckily I am aware of the technology side of the US so I typically take the cynicism with a pinch of salt but many people take it at face value and mouth it off as facts.
vearwhershuh 7y ago
Daily reminder that congress looked into the JFK assassination and found: "Scientific acoustical evidence establishes a high probability that at least two gunmen fired at the President." and "The committee believes, on the basis of the evidence available to it, that Kennedy was probably assassinated as a result of a conspiracy. The committee was unable to identify the other gunmen or the extent of the conspiracy." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_House_Select_Committee_on_Assassinations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_House_Select_Com... But then the conspiracy theory meme just kinda mopped everything up, and that was that.
- AndrewBissell 7y ago
  The real skill was not in the cover-up (which left a ton of breadcrumbs) but in browbeating the American public into accepting and ignoring it. Right there in front of everyone's eyes Greatest magic trick ever under the sun Perfectly executed, skillfully done
  - catalogia 7y ago
    To be fair, most Americans don't believe the official 'lone gunman' narrative: https://news.gallup.com/poll/165893/majority-believe-jfk-killed-conspiracy.aspx https://news.gallup.com/poll/165893/majority-believe-jfk-kil... But what can anybody do about it?
    - AndrewBissell 7y ago
      Not electing the guy who probably helped plot the assassination to the office of POTUS would have been a start. There's a whole lot of daylight between "he wasn't killed by a lone gunman" and actually taking some minimal steps to identify and oppose the people responsible.
      - catalogia 7y ago
        While the majority doubt the lone gunman narrative, I don't think there is any majority consensus beyond that. People have loads of different theories, different ideas for who the perpetrators were or what their motivations might have been. It's easy to say that something should be done, but actually getting that something done is another matter.

49 points by tintinnabula 7y ago

neonate 7y ago

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3NbQkyvbw18 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3NbQkyvbw18

blast 7y ago

I love how ever-enigmatic Bob releases this now even though it was "an unreleased song we recorded a while back".

rst 7y ago
Dylan's notorious for leaving brilliant songs on the shelf, sometimes for decades. Some of them leak and circulate among collectors/rabid fans, but some of them don't.
- blast 7y ago
  Oh indeed. That's part of what makes the timing of this release enigmatic. Do you have any favorites that were released this way? I've fallen off the bobwagon in recent decades.

adaisadais 7y ago

Darkness at the break of noon Shadows even the silver spoon The handmade blade, the child’s balloon Eclipses both the sun and moon To understand you know too soon There is no sense in trying -Bob Dylan The music Dylan was making in the 60s is just as relevant today as ever before. “Murder Most Foul” hit me in the gut. Truly an epic.

ericzawo 7y ago

An important song for today from a legendary American artist.

AndrewBissell 7y ago

From a good Twitter reaction thread by a longtime JFK assassination commentator: "there's a continuous thread of reference to mostly-black pre-rock music as knowledge of just what happened to JFK and mostly white pop/rock as a kind of rebellious sublimation or, if you like, extrovert denial, acting out the rage but not admitting what happened" https://twitter.com/corpseinorbit/status/1243409386262810625 https://twitter.com/corpseinorbit/status/1243409386262810625 One theory is that the lyric "howl Wolfman, howl" may be a reference to George H. W. Bush, whose CIA codename was Timberwolf and who claimed for years not to remember where he was the day JFK was assassinated.

ratww 7y ago
Wolfman is most certainly Wolfman Jack, the 50s/60s DJ and cultural icon, immortalised in George Lucas' American Graffiti. His whole name is mentioned in the fourth verse, and he did start his broadcasts by howling.
- AndrewBissell 7y ago
  If the theory is right it wouldn't be the only name in the song Dylan uses as a play on words or with double meaning. The first reference is sandwiched right up against a bunch of rumination on the nature of Kennedy's murder and the people who carried it out.

pc2g4d 7y ago

"The small towns of Faulkner, the paranoid communities of Pynchon, the tangled but discrete “cases” of Raymond Chandler, all reflect beyond themselves onto the guilt, corruption, and greed that power our national political “progress” and economic “growth.”" I really hate cynicism. It's considered hip nowadays to think everything is degraded, monstrous, corrupt garbage. It's like people have forgotten that there's more to humans than the murderous. Must we blind ourselves to the good in order to recognize the bad? How about the respect for human dignity, the love of family and country, the sacrifice, the self-restraint, the growth and change, the reform that we've seen through human history, and American history in particular? Was the Civil Rights Act powered by "guilt, corruption, and greed"? Was the establishment of drug safety standards? Was the abolition of slavery? People are so blithe in proclaiming everything horrible. I just worry it's a self-fulfilling prophecy.

darkerside 7y ago
This is a fine point, but it is totally orthogonal to the point of this essay, which is specifically about a tragic and evil event that reverberates through American history (the good and the bad) ever since.
svara 7y ago
Nothing wrong with recognizing that few things are all black or all white. In fact, I suspect those beautiful things that you mention happened at least in part because people were motivated by the darkness they saw.
0_gravitas 7y ago
Just because you see a ray of sunshine does not mean that the night does not exist
mmsimanga 7y ago
I fully agree. I was astonished at how polite and helpful people were in the US for my week long first ever visit beginning of this year. The sentence you quote seems to be typically of most news/social media we are exposed to. Luckily I am aware of the technology side of the US so I typically take the cynicism with a pinch of salt but many people take it at face value and mouth it off as facts.

vearwhershuh 7y ago

Daily reminder that congress looked into the JFK assassination and found: "Scientific acoustical evidence establishes a high probability that at least two gunmen fired at the President." and "The committee believes, on the basis of the evidence available to it, that Kennedy was probably assassinated as a result of a conspiracy. The committee was unable to identify the other gunmen or the extent of the conspiracy." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_House_Select_Committee_on_Assassinations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_House_Select_Com... But then the conspiracy theory meme just kinda mopped everything up, and that was that.

AndrewBissell 7y ago
The real skill was not in the cover-up (which left a ton of breadcrumbs) but in browbeating the American public into accepting and ignoring it. Right there in front of everyone's eyes Greatest magic trick ever under the sun Perfectly executed, skillfully done
- catalogia 7y ago
  To be fair, most Americans don't believe the official 'lone gunman' narrative: https://news.gallup.com/poll/165893/majority-believe-jfk-killed-conspiracy.aspx https://news.gallup.com/poll/165893/majority-believe-jfk-kil... But what can anybody do about it?
  - AndrewBissell 7y ago
    Not electing the guy who probably helped plot the assassination to the office of POTUS would have been a start. There's a whole lot of daylight between "he wasn't killed by a lone gunman" and actually taking some minimal steps to identify and oppose the people responsible.
    - catalogia 7y ago
      While the majority doubt the lone gunman narrative, I don't think there is any majority consensus beyond that. People have loads of different theories, different ideas for who the perpetrators were or what their motivations might have been. It's easy to say that something should be done, but actually getting that something done is another matter.