Expecting Rain

The song that changed the world! Light years ahead of the Beatles & Stones. This song says it all. Great Great tune! Always will be a favorite of The MEZ's, no matter how often it's been played or heard. So many live renditions to pick from (Hint Hint Marker!) What shall we come up with for favorite dates, Arrangements, posts, comments. The MEZ absolutely loves this one. The MTV version I like very much as well. MEZ

This will forever be one of the greats. The album version is definitive, but there have been many good performances as well. MTV Unplugged is nice. Unfortunately these days he seems to have a tendency to flub the lyrics a lot. It's kind of a shame, because the latest arrangement suits the song pretty well.

I rank it as one of the all time great songs. It is pure raw Dylan at his best , complete with biblical references and the words are as true today as they were then.

Sounds pretty dated to me now. That's the weakest of the pre-electric LPs.

Someone help me out here. There was a version done in 2002 (I think) and he did it in a gig as a tribute to a Senator (I think) that had just died.

Was a spectacular verions.

Either the sea niles have finished eating what little remains of Long Johnny's sotted brain, or that was some sort of game attempt at humour.

No song from Dylan's past has retained its truth or vitality quite like this one has over the decades. I was astounded at how relevant it seemed - nay, was - when it was played during the lead-up to the American election last fall. Perhaps the strongest offering from Dylan's best-rounded pre-electric LP (although Restless Farewell, Boots and Hattie Carroll all give it a damned good run for its money).

some things never date . That Lp is one of them

Personally I enjoyed the version played at the London O2 arena earlier this year. But mostly because he played Things Have Changed immediately afterwards.

It was a powerful song in its day, which sadly I remember well, but us oldies are savvy enough to have realized that the times are forever changing and - as the French say - forever staying the same. So it sounds a bit hollow to me now.

Plus ca change . . .

Yeah... the cover is still hilarious, I'll give you that. Bob, sucking in his cheeks in an attempt to look like a Dorothea Lang photo of a dust bowl victim; every wrinkle in his "work clothes" perfectly arranged.... In Peter Guralnick's Elvis biography he writes about how Elvis, when he first decided he wanted to be a movie star, made his own study of what was involved and discovered that great actors never smile. The cover of "Times" looks like Bob made the same discovery.

Dylan's friend, Tony Glover, recalls visiting Dylan's apartment in September 1963, where he saw a number of song manuscripts and poems lying on a table. "The Times They Are a-Changin'" had yet to be recorded, but Glover saw its early manuscript. After reading the words "come senators, congressmen, please heed the call", Glover reportedly asked Dylan: "What is this shit, man?", to which Dylan responded, "Well, you know, it seems to be what the people like to hear."

Dylan recalled writing the song as a deliberate attempt to create an anthem of change for the moment. In 1985, he told Cameron Crowe: ""This was definitely a song with a purpose. It was influenced of course by the Irish and Scottish ballads ...'Come All Ye Bold Highway Men', 'Come All Ye Tender Hearted Maidens'. I wanted to write a big song, with short concise verses that piled up on each other in a hypnotic way. The civil rights movement and the folk music movement were pretty close for a while and allied together at that time."

More recently, the song seems to have been linked to banking for some reason: In 1994, Dylan licensed the "The Times They Are a-Changin'" to be used in an advertisement for the auditing and accountancy firm Coopers & Lybrand, as performed by Richie Havens. Two years later, in 1996, a version of the song by Pete Seeger was used in a TV advertisement for the Bank of Montreal. [Wiki]

Listening to it in 2009, half the record is excellent, and half is very dated, more so than any of Dylan's other work from the period.

"Only a Pawn In Their Game" may be the best "protest" song ever written as it is the only one I can think of that doesn't simply sing to an audience of the already converted. "Hattie Carrol" is its opposite, a shrill and embarrassingly bad song. "One Too Many Mornings" and "Boots of Spanish Leather" are both beautiful and timeless songs. "When the Ship Comes In" is as brilliant in its simplicity as "Restless Farewell" is brilliant in its complexity.

But the rest.... ugh.

"With God On Our Side" is OK if you listen to it as a parody of early 60s folk self righteous smugness. "Hollis Brown" is Bob trying to out Woody Woody and falling on his face in the effort. And "North Country Blues".... I don't know for sure as I've never managed to stay awake for the whole plodding dirge.

That really sums it up. This song is more a parody than anything else.

The album, though, is excellent.



North Country Blues is an outstanding track. One of the best songs about the rust belt ever.

Now he sings "I used to care but things have changed''. Why? Because nothing did.

Absolutely. Women and minorities still can't vote or hold political office or become doctors, lawyers, CEOs, etc. No way could a black man be elected President or a Puerto Rican woman appointed to the Supreme Court. Nope. No way.

Yup, when yer right yer right. Things are exactly the same as they've been since 1,000,000 BC.

[or, is there something happening here but you don't know what it s, do YOU, Mister.Jones? ]

I think intending to write an anthem and then doing so successfully is admirable, when the cause is just. I see no problem with preaching to the choir now and again--affirmation and collective recognition of mutual interests can be powerful and even essential to sustaining social movements. I agree that half the lp feels dated--again, nothing inherently wrong with that fact. Every good song doesn't have to be timeless--some need to be timely.

I always think of the cover as his James Dean pose (Dylan as Dean as Jett Rink in Giant).

The song (along with BITW) that made his reputation and by which his music will be remembered (if it is remembered). It was a great, inspiring song then and now, which is why it is used in everything from bank commercials to comic book movies. The album may be an artifact of its time, but it's one I still listen to with pleasure. Only a Pawn in the Game was the song the got me into Dylan, and no less a critic than Christopher Ricks thinks Hattie Carroll is Dylan's most nearly perfect song.

"Only someone with a heart of stone can look upon the death of Hattie Carrol without laughing." - Oscar Wilde

Unlike Little Nell, Hattie Carroll was a real person.

I was in awe the first time I heard it. I was 15 years old.

It's a young man song, written by a young man, impressing the young.
As you get older and more cynical you realize that things are not that simple.
The more you hear it it, the more flat, obvious and trite it seems.
It's a song you use up, after a while it seems wasted on the world and on your life

It was also the anthem of the sixties.
The sound of a bygone time, a time which optimism, idealism
and belief in the possibility of revolutionary change are long lost.

It's author knew what he was doing. It's impact was calculated and carefully planed,
he was maybe not totally sincere but it meant a lot to a lot.

It still is a great manifestation of youth and optimism,
a fairytale almost.

"Come gather round people..."

Yes, but like Little Nell, Dylan transformed her into a maudlin melodrama. Totally unlike the portrayal of Byron De La Beckwith in "Only a Pawn...."

There is still something thrilling about the song. I think the optimism (however faked) and the sense that people can influence their own destinies...It is actually one of those songs best heard by accident - on the radio, on a film soundtrack - rather than deliberately.


The album is easily the worst he made in the sixties. Even the great songs are much better performed elsewhere. One Too Many Mornings is the best example - okay but kind of dull on the album - amazing in 66 or 76 or 93 or 2000. And Restless Farewell - is there anyone who would take the album version over the performance for Sinatra? (Let me qualify that - is there anyone other than Long John who would take the album version).


Funny the hatred for "With God On Our Side". Is this just embarrassment - oh hell, I used to like that stuff... In a world dominated by religious fanatics, is this really such a bad song? Dylan may be making a blindingly obvious point, but Bush and his soul brother Bin Laden never understood it.

Quite true, I liked the song lots when I was a smug, self righteous fella myself, and still do--though it is pretty damned long and I rarely listen to it.

The Times They Are A-Changin' on iTunes... $9.90
"The Times They Are A-Changin'" on iTunes... $0.99
Acoustic guitar... $300-100,000
Playing "The Times" on an acoustic guitar in C position... priceless.

[which is not to say I'm anywhere close to figuring out how he does the G version (on the LP)]

I think you should be called senile old Johnny and do not forget your medication !

Wow.... what a comeback! What a retort! What saber-like wit!

You, sir, I do believe could give David Crosby a race. I think the 2009 Doofi Competition is in Akron this year; keep training and best of luck to you!

sorry pal I am too busy, you can have it on your own