Bob Dylan's Highway 61 Revisited (33 1/3) Review

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(More customer reviews)I have read a handful of the 33 1/3 line of books, each devoted to a landmark album, and Polizzotti's may be the best.
For starters, it's well-researched, adds original research by Polizzotti himself-- including interviews with the Highway 61 session musicians-- and seeks to settle any mysteries or contradictions extant in previous sources (like who played second guitar on Desolation Row). This is unsurprising, as Polizzotti has proven himself a rigorous scholar in such works as Revolution of the Mind: The Life of Andre Breton, which was clearly assembled from a mountain of primary sources and original research (and done in French, no less!).
But in addition to solid research, Polizzotti has written an intensely personal book on his history with and interpretation of Highway 61. He walks a fine line, never letting his obviously large vocabulary lead him too far into questionable interpretive territory. His interpretations are convincing, or at least always well-reasoned and explained. When it's impossible or difficult to say what Dylan means by a certain lyric or song (which, as Dylan fans know, is often), Polizzotti has no problem admitting it. He does not force or stretch his interpretations over Dylan's many enigmas.
And this, I believe, is what makes this the perfect 33 1/3 book. If Polizzotti were writing a traditional biographical or journalistic account of Highway 61's creation, his personal descriptions and interpretations would intrude on the narrative. But here, they are not only welcome but epitomize the spirit of the 33 1/3 line. An excellent piece of Dylan scholarship and a fine read for anyone seeking to decode Highway 61 (as far as such a task is possible).

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Highway 61 Revisitedresonates because of its enduring emotional appeal. Few songwriters before Dylan or since have combined so effectively the intensely personal with the spectacularly universal. In "Like a Rolling Stone," his gleeful excoriation of Miss Lonely (Edie Sedgwick? Joan Baez? a composite "type"?) fuses with the evocation of a hip new zeitgeist to produce a veritable anthem. In "Ballad of a Thin Man," the younger generation's confusion is thrown back in the Establishment's face, even as Dylan vents his disgust with the critics who labored to catalogue him. And in "Desolation Row," he reaches the zenith of his own brand of surrealist paranoia, that here attains the atmospheric intensity of a full-fledged nightmare. Between its many flourishes of gallows humor, this is one of the most immaculately frightful songs ever recorded, with its relentless imagery of communal executions, its parade of fallen giants and triumphant local losers, its epic length and even the mournful sweetness of Bloomfield's flamenco-inspired fills. In this book,MarkPolizzottiexamines just what makes the songs on Highway 61 Revisitedso affecting, how they work together as a suite, and how lyrics, melody, and arrangements combine to create an unusually potent mix. He blends musical and literary analysis of the songs themselves, biography (where appropriate) and recording information (where helpful). And he focuses onDylan's mythic presence in the mid-60s, when he emerged from his proletarian incarnation to become the American Rimbaud. The comparison has been made by others, including Dylan, and it illuminates much about his mid-sixties career, for in many respects Highway 61 is rock 'n' roll's answer to A Season in Hell.>

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