Maybe I'm oversimplifying but I just assumed that "the night they drove old Dixie down" was a reference to the Confederate surrender and the end of the war.
Cheers, John On Sat, Aug 15, 2020 at 1:55 PM <[email protected]> wrote: > I'll look into the Shelton book since you recommend it, but I don't think > it will make me see Dylan as anything other than an occasionally amusing > entertainer. I particularly used to like it when he sang, blew the > harmonica, and strummed the guitar simultaneously. That's about the extent > of it. If he'd been able to ride a bicycle at the same time, I'd have been > ecstatic. > > People find deep meaning in rock lyrics generally by pawing through the > heap of disconnected phrases and vague imagery and identifying some hidden > significance, perhaps based on biographical fact, perhaps on Hermes > Trismegistus. This procedure, in my opinion, is roughly on a par with > finding nanothermite in a common pile of dirt. There are a lot of experts > writing books about that, and I'm not going to read any of them. > > I was interested to find that the OK, though decidedly non-revolutionary, > current pop star Harry Styles, whom I like up to a point, seems to view his > songs as having hidden biographical significance--this approach seems quite > widespread and "fans" generally seem to think that way too. So the writing > of these things is meant by at least some of the authors to be the > easter-egg hunt that "rock critics" and their kind take it to be. But so > what? That just limits the actual level of meaning that commercial pop > music can ordinarily achieve. > > Anyone not holding the occult key to a song can always speculate about the > it, although in the case of "old Dixie" nobody seems to have come up with > anything to pin the alleged driving-down event to. Maybe it refers to one > of the Bandsmen's suddenly wilting in a sexual situation with a particular > person whose name we may hope to discover. Who knows? > > This kind of hidden meaning isn't on a par with actual poetry--although in > some cases, as in the song "Strange Fruit" an "occult" meaning can be very > deep and tremendously important. I think that's quite different, however. > I don't give a damn who the "sad-eyed lady of the lowlands" was--bores the > hell out of me and is IMO another kettle of fish altogether. > > The thing that set me off on this was a cross-posting here to a piece on > Cosmonaut recommending "revolutionary sobriety." > > I hold no brief for or against *Cosmonaut*, with which I am only > glancingly familiar and find strange, but I see a worthwhile point > there--so much of "Sixties" so-called "culture" revolved around the > idealization of the intoxicated state--being "always drunk" to quote > Baudelaire--which could mean being drunk on poetry, music, "the arts" > (depressing phrase), or just "high on life" like Pat Boone. > > This ties neatly into the mass of addictions promoted by capitalism, one > of which is the addiction to popular music, but also to "the arts" in the > hoity-toity sense as well as records, books, and shows--anything that can > be monetized and consumed and converted into ego-armor. > > Maybe the left should step away from the arts altogether, at least to some > extent, and try to achieve a sober, disciplined perspective without leaning > on the pleasure of art consumption at every turn. > > > -- "All I ask of our brethren is that they take their feet off our necks." Sarah Moore Grimke, abolitionist (1792-1873) -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Groups.io Links: You receive all messages sent to this group. View/Reply Online (#411): https://groups.io/g/marxmail/message/411 Mute This Topic: https://groups.io/mt/76186108/21656 -=-=- POSTING RULES & NOTES<br />#1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message.<br />#2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived.<br />#3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. -=-=- Group Owner: [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://groups.io/g/marxmail/leave/8674936/1316126222/xyzzy [[email protected]] -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
