Bob Dylan - Visions of Johanna (1966)

If you take the words of Bob Dylan on their face, that is exactly where you will end up - on your face. How do I know? Been there done that. Then the light came on, and I learned to listen carefully. More than anything, I learned not to project my values into his words. So, here in this song, Dylan is once again the master at word play. What's he say? He says that these visions of Johanna keep him up at night, right? He knows he immediately has you heading off in the wrong direction because he knows that every single one of us is going to reach the initial conclusion that this Johanna must be quite a fetching person, to the point that just picturing her is more than sufficient enough to stay awake. But look at the line again, what does he say? "But these visions of Johanna kept me up past the dawn." Do you see it? Do you see that these words can be taken in a completely different manner? Yes, Bob did not stay up all night picturing Johanna; rather, Bob was up all night picturing a vision that Johanna had. Now tell me, is Bob fantastic or what? And with that, there must be some very famous person named Johanna that had a very significant vision, or what I'm saying is meaningless. Find that Johanna and the vision she had and you will have found what it was that really kept Bob up all night. With Bob being a person that is extremely familiar with scripture, as am I, finding the Johanna that had an incredible vision was easily found: Luke 24:1-10 On the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women took the spices they had prepared and went to the tomb. 2 They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, 3 but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. 4 While they were wondering about this, suddenly two men in clothes that gleamed like lightning stood beside them. 5 In their fright the women bowed down with their faces to the ground, but the men said to them, “Why do you look for the living among the dead? 6 He is not here; he has risen! Remember how he told you, while he was still with you in Galilee: 7 ‘The Son of Man must be delivered over to the hands of sinners, be crucified and on the third day be raised again.’ ” 8 Then they remembered his words. 9 When they came back from the tomb, they told all these things to the Eleven and to all the others. 10 It was Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the others with them who told this to the apostles. ---- (Note: Joanna and Johanna are variant spellings of the same name. Most Bibles opt for Joanna, but not all. For example, the Darby Bible references Johanna. The above passages are from the NIV Bible, which is the bible for the End Times) Yes, Johanna did have an incredible vision - two men in clothes that gleamed like lightning stood beside her, and they told her the good news, that Jesus has risen. So much more to say about how the verses juxtapose with the refrain, but understanding Bob takes time, contemplation, possible research, and on and on. Bob does this often, presenting lyrics that lead those in a hurry astray, while providing something very fruitful to those that take the time to explore his incredible profoundness.

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Arguably the greatest lyrics of any song ever. Dylan is a somgwriting powerhouse! I’ve been listening to this song for a while, yet I still haven’t understood what exactly he’s on about. His lyrics require you to approach a different direction of though to understand them

The night does not in fact play tricks when you're trying to be quiet.

Wow!! Those lyrics ‘The ghost of 'lectricity howls in the bones of her face’

sweet endearing women in his lyrics back then, like Johanna and Louise.

My favouritest song of all times.

This being Dylan and all, I have always assumed the lyric was, "The country music station plays Sartre." But I just asked Grok about that, and Grok says the station was playing "soft."

Beautiful ❤️

“Jeez I can’t find my knees…" Amazing that he kept all those serpentine lyrics in his head and spilled them out live.

To my mind, his very best. The imagery is stunning