Episode 12: Bob Dylan, JFK, and the Poignancy of "Murder Most Foul"

[@adrianlee3497]

It's somber, pensive, reflective and it's a masterpiece and it's no coincidence that Bob's dropped this song at this point in time. Just saying.

[@worksupermodel]

He dropped it the day after the lockdown, like a message.

[@dianetyler5343]

I've listened to it a dozen times. It's BEAUTIFUL I think it's his best. Class all the way. His voice even sounds good.. the music arrangement is perfect. I love it

[@Espina907]

😭

[@mikedag1176]

Yes,his voice is crisp, vibrant, in tune,.Bob is a blessing.

[@47RozUFO]

Elizabeth McAfee Pat and I just spent over 17 minutes listening to "Murder Most Foul"--this astounding song will immediately jump up near the top of Dylan's best and most evocative work. We then commented that it will bring out the explicators in droves. We listened to one commentary from a man outdoors in Eastern Europe and then clicked onto this one. From the minute this man started talking, something made me reach for my copy of The Fourth Turning by William Strauss and Neil Howe. The book was open in my lap when the generational diagram from this very book appeared in this video. COLD CHILLS! Yes indeed, Something is Happening Here! Reminds me of the lyric from "Ballad of a Thin Man: "You try so hard but you don't understand Just what you will say when you get home Because something is happening here but you don't know what it is Do you, Mr. Jones?"

[@generationreport]

That's one of my favorites. He and his band really knocked it out of the park the first time I saw him live. More power chords than the album.

[@adrianlee3497]

And it just became his first no.1 hit song. He definitely dropped this for a reason.

[@generationreport]

Wow

[@artsanchez9122]

Good to hear and consider...love the 'cut' and the sentiments expressed. Bob be amazing...

[@danielsemmens6640]

Actually JFK was speaking like Dylan slightly out of the box

[@bethsimmonds6320]

Come on people, it’s just a song. A very brilliant and damned good tune. Thought provoking to say the least.

[@tool_fighter]

And the Beatles wrote "just" songs. But they changed the world.

[@bunkyzirkus]

After viewing this thoughtful “review”, I checked out your webpage. Generalizations about generations generate chuckles among geriatrics, like myself. By some twist of fate, I got to be there, right up front, when young Bob and Joan sang to us at the March on Washington, as pictured in your brilliant video. Murder Most Foul takes me on a melancholy stroll down memory lane, but more like a haunting life review than a walk in the park. Sadly hardened at 73, I am not easily moved, but this song reminds me of my own mortality in a bittersweet way. I will definitely explore your work, further. Well done!

[@generationreport]

Well thank you. I had an uncle who recently passed away who was at Woodstock as a teenager. At 18, 19, 20, my friends and I all wished we had been there too, even if it went unexpressed. Problem is, we're Millennials. Coming of age in 2008 was a world apart from coming of age with Woodstock, just as coming of age with Woodstock was a world apart from coming of age with the New Deal. More to the point, being a teenager in 2000 was a world apart from being a teenager in 1963, just as being a teenager in 1963 was a world apart from being a teenager in 1933. That's how generations work. People born at different times in history are, fundamentally, different...and they shape history differently as a result.

[@robertobrian1993]

@@generationreport , very thoughtful post.

[@admiralbillom7559]

same here man, same age too!

[@randal_gibbons]

I love the comment Dylan posted when he uploaded this song. Part of it read, "I think you'll find it interesting". The song has undoubtedly has meaning to him, yet he wants each of us to derive what it means to us as individuals.

[@mikedag1176]

To me, this song reminds me of CATASTROPHIC LOSS... Tragedy compounded... Incalculable as to what was STOLEN FROM AMERICA BY EVIL MEN.

[@dcrelief]

Exceptional song for expedient thoughts and deeds.

[@marytorres4843]

Mr.dylan like no other!! A genius!!

[@hazelhouse1]

"Darkness and death will come when it comes" God help us.

[@loveforceinternationalpubl8147]

This is a very good and interesting analysis.

[@mikedag1176]

Very insightful especially JFK's undelivered speech!!!

[@tarivardamir]

Thanks very much for your channel.

[@generationreport]

My pleasure. Subscribe...there's plenty more to come!

[@SuperMikelondon]

Wonderful.

[@blackcrow7049]

A real Dylan fan has any interest about JFK's murder . The only thing that have interest for a Dylan fan is the same Dylan . Murder Most Foul is , as Dylan says , A GIFT to all his fans . Nothing more and nothing less . JFK's murder is the paper which Dylan wraps this gift , full of references , quotes , places , names , films and songs ... some of them are clearly described , but most of them are hidden with doublé meanings and metaphors . Dylan DON'T TRY resolving who or why JFK was murdered , he only is a storyteller but with his point of view as always did . All the lyrics are subordinated to give all the fans those references that Dylan enjoyed thuru the years since his very first recording , even before . Dylan himself writes that you must take a pencil to write under the words to try not to forget all about . But Dylan geniality goes on because , as JFK's unsolved murder , Dylan's influences remains unsolved even if you find everyone in this song . A genius like Dylan have a lot of influences thru the years . You cannot say '' Yes , now I've discovered all the secrets about Dylan and his songs '' . Sure you can't . Nobody can't do it .

[@karenknight5841]

As usual, Bob Dylan is spot on!!!

[@admiralbillom7559]

interesting presentation - thanks. in one of his versions of dignity, dylan refers to the "soul of a nation being under the knife, death is standing in the doorway of life" karuna!

[@williamcarr7347]

It sounds like this talks about everything else but the amazing lyrics, and their meaning in Dylan's song.

[@generationreport]

I don't set out to do what everyone else does.

[@WEBALON12]

I am sorry but when you say that this song is about the “assassination” of JFK, that word “assassination” brings up imagery of a lone gunman, Oswald, shooting JFK. To the contrary Dylan does not use the word “assassination”. Rather, he uses the term murder, and refers several times to the murderers as THEY (not him), and that THEY shot the President down “like a dog in broad daylight.” That is murder Most Foul, not assassination.

[@gavinreid2741]

In an award acceptance speech in December 1963 Dylan said he sympathised with Lee Harvey Oswald.

[@robbhahn8897]

Conspiracy theories can take root and even the most intelligent of people.

[@CocaineCowboysUncensored]

BULL

[@guitarplayerdonald7546]

JOAN BAEZ also helped encourage Bob Dylan to write and sing those songs of the 1960's. 🎼🎵🎶

[@mikedag1176]

I love Jones voice, spirit.

[@nwofoe2866]

I'll tell you why he released it - President Trump used the 56th anniversary of President Kennedy's assassination - last November 22nd - to award intelligence community actor Jon Voight for his film roles, including his role as a treasonous NSA official who was born on September 11th, in the 1998 "Enemy Of The State" (following the award, Voight danced a jig in front of the White House audience). The 911 scene is to be found in the original uncut version at 1:54:29. Some of you may find the following link from a discussion forum particularly interesting and relevant, if you have the time - www.godlikeproductions.com/forum1/message4137935/pg1 You are going to have to get your heads around the fact that major media figures are co-opted into the intelligence community's operations. A former Director of the Central Intelligence Agency was about to make this known - and did make some preliminary public statement - when he was found floating in the Potomac River. There are some highly relevant additional facts to be presented here, for the patient and the dedicated.

[@thedudeabides3930]

What evidence is there that William Colby was "about to make known [the fact that major media figures are co-opted into the intelligence community's operations]?"

[@nwofoe2866]

@@thedudeabides3930 all I'll say is that the evidence doesn't yet include my dead body. I was asked 45 years ago to work for the Agency.. What I CAN tell you from open-sources is that Senator Dianne Feinstein disclosed this fully on the floor of the U.S. Senate at the end of August 2016. She called for an investigation but was quickly sidelined when it was discovered that her limo driver was a Chinese spy, and I saw the pic of her surrounded by a group of very tall men in a Senate antechamber at the time. I think Colby's indication of making the Mockingbird program public is better known as having contributed to his premature death.

[@thedudeabides3930]

@@nwofoe2866 Okay, will check into it.

[@nwofoe2866]

@@thedudeabides3930 I can say that Senator Feinstein wasn't about to dismantle the program, but that the scope of her interest was that the collusive Government-entertainment industry program had become too transparent. But even that was stepping on toes that didn't want to be stepped upon. If there's something to be done, they take care of it themselves, you might say, and as "Enemy Of The State" producer Tony Scott found. A long way from the U.K. he was, on the Vincent Thomas bridge near one of the actual sites from which some of that film's themes were drawn.

[@oojudg3oo]

That massive Q intelligence drop was about in it's 2nd year of amost daily posts on the anonymous Chan sites then. There is a JFK theme within the posts that had/has me believing that this Dylan track is related by subject and timing. And the length of the record. 17=Q The track is more precisely 16:59. Which i suspect that was deliberate, and that being 'cut short' by one second. Just as the Q Plan has many references to getting the world back on track, and 'Making America Great Again'. Ive notived the Q/JFK theme indicates that it is going to finish what JFK pursued. It was Peace. But he was 'cut short' as the track length is cut short by one second. But there is so much more. Interesting.

[@vincentbrannelly8786]

When did murder most foul drop ?

[@generationreport]

It dropped overnight less than 24 hours before I recorded this.

[@pmcclaren1]

'age of the antichrist has just begun'---now in 2021 the devil's biggest weapon has been the increasing Biblical illeteracy. Recall in 1962 prayer was outlawed in public schools. We are in full judgment as the LORD gives over anyone to the wickedness they so choose. The LORD IS at the door. Make sure you 'know' without doubt you are going to heaven when you leave this earth (John 3.3, 33-34). Your place in eternity is the only thing that matters.

[@mikemestas9835]

america is like TheChalkboardJungle and the artist is the teacher that puts herself/himself in harms way,,internal/external

[@martincaspersen2727]

for en loke

[@chancethadood]

how’d you avoid mentioning trump? this appears to me to be his most outright political song in a good 50 years

[@BobMori]

Music Video - Murder Most Foul - kzbin.info/www/bejne/onOplqKZn9CFf80

[@hookywookywithmalarkyman704]

There's Dylan & the late Leonard cohen ... how strange that both are jewish , i mean that in my most respectful tone.

[@gavinreid2741]

Dylan converted to Christianity and released several evangelical albums.

[@highlyedited4010]

17 years no releases, 17 minutes long, 17th letter of the alphabet Q There are no coincident. QQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQ

[@JD43232]

I know!!!!

[@gavinreid2741]

It's is not 17 minutes long. Dylans previous album was Triplicate , 2017.

[@atwaterpub]

Why does the USA presently have more coronavirus cases than any other country on earth? Why is the mortality rate in the USA higher than average? (mortality rate= deaths/resolved cases)

[@greypossum1]

Because your president did practically nothing about it for two months while going on T.V stating it was a hoax and that it would just disappear. That's why you have more cases now than Spain, Italy and France combined.

[@atwaterpub]

@@greypossum1 Thanks. I thought so... Too bad.

[@gavinreid2741]

Anti Vaccine Anti maskers

[@jaddison1112]

I had just turned 13 just ten days before JFK was murdered. It my the beginning as a teenager, and the end of my innocent life as well. I have never been the same since. ... Paul Zimmy, I'm a historian too, this interpretation statement is wrong !

[@davidpaul5338]

Fraud Most Foul

[@jennifermyers66]

Thank you cord Meyer for killing jfk

[@davidpallin772]

And 2years later you are still an asshole.

[@dbmorton1114]

Bob Dylan must be bemused by all the kooky interpretations of Murder Most Foul. It contains no secret messages or codes. He is not now, nor has he ever been, a prophet.

[@robertobrian1993]

Actually, he is. A prophet. That's obvious.

[@dbmorton1114]

@@robertobrian1993 Isn't a prophet supposed to project foward into the future? Seems to me with Murder Most Foul, Dylan is trying to fathom the present by looking at the past. Besides, he scoffs at such notions that he is a prophet, soothsayer, etc. in his own diaries. He calls himself an artist. We should take him at his word.

[@j.k.asbill6131]

@@dbmorton1114 in case you haven't figured out, the past and present are intriquitely connected. If you can't see that, you are oblivious to what this song is saying..and oblivious, in general, to how the world works. You are right that Dylan is no prophet..he doesn't need to be to know these things. Many of us who research already know the things Dylan is speaking of in the song.. if youv'e been living in a glass bubble, you won't get it at all. I am reminded of the quote "those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it" Dylan is telling us the same cabal that took out JFK is still alive and well, and are behind the current events. Get it? Don't need to be a phrophet..just awake and aware.

[@dbmorton1114]

@@j.k.asbill6131 Really? Robert O'Brian (above) says Dylan is a prophet. I don't agree and neither does Bob Dylan. Hence my reply. So yes some people do mistakenly believe and say that Dylan is a prophet. Glad you like the song. I do too. It's a good one, not one of Dylan's best, imo, but having lived through those times I find it very moving. But it's not a secret message for those 'in the know' or Q anon quacks or whatever. It's just a song.

[@dbmorton1114]

@@j.k.asbill6131 Nice post-editing job, Jill. Still a few typos though. You know spellcheckers are pretty user friendly these days. Give it another go.

[@robbhahn8897]

More Dylan gibberish

[@bobl5335]

GOD BLESS GEORGE FLOYD . . .

[@JD43232]

Qanon!!!!!!

[@surfwriter8461]

I disagree. "Murder Most Foul" is one of Dylan's most embarrassing compositions and a sign of his muse being out of the building. It's excessively long, leaden, undistinguished, lyrically lame, melodically void, and pretentious. The historical events are potent on their own, but he turns them into a cliche.