In honor of Dylan Fest tonight at the Bowery Ballroom, and Bob Dylan’s recent birthday, (May 24th, he’s now 69!) I decided to celebrate the sometimes frustrating, but always satisfying music of Dylan by cataloging a list of the top 5 most random Bob Dylan song titles. Yesterday I released the honorable mentions, the three songs that just barely missed the cut. Below, in order, are The Top Five Most Random Bob Dylan Song Titles!

5. Temporary Like Achilles – Blonde On Blonde

Plucked straight out of Dylan’s legendary double album Blond on Blonde, this wheezy and rollicking slow bluesy tune would have been titled ‘So Hard,’ or something to that effect by any other artist, in reference to the refrain “You know I want your lovin’, Honey, why are you so hard?” However Dylan is most definitely not ‘any other artist.’ He lives to continually confuse and befuddle his fans, and he therefore decided to name this track after the obscure reference leading off the final verse “Achilles is in your alleyway.” It’s quite logical if you’re Bob Dylan, quite arbitrary if you’re not.

4. Bob Dylan’s 115th Dream - Bringing It All Back Home

The first hint that this song is going to be a lot of fun is that its opening is a studio outtake of Dylan laughing hysterically. If you’re not laughing hysterically along with him by the time Bob Dylan’s 115th Dream is over, then you are no Dylan fan. The actions described in this song are insane, inane, idiotic, implausible, and so completely ridiculous that the listener has no choice but to love it. This is satirical Bob Dylan humor at its best, and he wrote the perfect jangling melody and bouncing bass line to match the energy and feel of the story he paints. It’s actually the identical melody to “Motorpsycho Nitemare,” a similar piece from his previous album “Another Side of Bob Dylan.” Although the title is completely forgettable, it was clearly an unforgettable dream.

3. It Takes A Lot To Laugh, It Takes A Train To Cry - Highway 61 Revisited

This song takes the number three slot more for the creativity and length of the title, than its randomness. While Dylan waxes poetic about his life on a mail train, its clear that he’s not actually talking about a train. What he is saying is, as always, up for interpretation. What interests me equally with this song, is what inspired him to add the first clause to this multi-part title.

2. From A Buick 6 - Highway 61 Revisited

The lyrics of this song have everything: graveyard women, junkyard angels, steam-shovel mamas, and dump trucks. The only thing they are missing is any reference to a Buick! Honestly, even after hundreds, if not thousands of listens to this album, I am still unsure as to what a Buick 6 even is. Even Wikipedia has failed me in my search for answers to this query. However the apparent lack of any specific meaning hasn’t kept the phrase from joining the great American lexicon, and has now been adopted as the name of a delta blues band from the U.K.

And now for number 1…The most random Bob Dylan song title….and by the transitive property, most likely the most random song title ever…is….a tie!

1. Rainy Day Women #12 & 35 - Blonde On Blonde & Positively 4th Street – Bob Dylan’s Greatest Hits

These two songs are definitively the most random Dylan titles ever penned. Rainy Day Women # 12 & 35, the leading track off Blonde on Blonde, is most famous for its chant-inducing refrain “everybody must get stoned,” rather than its proper title, and for good reason. Nowhere amidst any of the double entendre does Dylan come close to mentioning any rain, days, women, or any combination thereof. Positively 4th Street has a different story. Dylan’s follow up to Like A Rolling Stone reached the Billboard top 10 in 1965 despite never being released on a major studio album. Its nasty and accusatory lyrics never refer to the title in any way. However, 4th street was a main thoroughfare in Greenwich Village, Dylan’s home during the early 60s, leading many people to believe they were the subject of Dylan’s ire. While 4th street does connect to the song in a broader sense, in purely lyrical terms, the name Positively 4th Street is as random as they come.

There they are; the top five most random Dylan song titles. Further analysis of this also concludes that Bringing It All Back Home was Dylan’s album with the most randomly titled songs, snatching up three of the nine total slots on the chart. I’d like to clarify that I did not create this list out of annoyance or any bad feelings towards these songs or Bob Dylan. In fact I am a huge Dylan fan, and embrace the idiosyncrasies of his music, lyrics, and of course song titles, with open arms. These little quirks only add to his legend, and enhance the listening experience. If you have any comments, disagreements, or songs you think i missed, feel free to comment.

Bob is currently off touring Eastern Europe, but to get tickets to any upcoming shows on his never-ending tour when he returns to the U.S, check out SeatGeek’s Dylan page here.

With Dylan Fest at the Bowery Ballroom in NYC fast approaching, (it’s tomorrow night, Thursday May 27th) I decided it would be a good idea to list the top five Bob Dylan songs with the most confusing, misleading, and otherwise completely random titles. This was no easy task, as Dylan is notorious for his arbitrary track names, and in his extensive catalog there are dozens of candidates. I found it virtually impossible to limit myself to five songs, so please indulge me as I include three “Honorable Mentions” listed below, which just barely missed out on landing a spot in the highly competitive top five, to be named later.

Honorable Mentions:

I Shall Be Free No. 10 – Another Side of Bob Dylan

One of Dylan’s talking blues pieces that were mainstays of his early albums, I Shall Be Free No. 10 is classic rambling Bob at his best. His semi-autobiographical verses in this song feature a challenge of Cassius Clay to a boxing match, and attempting to play tennis in his “high heeled sneakers” with his “wig-hat” falling in his face. I’m still unsure as to the meaning of any of this, but I am sure its highly entertaining, showcasing Dylan’s sense of humor and extensive use of irony. Dylan himself doesn’t help with the explaining either, laughingly singing in the final verse:

“Now you’re probably wondering by now
Just what this song is all about
What’s probably got you baffled more
Is what this thing here is for.
It’s nothing
It’s something I learned over in England.”

It doesn’t make the top 5 however, because somewhere amongst the strange happenings in the anecdotes of this harmonica laden ballad, I assume Dylan is expressing his desire to be free. I’m just not smart/crazy enough to figure out where.

Subterranean Homesick Blues – Bringing It All Back Home

I would argue that Subterranean Homesick Blues was one of the first ever rap songs. During this 2 minute, 22 second roller-coaster ride of a song Dylan spits out rhymes with better flow than Drake, and more charisma than Jay-Z. As a result, this is one of his most memorable and quotable songs, even providing the inspiration for the name of a 1960s radical terrorist organization “The Weathermen,” whose name was cribbed from the line: “You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows.” Despite all the memorable lyrics, the phrase ‘subterranean homesick blues’ doesn’t even come close to appearing in any of the verses, and for that fact, this song is included on my list as an honorable mention. It misses out on the top 5 however, because the opening line of “Johnny’s in the basement mixing up the medicine” shows subtle connections to the title. These references are primarily that the “basement,” it being a basement after all, by definition is of a subterranean nature, and the “medicine,” I can only imagine, is being “mixed up” as a cure for his homesickness. Touche Bob.

On The Road Again – Bringing It All Back Home

Falling into the category of songs  that are easily recognizable and difficult to name, On The Road Again is, like I Shall Be Free No. 10, a long-winded dissertation on Dylan’s world. Describing an unbelievably absurd setting, its clear this song’s title comes from the narrator’s desire to move away from his ridiculous surroundings. Therefore, while its title is far from memorable, its score on the randomness meter is insufficient to land a spot in the top five.

So there you have the top losers, click here with titles that are guaranteed to drive you completely insane.