The Bob Dylan Top 125 Countdown, This Week's Statistics & Oscar Eligible Songs

We are now entering the Top 75 of the Bob Dylan Top 125 Countdown, so expect to hear many great songs as we ascend. But we're also introducing a new section, with this year's Oscar eligible songs. Let's go!

At #75 is The Wicked Messenger, a song written and originally performed by Bob Dylan for his album John Wesley Harding. It was recorded in Nashville on November 29, 1967. The song's instrumentation is light, a characteristic shared with the rest of John Wesley Harding. It features a repetitive descending bass line that carries the song, and the most prominent instrument used is Bob Dylan's acoustic guitar.

The lyrics have their origins in the Bible. In his book, Wicked Messenger: Bob Dylan and the 1960s, Mike Marqusee writes:

“The song title appears to be derived from Proverbs 13:17: "A wicked messenger falleth into mischief: but a faithful ambassador is health.". [In the song] the character first appears in public, unbidden, as an obsessive[...] The wicked messenger is the artist, the prophet, the protest singer.”

Dylan was studying the Bible at the time, and he used many biblical reference in the songs on the John Wesley Harding album. His mother, Beatty Zimmerman, revealed in an interview at this time:

“In his house in Woodstock today, there's a huge Bible open on a stand in the middle of his study. Of all the books that crowd his house, overflow from his house, that Bible gets the most attention. He's continuously getting up and going over to refer to something."

”The song revolves around a character, a "wicked messenger", who has been sent by Eli, a priest in the Books of Samuel. For the critic Andy Gill, "this eponymous messenger is, of course, Dylan himself, the bringer of harsh truths". The lyrics are somewhat opaque ("When questioned who had sent for him/He answered with his thumb/For his tongue it could not speak but only flatter"), and the song ends with a sardonic, slightly cryptic moral, "And he was told but these few words/Which opened up his heart/"If ye cannot bring good news, then don't bring any" perhaps a reference to 2 Samuel 4:10.

Gill's interpretation of the song is that the high priest Eli was one of the more intellectual figures in the Old Testament. To have been sent by Eli implies a reliance on intellect. Gill suggests that "perhaps Dylan felt he had valued rationality too highly over spirituality."

This is a very good cover, with Greek lyrics, by Greek singer/songwriter Dionysis Savvopoulos (Διονύσης Σαββόπουλος):

At #74 we find You're Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go, a song that appears on Dylan's album Blood on the Tracks, released in January 1975. According to the Daily Telegraph the song is the album's "simplest, breeziest song – yet it remains heartbreaking in its almost carefree surrender to the inevitability of romantic pain." Dylan has not performed the song since 1976.

The song's lyrics have brought forth multiple interpretations—from the idea that they are confessional, to Dylan's claims that the album was inspired by literature, to the lyrics being called Dylan's most masterfully written love poem. Many believe the song describes Dylan's relationship issues with his wife during the time when they were separated. Additionally, Ellen Bernstein, a girlfriend of Dylan's in 1974 while he was separated from his wife, claims that the song was about their relationship.

Jim James says in "Rolling Stone":

Blood on the Tracks has always been one of my favorite Dylan records – it's the classic tough-love album to turn to when you're feeling kind of alone. You're Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go might win my repeat-listening award. I don't know if it's just the acoustic guitar and the bass, the way they work together rhythmically, but when I hear the song, it's just the essence of love.

He's describing everything so viscerally. I can almost smell the trees and different people I've known over the years, the flowers, the sunlight – the way things look when you're falling in love and how that turns in on itself when you have to leave or move on or life changes you or changes the other person. He's reflecting on it in such a beautiful way, saying that person will always be a part of him. He'll see her everywhere.

This is the original version:

You're Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go

This is live in Forthworth, Texas in 1976:

... And this is an interesting cover by Miley Cyrus:

Finally for today, at #73 a haunting Country Rock epic that was inspired by a man Dylan saw on a train ride from Mexico to San Diego: "He must have been 150 years old... Both his eyes were burning, and there was smoke coming out of his nostrils."

The song is called Señor (Tales of Yankee Power) and appears on the album Street Legal (1978). The album had opposing fates in either side of the Atlantic: in the UK it was Dylan's most successful studio album, peaking at #2 and going platinum. In the US it peaked at #11, making it his first studio album to miss the US Top 10 since 1964.

The same with the critics: good to great reviews in the UK, mediocre to good reviews in the US. I liked the album from the start, feeling that it was a natural procession for the man. Was it a perfect album? No. But it was a good enough Dylan album, which means it was better than most other albums by other artists at the time.

Here's a live version of the song:

... And here's a good cover by Willie Nelson & Calexico:

Now, let's move on to the weekly statistics. This week, things are beginning to normalize: we had a third of last week's visits, but we still had twice as much as the week before that. Which means that a lot of our first time visitors stuck around, even though this week there have been fewer new posts than usual. The new posts got their fair share of traffic, but it was the George Michael story that continued to dominate. What's interesting is what people chose to read, compared to the traffic before George's departure: The Wham! story doubled its readers, the George Michael part 1 story (which concerned the huge success of the 80s and early 90s) tripled its readers, while the George Michael part 2 story (which concerned the less successful, but equally productive years after 1991) increased its visitors by 75 times. That's an increase of 7500%! What this says to me is that there was a gap of coverage for this period, since most publications have seen fit to cover the most commercial periods. I for one prefer his later career, especially his gradual opening up about his sexual identity in his songs, which became crystal clear from Outside onwards. It seems many readers thought so too.

The big winners of the week were primarily the United States and France, while the other usual contenders kept the strength, more or less. For Russia, Canada, and Cyprus, it was a return to form.

The full Top 10 is as follows:

1. the United States

2. France

3. Germany

4. the United Kingdom

5. Greece

6. the United Arab Emirates

7. Italy

8. Australia

9. Russia

10. Canada

10. Cyprus

Here are the other countries that graced us with their presence this week (alphabetically): Algeria, Argentina, Austria, Azerbaijan, Bahamas, Belarus, Belgium, Bolivia, Brazil, Brunei, Bulgaria, Cameroon, Chile, China, Colombia, Costa Rica, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Ethiopia, Finland, Guadeloupe, Guernsey, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Iraq, Ireland, Israel, Jamaica, Japan, Jordan, Kenya, Latvia, Lithuania, Madagascar, Malaysia, Malta, Mexico, Monaco, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Panama, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Qatar, Romania, Serbia, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, Thailand, Trinidad & Tobago, Turkey, Ukraine, US Virgin Islands, and Vietnam. Happy to have you all!

In the all-time Top 10, no great changes occurred: Greece has recently slowed down, but it's still safe from losing second place to Germany or France, both of which are gaining ground. The US has absolutely no problem sitting pretty at the top. The Netherlands and Brazil have slowed down a bit: they have to pick up speed, if they don't want to be replaced by Canada, Cyprus, and Australia, which are coming from behind. Here's the all-time Top 10:

1. the United States = 46.6%

2. Greece = 10.4%

3. Germany = 8.5%

4. France = 7.4%

5. Russia = 6.0%

6. the United Kingdom = 3.3%

7. Italy = 1.19%

8. the United Arab Emirates = 1.10%

9. the Netherlands = 0.84%

10. Brazil = 0.78%

Before we close, since we're inching closer to the Oscar nominations, I will start presenting the songs that are eligible for nomination, in order of personal preference. It all depends on the songs' availability on YouTube as well.

Here are a few that I like (not necessarily those that I think are likely to be nominated: I just like them in this order, more or less).

From Pete's Dragon, here's Lindsey Stirling performing Something Wild:

From Queen of Katwe, here's Alicia Keys with Back to Life:

From 13th, here's Common ft. Bilal with Letter To The Free:

From Audrie & Daisy, here's Tori Amos with Flicker:

From Jim: The James Foley Story, here's J. Ralph & Sting with The Empty Chair:

Finally for today, from Trolls, here's a more familiar one; Justin Timberlake with Can’t Stop the Feeling:

More will follow. See you then!