Credit: Twin/Tone Records

‘Like A Rolling Pin’: The Replacements’ hilarious parody of Bob Dylan

Tue 24 January 2023 16:00, UK

In the late 1970s, Bob Stinson gifted his 11-year-old brother, Tommy, a bass guitar to preoccupy his time. The two brothers recruited Chris Mars, a high-school dropout, to join their new band, and soon The Replacements were born. Well, in the early days, they went by the questionable name ‘Dogbreath’, performing covers of Aerosmith, Yes, and Ted Nugent songs. However, the band were missing a singer, so they auditioned several possible contenders before settling on Paul Westerberg, a friend they’d already been jamming with.

It soon became apparent that Westerberg was much more dedicated to creating music than the rest of the band, who spent much of their rehearsal time taking drugs and drinking. “They didn’t even know what punk was,” he later said. “They didn’t like punk. Chris had hair down to his shoulders.” However, the rest of Dogbreath soon discovered classic punk bands such as The Clash, the Buzzcocks, and the Damned, which inspired them to incorporate a heavier sound into their music.

The band changed their name to The Replacements after getting kicked out of a gig for poor behaviour. Mars explained the name change, stating: “Like maybe the main act doesn’t show, and instead the crowd has to settle for an earful of us dirtbags…It seemed to sit just right with us, accurately describing our collective ‘secondary’ social esteem.”

Encouraged by their enthusiastic and dedicated manager Peter Jesperson, the band kept playing, even when crowd turn-outs were low. They eventually began to release material, which fell under the hardcore/punk umbrella due to the influence of contemporaries such as Hüsker Dü. Yet, the band claimed they never identified as a hardcore band, with Mars explaining: “We were confused about what we were.” Over the next few years, the band refined their sound and released seven studio albums before breaking up in 1991, cementing their departure with a farewell tour. Their last show (until a reunion period during the 2010s) saw each band member leave the stage one by one before their roadies slowly replaced them, leading fans to refer to the show as ‘It Ain’t Over ‘Til the Fat Roadie Plays’.

Evidently, The Replacements have always had a sense of humour, perhaps not always taking their music as seriously as they should have. The band often appeared drunk and disorderly, making their gigs wildly unpredictable. After over a decade of being together, the band showed no sign of calming down their irresponsible ways. Whilst recording their final album, All Shook Down, in 1990, the group decided to mess around and parody ‘Like A Rolling Stone’ by Bob Dylan, who was in the same studio – Oceanway in Hollywood – recording overdubs for Under the Red Sky.

At the studio, The Replacements had a conversation with Dylan, whose son was a fan of the band, bonding over the fact they were all from Minnesota. However, a few days later, a jam session saw the band parody ‘Like A Rolling Stone’. Bassist Tommy Stinson can be heard saying, “Hey, Bob, come on in here and play guitar, like a rolling pin” at the beginning of the track, before Westerberg launches into a gravelly-voiced parody of Dylan’s song. Changing Dylan’s opening lines, “Once upon a time you dressed so fine, threw the bums a dime in your prime,” to “Once upon a time, you threw the ‘Mats a dime” (the Mats was The Replacement’s nickname), the band recorded ‘Like a Rolling Pin’.

However, Dylan was standing outside the studio when Stinson quipped the line, prompting him to walk inside. When the band realised what had happened, they were unsure what to do, so they let Westerberg continue, who had his back turned to the door. Of course, the singer was embarrassed when he realised what happened, reportedly falling to the floor and begging on his knees for forgiveness.

There have been differing reports on how Dylan reacted, although the general consensus is that he didn’t seem to mind. The singer visited the band after the incident, bringing his kids to meet them. The final track was released on the compilation album, All for Nothing / Nothing for All in 1997, and although it sounds far from any of the band’s best work, its hilarious backstory makes it worth a listen.

Listen to the track below.