The Bob Dylan track he called perfect: “All there in one song”
Bob Dylan never had any interest in being the musical God everyone took him for. He was more than happy to write solely for himself, and whether or not anyone else liked it was really beside the point half the time. Still, he did acknowledge that his audience was a big part of why he could carry on, and he pointed to ‘Shot of Love’ as one of his most emblematic songs for his public persona.
By the time Dylan reached the 1980s, though, his star had started falling just slightly. Despite the number of classics he had already released, his turn as a born-again Christian at the end of the 1970s felt like a more refined version of the mischievous lyrical punk his fans knew. Now, instead of asking for answers from people who had few good ones to offer, Dylan seemed content to have everything figured out and encouraged everyone to follow behind him. While Slow Train Coming had that sense of spiritualism, the folk icon was starting to unravel a little when making Shot of Love.
Whereas George Harrison had made his appeals to God seem fairly compelling on every one of his records, hearing Dylan talk about ‘Shot of Love’ as his personal mantra at least sounds like it’s coming from a genuine place. It was always difficult to find out what the hell Dylan was getting at during the best of times, but singing about how he only needs his spiritual life to get him through isn’t all that different than what the former Beatle had done on ‘Awaiting On You All’.
Even Dylan himself considered this his ultimate statement, saying, “To those who care where Bob Dylan is at, they should listen to ‘Shot of Love’. It’s my most perfect song. It defines where I am spiritually, musically, romantically and whatever else. It shows where my sympathies lie. It’s all there in that one song.”
While it’s far from the level of ‘Like A Rolling Stone’ or ‘Blowin’ In the Wind’, it’s interesting to hear Dylan at his most confident on this record. Regardless of the amount of BS that he had to take from people calling him a phoney in the 1960s and trying to outrun his own celebrity in the 1970s, ‘Shot of Love’ saw him almost going as far back as the hippy movement by claiming that he was in love with all parts of life.
That kind of euphoric high needed a comedown, though, and Dylan’s stretch of albums from Infidels to the start of the Traveling Wilburys is a rough patch in his career, including songs that could have been on a forgotten Tom Petty solo outing or a one-hit-wonder folk rock act’s biggest smash.
When listening to where Dylan would go from there with his albums in the 1990s like Time Out of Mind and even later on Rough and Rowdy Ways, he still had the same sense of conviction that he had with ‘Shot of Love’. It’s one thing to be able to write a great melody, but if Dylan learned anything from those years as a borderline song evangelist, it was about saying things with confidence.
Never Miss A Tale
The Far Out Bob Dylan Newsletter
All the latest stories about Bob Dylan from the independent voice of culture.
Straight to your inbox.