Music

Bob Dylan releases 17 minute epic Murder Most Foul about JFK — and so much more


First original song by Nobel Prize-winner takes listeners on a journey through the 60s — but with contemporary resonance

Friday, 27th March 2020, 1:49 pm

Updated Friday, 27th March 2020, 2:19 pm
Bob Dylan releases 17-minute epic track Murder Most Foul about JFK (Photo: Kevin Winter/Getty)

Bob Dylan delighted fans by sharing his first original song in eight years, a 17-minute epic about the assassination of John F Kennedy.

However the lyrics of the track, titled Murder Most Foul, prompted Dylanologists to speculate that the mercurial singer intended the song to carry a contemporary political resonance.

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“Greetings to my fans and followers with gratitude for all your support and loyalty across the years,” Dylan said.

State of the Nation epic

“This is an unreleased song we recorded a while back that you might find interesting. Stay safe, stay observant and may God be with you. Bob Dylan.”

Murder Most Foul explores JFK’s 1963 assassination in Dallas while also touching on other themes of the decade.

The Beatles, The Who’s Tommy and Ferry Across The Mersey get a mention, as do the Woodstock and Altamont concerts, both key events in the 1960s counterculture.

“The day they killed him, someone said to me, son, the age of the antichrist has just only begun,” Dylan, 78, sings on the track.

Trump allusion?

“The soul of a nation’s been torn away, and it’s beginning to go into a slow decay… It’s 36 hours past judgment day.”

Fan believed that the tone of Dylan’s voice suggested a relatively recent recording.

Rolling Stone magazine said the song’s “themes of doom – and possible redemption – feel alarmingly in tune with our current moment, which may have prompted Dylan to choose it for release.”

‘Mesmerising’

The publication said Murder Most Foul’s “structural freedom and mesmerizing arrangement  – a dusting of piano, a lilting violin, distant percussion – feel like fresh territory for Dylan.”

Rumours suggest that Dylan, who has recently released his interpretations of the great American songbook, has been preparing a new album.

Fans hoped that Murder Most Foul might indicate a timely return to the social commentary of Dylan’s era-defining 60s protest songs such as Blowin’ In The Wind and The Times They Are a-Changin’.



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