Download "Highway 61 Revisited"

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 And he said yes I think it can be easily done
Just take everything down to Highway 61

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      Billy released his demo cover of Bob Dylan's classic "Highway 61" on My Lives.  It is a perfect song for Billy to cover given the bittersweet and sardonic lyrics, and its roadhouse rocker feel.  This could have been an appropriate B-side to anything from Storm Front.  It is both a faithful rendition of the original, while also giving the song a new twist.  Billy has performed with his other musical idols such as Ray Charles, Stevie Winwood, and Paul McCartney;  I'd like to see him perform or record with Dylan sometime.  As an aside, my favorite cover of a Dylan song is Nina Simone's  "Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues."
 
      As noted earlier on this website, Billy had been a fan of Bob Dylan as a teen, and signed with Columbia Records in the early 1970s rather than Atlantic Records in part because Dylan was on Columbia.   So it was natural that Billy performed Dylan's classic song "The Times They Are A Changin'"  while in Russia in 1987.   When Dylan released the song back in the 1960s in the United States, it perfectly captured the changing cultural and political climate of the United States including the Civil Rights movement and Free Speech movement.  Billy aptly saw that something similar was happening in Russia at the time.  
    
     Ten years later, in 1997, Billy would cover another Dylan tune, "To Make You Feel My Love" on Billy's Greatest Hits, Volume III.  Billy's version actually was released before Dylan's own version. 

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Michael Jackson, Christie Brinkley, Bob Dylan and Billy Joel at the recording of "We Are The World" (1985).  Photo: Sam Emerson.

Highway 61 Revisited          <<         >>
(My Lives) (2005)     
(Words and music by Bob Dylan) 

Oh God said to Abraham, “Kill me a son”
Abe says, “Man, you must be puttin’ me on”
God say, “No.” Abe say, “What?”
God say, “You can do what you want Abe, but
The next time you see me comin’ you better run”
Well Abe says, “Where do you want this killin’ done?”
God says, “Out on Highway 61”

Well Georgia Sam he had a bloody nose
Welfare Department they wouldn’t give him no clothes
He asked poor Howard where can I go
Howard said there’s only one place I know
Sam said tell me quick man I got to run
Ol’ Howard just pointed with his gun
And said that way down on Highway 61

Well Mack the Finger said to Louie the King
I got forty red, white and blue shoestrings
And a thousand telephones that don’t ring
Do you know where I can get rid of these things
And Louie the King said let me think for a minute son
And he said yes I think it can be easily done
Just take everything down to Highway 61

Now the fifth daughter on the twelfth night
Told the first father that things weren’t right
My complexion she said is much too white
He said come here and step into the light, he says hmm you’re right
Let me tell the second mother this has been done
But the second mother was with the seventh son
And they were both out on Highway 61

Now the rovin’ gambler he was very bored
He was tryin’ to create a next world war
He found a promoter who nearly fell off the floor
He said I never engaged in this kind of thing before
But yes I think it can be very easily done
We’ll just put some bleachers out in the sun
And have it on Highway 61

Copyright © 1965 by Warner Bros. Inc.; renewed 1993 by Special Rider Music

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Billy's demo version of Bob Dylan's "Highway 61."

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