Ballad of a Thin Man

"Ballad of a Thin Man"
Song by Bob Dylan from the album Highway 61 Revisited
Released	August 30, 1965
Recorded	Columbia Studios, New York, August 2, 1965
Genre	Blues rock
Length	5:58
Label	Columbia
Writer	Bob Dylan
Producer	Bob Johnston
Highway 61 Revisited track listing
From a Buick 6 (4) "Ballad of a Thin Man" (5) Queen Jane Approximately (6)

"Ballad of a Thin Man" is a song written and recorded by Bob Dylan, released on the album Highway 61 Revisited in 1965.

Meaning

"Ballad of a Thin Man" comments on a conventional "Mr. Jones", who walks into a room of intentionally bizarre circus freaks and doesn't "know what's happening".

The "identity" of Mr. Jones has long been in dispute. When asked about it in an interview in 1965, Dylan responded:

"He's a pinboy. He also wears suspenders. He's a real person. You know him, but not by that name... I saw him come into the room one night and he looked like a camel. He proceeded to put his eyes in his pocket. I asked this guy who he was and he said, "That's Mr. Jones." Then I asked this cat, "Doesn't he do anything but put his eyes in his pocket?" And he told me, "He puts his nose on the ground." It's all there, it's a true story."

Another theory is that the Jones in question was Jeffrey Owen Jones (later a film professor at Rochester Institute of Technology). As an intern for Time Magazine, Jones had interviewed Dylan just a day before the musician's performance at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival. Jeffrey Jones later wrote a piece for Rolling Stone, recalling how he wrote an assigned piece on the increasing popularity of harmonicas, while missing the controversy around Dylan going electric.

Releases

It was originally released in 1965 on Highway 61 Revisited, with live versions released on Before the Flood (1974), Bob Dylan at Budokan (1979), Real Live (1984), Hard to Handle (video, 1986), The Bootleg Series Vol. 4: Bob Dylan Live 1966, The "Royal Albert Hall" Concert (1998) and on The Bootleg Series Vol. 7: No Direction Home: The Soundtrack (2005). "Ballad of a Thin Man" has been extensively performed live throughout Dylan's career, up to this day.

The song featured in David Edgar's short play, Ball Boys, published in 1978.

Covers

• The Grass Roots: Where Were You When I Needed You (1966)
• The Sports: The Sports Play Dylan & Donovan (1981)
• Top Jimmy & The Rhythm Pigs: Pigus Drunkus Maximus (1987)
• Uncle Green: Tribute to Bob Dylan, Volume 2 (1995)
• Calamity Jane: Outlaw Blues, Volume 2 (1995)
• Golden Earring: Love Sweat (1995)
• Elliott Smith played the song live on occasion, and bootlegs of his cover exist
• The Grateful Dead: Postcards of the Hanging: Grateful Dead Perform the Songs of Bob Dylan (2002)
• Robyn Hitchcock: Robyn Sings (2002)
• Kula Shaker: Kollected (2003)
• Willard Grant Conspiracy: Let It roll (2006)
• Jamie Saft Trio with Mike Patton: Trouble: The Jamie Saft Trio Plays Bob Dylan (2006)
• Enrique Bunbury
• Stephen Malkmus And The Million Dollar Bashers: I'm Not There Soundtrack (2007)
• Laibach, cover CD released by USA Embassy in Ljubljana, Slovenia Projekt Bob Dylan: Postani prostovoljec (2011)

External links

• Lyrics to "Ballad of a Thin Man"