 This video is brought to you by CuriosityStream. By signing up to CuriosityStream with the link in the description, you'll also get access to Nebula where you can watch my original series, Led Zeppelin's The Epics. Find out more after the video. Bob Dylan had a complicated relationship with the press. In his early days, Dylan used the media as a tool for self-mythmaking. He would feed them lies and half-truths about his biography to create a very specific image, a Woody Guthrie-inspired traveling vagabond. But the myth of Dylan grew from there, and soon enough he became the icon for a growing counterculture in the United States. By the middle of the 1960s, Dylan had been dubbed the voice of his generation, and that title brings with it a weight and responsibility, often in the form of countless press tours. So Dylan began to take an adversarial approach to the press. This is perhaps most iconically exemplified in this 1965 press conference in San Francisco. The entire conference is an hour of sarcastic retorts and non-answers by Bob Dylan. It's become a key part of the iconography of Bob Dylan, and halfway through, one reporter asks Dylan one of the greatest lingering questions of his career. This is of course referring to the song Ballad of a Thin Man, and there's a certain kind of irony to a reporter asking this question of Bob Dylan, because Ballad of a Thin Man is itself a caustic shot at the press and the mainstream society they represent. Let's take a closer look. Before we go any deeper into this, we need to get something out of the way. We still don't know who Mr. Jones is. Over the years, Dylan has given many answers to the question of his character's identity, though. He said Mr. Jones was someone who asked questions all the time. He said he's a pin boy and a man in a truck stop. He's even said that Mr. Jones is multiple people. But of course, it's been well established that Dylan's words are to be taken with several grains of salt. Now, this hasn't stopped people from speculating as to the true identity of Mr. Jones over the years. The most likely answers are probably a pair of music journalists. Max Jones wrote for Melody Maker Magazine in the mid-60s, and Dylan once asked after him at a press conference. And then there's Jeffrey Jones, who claimed throughout his life that he was the real Mr. Jones, even if it was a dubious title to lay claim to. Jeffrey Jones was an intern for Time Magazine in 1965, when Dylan infamously played his first electric set at the Newport Folk Festival. He was tasked with interviewing Dylan, and if his tale is to be believed, the interview went poorly enough that Dylan wrote a song about him. But I think the best answer as to who Mr. Jones is comes from our unreliable Bob Dylan himself. Talking to his biographer Robert Shelton, Dylan once said, I could tell you who Mr. Jones is in my life, but like everybody has got their Mr. Jones. This isn't to say that everybody has press in their life, but it's more of a statement on what the press represented to Dylan. To Dylan, the press where people out of touch with him and his movement, people who pestered him for his beliefs without truly understanding where they came from. The press were outsiders, trying to give the world a voyeuristic peek into the world of his in-group, and the press were all of old society, trying to pass blanket moralistic judgments on his culture and lifestyle. When penning his response to these people, Dylan started from an interesting narrative choice, writing in the second person. Dylan makes his audience Mr. Jones, and sets himself up as the narrator, walking Mr. Jones through a dark, confusing scene. The music pairs well with this feeling. Dylan borrowed a piano lick from the great Ray Charles. Behind, Al Cooper's organ sings in a haunting dirge. The way Dylan plays the piano is plodding, dark, and heavy. It feels like walking into a dimly lit room, fitting given the opening lines of the song. These lines lend credence to the theory that Mr. Jones is a journalist. He's pictured with a pencil in his hand. The first two verses are similar. They create an air of confusion. In the second verse, Dylan leans into this confusion in form, not just function. The very way he phrases the verse is surreal. It seems to carry a kind of dream-like logic to it, with a series of questions, each answered by further questioning. It becomes clear that Mr. Jones has stepped into a world he can't make sense of, a world in which he's a stranger. And, of course, that's the thrust of the refrain. In the third verse, we get an ironic twist here. Mr. Jones is watching the people he considers to be freaks, but the geek reaches out and hands him a bone. It's still in pointing out that those on the fringes of society, those that Mr. Jones passes moral judgment on, will still humanize Mr. Jones. As the beating heart of America's counterculture, Dylan was often othered by the mainstream media. He felt as though they were showing him off in some sort of freak show. After another refrain, we launch into the most vitriolic verse, where Bob Dylan describes Mr. Jones' life dripping with sarcasm. He portrays Mr. Jones as being celebrated in polite society. Professors respect him. He has discussions with lawyers. You've discussed lepers and crooks. You've been through all of... But there's a facade here. Dylan's name-dropping of F. Scott Fitzgerald is no accident. Fitzgerald is a great author, but he's one that's often name-dropped and celebrated superficially in high society. Across his career, he only wrote four full books, so reading them all isn't that much of an impressive feat. And perhaps most notable, Fitzgerald is famous for writing The Great Gatsby, a book centering around someone who fakes at being part of high society. For Dylan, Mr. Jones is inauthentic on all levels. He's faking his way through intellectual circles while fetishizing the counterculture. Ballad of a Thin Man also has palpable homoerotic undertones. From the very opening scene, we get a man holding a pencil, seeing another naked man. Then throughout the song, we get various pieces of phallic imagery. The theme plays out most clearly in the fifth verse, when Bob Dylan describes the sword swallower. Wearing high heels, the sword swallower kneels before Mr. Jones. I like to read this as Dylan empathizing with queer communities and how the press at the time vilified them. Dylan aligns Mr. Jones against these gay scenes, peering at them, judging them, and being confused by them. But in the end, this is hypocritical, as Mr. Jones himself receives pleasure from the sword swallower. Mr. Jones wants to point and laugh at the freaks, but he himself is one. Of course, this could be an elaborate metaphor for Dylan and his art, too. The press obviously had a fascination with his art, but weren't willing to follow its message, weren't willing to join in with the counterculture. In the sixth verse, we see how Dylan can use the press, though. As he tells Mr. Jones, you're a cow, give me some milk, or else go home. To Dylan, the press is necessary. He can milk the press to spread his message further, but he's tired of them seeing this relationship as anything other than that. In the final verse, we return to the beginning, Mr. Jones walking into a room. This time, Mr. Jones doesn't even try to observe. He puts his eyes in his pocket. And at the end, Dylan decides upon Mr. Jones' sentence. He should be made to wear earphones. Like so much of the song, it's a double meaning. Mr. Jones should be forced to listen closely to the music he writes about, but he should also be isolated from society. Ballad of a Thin Man is one of the heaviest, darkest songs of Dylan's entire career. It gives us a peek into his head, into who he thinks are his enemies and how he thinks they see the world. And the great irony of the piece is that, in the end, by calling out the press for asking too many questions, Dylan just spawned a thousand more waiting to be answered. You might not be able to find answers to Dylan's many questions, but if you're looking for answers to questions like, can a computer write a hit musical? Can we colonize Mars? Or why are we here? You should look no further than CuriosityStream. If you watch this channel enough, you probably already know the deal with CuriosityStream. They're a streaming service dedicated to documentary content, and they've got thousands of documentaries on a wide variety of subjects. 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