Saturday, March 29, 2025

Bob Dylan's 50+ Greatest Songs


Sketch of Bob Dylan based on 1961 portrait 
(Michael Ochs Archives/Getty)

We watched A Complete Unknown last night. My wife had watched it earlier in the week and complained about earworms keeping her awake for the rest of the night. Unlike her, I know very few of the lyrics (your typical music luddite).

With my 60s culture ignorance in mind I retrieved Bob Dylan's 636 songs and made a list of his 50 best songs with links to the lyrics (the ranking is the lyrical link).

The list was compiled from the following articles:


Bob Dylan's Greatest Songs
compiled from Rolling Stone, Paste, MOJO, Guardian
Rank
+ lyrics
Song title
+ wiki
Released[a]
1Like a Rolling Stone196521
2Tangled Up in Blue1975
3Desolation Row1965
4Idiot Wind1975
5Visions of Johanna1966
6The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll1964
7All Along the Watchtower1967
8Ballad of a Thin Man1965
9I Shall Be Released1971
10I Threw It All Away1969
11Not Dark Yet1997
12Changing of the Guards1978
13Most of the Time1989
14Brownsville Girl1986
15Isis1976
16Blind Willie McTell1991
17Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands1966
18Just Like a Woman1966
19Subterranean Homesick Blues196513
20Girl from the North Country19634
21Every Grain of Sand1981
22Positively 4th Street1967
23Murder Most Foul2020
24Simple Twist of Fate1975
25Sign on the Window1970
26Jokerman1983
27My Back Pages1964
28Love Minus Zero/No Limit1965
29Went to See the Gypsy1970
30A Hard Rain's a-Gonna Fall19636
31Tears of Rage1975
32Queen Jane Approximately1965
33Standing in the Doorway1997
34It's Alright, Ma (I'm Only Bleeding)1965
35Mr. Tambourine Man19652
36Precious Angel1979
37Shot of Love1981
38Shelter from the Storm1975
39Can You Please Crawl Out Your Window?1985
40Highway 61 Revisited19651
41Love Sick1997
42Abandoned Love1985
43Things Have Changed2000
44Masters of War196311
45Mississippi2001
46Lily, Rosemary and the Jack of Hearts1975
47Caribbean Wind1985
48Chimes of Freedom1964
49Buckets of Rain1975
50Hurricane1976
I Was Young When I Left Home20053
Don't Think Twice, It's All Right196310
Blowin' in the Wind196312
The Times They Are a-Changin'196415
[b]When the Ship Comes In196416
Maggie's Farm196519
It Takes a Lot to Laugh, It Takes a Train to Cry196520
It's All Over Now, Baby Blue196522
[b]Song to Woody196223
NOTES:
[b] song appears in one of the 4 lists


Ranking was determined as follows:
  • The number of times a song was included in one of the published lists was counted and put in descending order (i.e, the songs on all 4 lists were first, followed by those on 3 lists, etc)
  • The sum of the song's rankings was computed and sorted in ascending order (Example: 
    • Like a Rolling Stone and Tangled Up in Blue were on all 4 lists with ranking sums of 25 and 68 respectively.  Since Like a Rolling Stone had higher rankings on the list (a lower sum) it was ranked 1st.



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