Editing Highway 61 Revisited (section)

===Side one===

==== "Like a Rolling Stone" ====
{{Listen|filename=Bob_Dylan_-_Like_a_Rolling_Stone.ogg
|title="Like a Rolling Stone" |description=In 2004, ''[[Rolling Stone]]'' magazine ranked "Like a Rolling Stone" as "the greatest song of all time", and noted "the impressionist voltage of Dylan's language, the intensely personal accusation in his voice ('Ho-o-o-ow does it fe-e-e-el?')" and  "the apocalyptic charge of Kooper's garage-gospel organ".<ref name=RSgreatestsongs>{{harvnb|Rolling Stone 500 Greatest Songs: "Like a Rolling Stone"}}</ref>}}

''Highway 61 Revisited'' opens with "[[Like a Rolling Stone]]", which has been described as revolutionary in its combination of electric guitar licks, organ chords, and Dylan's voice, "at once so young and so snarling&nbsp;... and so cynical".<ref name = "Gray413">{{harvnb|Gray|2006|p=413}}</ref> Michael Gray characterized "Like a Rolling Stone" as "a chaotic amalgam of blues, impressionism, allegory, and an intense directness: 'How does it feel?'"<ref name = "Gray413"/> Polizzotti says the composition is notable for eschewing traditional themes of popular music, such as romance, instead expressing resentment and a yearning for revenge.<ref name=polizzotti1>{{harvnb|Polizzotti|2006|p=33}}</ref><ref name=trager2>{{harvnb|Trager|2004|pp=378–379}}</ref> It was suggested that Miss Lonely, the song's central character, is based on [[Edie Sedgwick]], a socialite and actress in the [[The Factory|Factory]] scene of [[pop art]]ist [[Andy Warhol]].<ref>{{harvnb|Bell|2012|pp=384–385}}</ref> Critic [[Mike Marqusee]] said the composition was "surely a Dylan cameo", and that its poignancy becomes apparent upon realizing that "it is sung, at least in part, to the singer himself: he's the one 'with no direction home'."<ref>{{harvnb|Marqusee|2005|p=165}}</ref> "Like A Rolling Stone" reached number&nbsp;two in the [[Billboard Hot 100|''Billboard'' Hot 100]] in the summer of 1965,<ref name=chart>{{harvnb|Highway 61 Revisited: Awards}}</ref> and was a top-10 hit in Australia, Canada, the Netherlands, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom.<ref>{{harvnb|Hits of the World (1965-10-09)|p=36}}</ref><ref>{{harvnb|Hits of the World (1965-12-25)|p=34}}</ref>

==== "Tombstone Blues" ====
The fast-paced, two-chord blues song "[[Tombstone Blues]]", driven by Michael Bloomfield's lead guitar, uses a parade of historical characters—outlaw [[Belle Starr]], biblical temptress [[Delilah]], [[Jack the Ripper]] (represented in this song as a successful businessman), [[John the Baptist]] (described here as a torturer), and blues singer [[Ma Rainey]] who Dylan humorously suggests shared a sleeping bag with composer [[Beethoven]]—to sketch an absurdist account of contemporary America.<ref name = "Gill84">{{harvnb|Gill|1998|pp=84–85}}</ref> Although other interpretations could be put forth: Where once the creativity embodied in the accomplishments of Ma Rainey and Beethoven flourished, now there is stultification of patriotic martial music. For critics Mark Polizzotti and Andy Gill, the reality behind the song is the then-escalating [[Vietnam War]]; both writers hear the "king of the Philistines" who sends his slaves "out to the jungle" as a reference to President [[Lyndon B. Johnson]].<ref name = "Gill84"/><ref name = "Polizzotti67">{{harvnb|Polizzotti|2006|pp=67–68}}</ref>

==== "It Takes a Lot to Laugh, It Takes a Train to Cry" ====
{{Listen|filename=It Takes a Lot to Laugh.ogg
|title=
"It Takes a Lot to Laugh, It Takes a Train to Cry"|description=According to critic Andy Gill, "It Takes A Lot To Laugh" illustrates Dylan's creativity, both in the way it adapts an old blues song, and in the way Dylan recorded two radically different versions of the song: the first, fast and guitar-driven; in his second version, released on ''Highway 61'', Dylan transformed the song into a "slow, loping, piano-based blues".<ref name=gilltrain>{{harvnb|Gill|1998|p=85}}</ref>}}

On July 29, 1965, Dylan and his band resumed recording "[[It Takes a Lot to Laugh, It Takes a Train to Cry]]".<ref name=williamstrain>{{harvnb|Williams|1990|pp=156–163}}</ref> [[Tony Glover]], who observed the recording session, has recalled that Dylan re-worked the song at the piano while the other musicians took a lunch break.<ref>{{harvnb|Heylin|2003|p=221}}</ref> Critic Sean Egan writes that by slowing down the tempo, Dylan transformed the song from an "insufferably smart-alec number into a slow, tender, sensual anthem".<ref name="Egan60">{{harvnb|Egan|2010|p=60}}</ref> Gill points out that the lyrics reveal the singer's talent for borrowing from old blues numbers, adapting the lines "Don't the clouds look lonesome shining across the sea/ Don't my gal look good when she's coming after me" from "Solid Road" by bluesmen [[Brownie McGhee]] and [[Leroy Carr]].<ref name="gilltrain"/>

==== "From a Buick 6" ====
[[AllMusic]] critic Bill Janovitz describes "[[From a Buick 6]]" as a "raucous, up-tempo blues", which is played "almost recklessly".<ref name=allmusicbuick>{{harvnb|Janovitz (1)}}</ref> The song opens with a [[snare drum|snare]] shot similar to the beginning of "Like a Rolling Stone".<ref name=gillbuick>{{harvnb|Gill|1998|p=86}}</ref> Partially based on [[Sleepy John Estes]]' 1930 song "[[Milk Cow Blues]]",<ref name=allmusicbuick/> the guitar part is patterned after older blues riffs by Robert Johnson, Charlie Patton and [[Big Joe Williams]].<ref name=sheltontrain>{{harvnb|Shelton|1986|p=280}}</ref> Robert Shelton hears the song as "an earthy tribute to another funky earth-mother",<ref name=sheltontrain/> while for Heylin it is close to filler material; he argues that only through the musicians' performance is Dylan able to "convince us he is doing more than just listing the number of ways in which this 'graveyard woman' is both a lifesaver and a death-giver".<ref name="Heylin 2009 252">{{harvnb|Heylin|2009|p=252}}</ref>

==== "Ballad of a Thin Man" ====
"[[Ballad of a Thin Man]]" is driven by Dylan's piano, which contrasts with "the spooky organ riffs" played by Al Kooper.<ref name = "MarquseeThin"/> Marqusee describes the song as one of "the purest songs of protest ever sung", as it looks at the media and its inability to understand both the singer and his work. He writes that the song became the anthem of an in-group, "disgusted by the old, excited by the new&nbsp;... elated by their discovery of others who shared their feelings", with its refrain "Something is happening here/ But you don't know what it is/ Do you, Mr Jones?" epitomizing the "hip exclusivity" of the burgeoning [[Counterculture of the 1960s|counterculture]].<ref name = "MarquseeThin">{{harvnb|Marqusee|2005|pp=169–171}}</ref> Robert Shelton describes the song's central character, Mr Jones, as "one of Dylan's greatest archetypes", characterizing him as "a [[Philistinism|Philistine]]&nbsp;... superficially educated and well bred but not very smart about the things that count".<ref name="sheltontrain"/>