In 1967 Bob Dylan went acoustic. Two years after galling his hardcore devotees by daring to wield an electric guitar at the Newport Folk Festival, the songwriter returned to his Americana roots for his next album, John Wesley Harding. The dramatic shift back to a more rustic, ascetic sound was partly due to the injuries sustained in a motorbike crash in July 1966; the incident forced him slow down, take stock and rein in his new rocker image.
But Dylan was also responding to the increasingly self-indulgent and ostentatious style of songwriting that had come to define the music of the mid-1960s. Psychedelia and verbosity had become anathema to him; he would now insist on “writing shorter lines, with every word meaning something”.
“All Along the Watchtower”is emblematic of this new, tauter approach to lyrics. At only 12 lines, it is more akin to a truncated sonnet than a song. Opening with a harmonica solo, and a first verse which introduces us to two characters, the track initially has all the hallmarks of a sprawling ballad in the vein of “Desolation Row”. Filled with medieval iconography of watchtowers, jesters and princes, we can imagine the story unfolding on a Bayeux-style tapestry.
But in two-and-a-half minutes it’s all over. In an ending similar to that of Browning’s “Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came”, Dylan abruptly leaves us with the ominous image of riders approaching a mysterious tower — and the onus of interpretation. Or even exegesis: while convalescing from his accident, Dylan immersed himself in biblical readings, and “Watchtower” contains several allusions to the Book of Isaiah in which the fall of Babylon is heralded by the arrival of unknown horsemen.
Whatever it’s all about, it certainly made an impression on Jimi Hendrix, who was immediately captivated by the song’s brooding, dramatic potential. Only weeks after hearing the original he was in the studio recording his own version. Some 27 takes and numerous overdubs later, Hendrix succeeded in creating an indelible, electrifying rock classic, hailed by The Telegraph and Rolling Stone as the greatest cover of all time.
The sense of foreboding cultivated in Dylan’s cryptic lyrics is intensified by heavy drums and the wailing wah-wah-driven guitar solos — extraordinary even by Hendrix’s preternatural standards — which replaced the harmonica. We can almost feel the howling wind, mentioned in the last line, tearing through the entire song.
The impossibly high bar set by Hendrix has not deterred artists from trying to put their own stamp on the song. Neil Younghas played it live several times, using Hendrix’s bluesy guitar work as a template for his own improvised renditions. But often running over 10 minutes, his live versions lack Hendrix’s intensity, and seem to embody the self-indulgence Dylan was so steadfastly against when he wrote the song.
The Grateful Deadplayed “Watchtower” more than 100 times in their live shows during the 1980s. A band perhaps best defined as a confluence of folk and psychedelic rock, The Dead fittingly fused the song’s two most famous incarnations in their own performances. A jazzy version, featuring a largely incomprehensible Dylan on vocals, can be found on the 1989 album, Dylan & The Dead.
If Dylan ended up sounding like a parody of himself, Bono is barely recognisable in U2’slive cover, which appeared on the 1988 album and tour documentary, Rattle and Hum. His usual clean-cut, Irish-lilted vocals give way here to something much grittier. Their version is not dissimilar to ones by Pearl Jam, who have also frequently given frenetic performances of “Watchtower” as part of their encores. Their frontman, Eddie Vedder, individually recorded the song for the soundtrack of the quasi-biopic of Dylan, I’m Not There, in 2007. Vedder’s voice, packing a subsurface volatility, perfectly conveys the original’s nervous energy.
More recently, grime artist Devlinsampled both Dylan and Hendrix’s versions in his 2012 rap-rock crossover. An instrumental version— complete with pulsating drums and electronic flourishes — worked brilliantly as the title theme for TV series, The Young Pope, bringing the song back to its biblical roots.
Among the myriad recordings of “All Along the Watchtower”, few resemble Dylan’s pithy ballad; all of them are variations on that first, definitive cover. But calling it a cover does a disservice to Hendrix — it is as much his song as it is Dylan’s, if not more so. After all, when Dylan did eventually pick up his electric guitar again, it was Hendrix’s version of “All Along the Watchtower”, not his own, which he chose to play.
We’re keen to hear from our readers. Do you prefer Dylan’s or Hendrix’s version of ‘All Along the Watchtower’? Let us know in the comments below.
‘The Life of a Song: The fascinating stories behind 50 of the world’s best-loved songs’, edited by David Cheal and Jan Dalley, is published by Brewer’s.
Music credits: Columbia, Legacy Recordings, Gonzo, Grateful Dead/Rhino, Columbia/Legacy, Universal-Island Records Ltd., Columbia/Sony Music Soundtrax, Universal-Island Records Ltd., Universal-Island Records Ltd.
Picture credit: Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images