Born In Time

If anyone asks, the answer is "Yes." We did go ahead and purchase the recently released and much maligned Dylan Christmas CD, Christmas In The Heart. I'll review it after we listen to it this weekend. For now, I'm still not done extracting the full measure of last year's Tell Tale Signs, and this morning I wanted to share another great tune, Born In Time.

A lot of people don't realize what a great album this is, opening last year at #6 on the Billboard 200. It was Dylan's 17th album to open on the Top Ten. Edna Gunderson, writing about the album for USA TODAY last year, described it like this:

The two-CD, 27-song set, out Oct. 7, contains previously unreleased studio recordings, demos, alternate takes, live tracks and rarities spanning 1989 to 2006, a rich period that generated the lauded Time Out of Mind, Love and Theft, Modern Times and Oh Mercy... Listeners will discover a wealth of fresh material and multiple versions of songs with altered lyrics, moods and styles.

"When Most of the Time came out on Oh Mercy, I thought it was such an achingly beautiful love song," says Steve Berkowitz, senior vice president of A&R at Columbia/Legacy. "Now it's here as a folk version and something that sounds like Dylan with Brian Eno and The Edge. To hear the way the songs and lyrics develop is fascinating. Dylan comes across as a folk singer, a blues musician and a jazz artist."

This song, too, Born In Time, is "achingly beautiful." You can probably find it online somewhere, but why not just get the whole enchilada? Tell Tale Signs is a thoroughly rich and wonderful experience that I'm still absorbing again and again.

The line "when we were made of dreams" evokes for me that moment in Vanilla Sky when Sofia tells David, "I'll see you in another life... when we are both cats." Many of the lyrics are ambiguous and obscure, yet they touch real places in the soul. Like a Fellini film, every passing moment is another opportunity to grasp meanings and lose them again. Open your eyes.

Born In Time
by Bob Dylan

In the lonely night
In the stardust of a pale blue light
I think of you in black and white
When we were made of dreams.

I walk along through the shaking street,
Listening to my heart beat
In the record breaking heat
When we were born in time.

Bridge 1:
Just when I thought you were gone you came back
Just when I was ready to receive you;
You were smooth, you were rough
You were more than enough,
Oh babe, why did I ever leave you? Or grieve you?

On the rising curve
Where the ways of nature will test every nerve,
I took you close and got what I deserve
When we were born in time.

Bridge #2:
Just when I knew
Who to thank, you went blank
Just when the firelight
Was gleaming

You were snow, you were rain
You were striped, you were plain
Oh babe, could it be that you were scheming?
Or was I dreaming?

In the hills of mystery,
In the foggy web of destiny,
You’re still so deep inside of me
Where we were born in time.