"This here, it ain't a protest song"

1962-04-16?, Gerde's Folk City?, New York, NY

At the start of the year, I began a series called The Earliest Concert Tapes, going through all of Bob Dylan’s very first concert recordings, from 1961 and 1962, one by one. I got through 1961, then other things came up. Today the series resumes with 1962! Today’s entry is free, but most will go to paid subscribers only. Find all past entries in the series here.

Bob Dylan at Gerde’s, 1962, via The Guardian

“This here, it ain’t a protest song or anything like that,” Bob Dylan says before his final song on today’s tape, “because I don’t write protest songs.” He then proceeds to debut his new not-a-protest song: “Blowin’ in the Wind.”

Yes, as early as April 1962, when “Blowin’ in the Wind” was a brand-new song he’d written just days before, he was already feeling hemmed in by people calling him a protest singer. It didn’t take until Another Side of Bob Dylan or going electric at Newport. He was pushing against the “protest song” stigma practically since he began writing, well, protest songs.

The funny thing about him acting all anti-protest song here is that he’d only just begun writing what most would consider his protest-song canon. This show took place before he had written “Masters of War” or “The Times They Are a-Changin’” or “Only a Pawn in Their Game” or “The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll.” (Hell, the subjects of the latter two songs were still alive at this point.) He’d only written what some consider his first protest song, “The Death of Emmett Till,” two months prior. It’s like he’s preemptively pushing against a label he doesn’t even have yet: Protest singer. Maybe he knows he’s about to get it, and is trying to head it off. Unsuccessfully.

This may well be the first time anyone heard “Blowin’ in the Wind,” though, as often happens with these very early shows, the details are too vague to state that definitively, from the date (April 16…probably) to the venue (Gerde’s Folk City…probably) to whether he’d already performed “Blowin’” at some lost-to-history show a day or two before (probably?). It’s almost certainly the first time anyone in this room heard it, at least. There’s no recognition applause when he begins, certainly no singing along. He wouldn’t record it for three more months. In fact, he’s not even finished writing it. It ends after two verses. The final verse (“How many times must a man look up…”) hasn’t been written yet.

“Blowin’ in the Wind” is the obvious headline here, but he debuts two more Freewheelin’ songs at this same show. They’re the album’s two covers though, which makes them more of a footnote: “Corinna, Corinna” and “Honey, Just Allow Me Once More Chance” (officially labeled a co-write with the song’s originator, 1920s bluesman Henry Thomas). He hadn’t written any of the other original Freewheelin’ songs yet as far as we know.

He also gives his only recorded concert performance of another cover, the blues traditional “Deep Elem Blues.” He introduces by shouting out Big Joe Williams in a way that sounds like Big Joe was also on the bill, saying he learned the song from him. In fact, Bob may be borrowing Big Joe’s guitar. He says, while tuning, “Big Joe plays a nine-string guitar. John Henry couldn’t swing this guitar…” It sounds like he’s struggling with Big Joe’s giant guitar. Then again, Big Joe really did play a nine-string guitar, and I can’t imagine Bob would have known what to do with that.

Note the extra three tuning pegs poking out of the top of the headstock

Regardless of whose guitar he’s playing, “Deep Elem Blues” is a great performance. Listen to how he hits that wild falsetto on the word “deep.” The harmonica solos are just as wonderfully unhinged, like he’s trying to hit every note on the instrument in as short a time as possible.

(Showing that Bob never forgets these old songs, even the ones that never become part of his regular repertoire, over 50 years later a fan captured a video of Bob and the band playing what sounds like an instrumental version of “Deep Elem Blues” at a soundcheck.)

This show comes five months after our last entry, Bob’s Carnegie Chapter Hall performance in 1961. Comparing the two is a bit apples and oranges, as that was a proper full-length concert with 22 songs while this is just five songs from a random night at a coffeehouse that just so happened to be recorded. Maybe not recorded in its entirety either; at the end you hear the event’s unknown MC ask Dylan to play “Baby Let Me Follow You Down” and the sound of a guitar being tuned—Bob preparing to fulfill the request?—before the tape cuts out.

A lot’s happened in the five months between Carnegie and here, but the big thing is: Dylan has recorded and released his debut album! So now he’s not just a buzzy kid around the neighborhood; he’s someone with a proper album out on Columbia Records. That sets him apart from his Village peers, even if the album did flop (hence the famous “Hammond’s folly” tag). That album was, however, mostly covers, and he batted .500 on the two originals (“Talkin’ New York,” which he performs here, is charming enough but not at the songwriting level of “Song to Woody”).

But now, as of this Gerde’s show, he’s got “Blowin’ in the Wind.” It’s not just the debut of his first truly iconic song. It’s also an indication that his days playing this sort of coffeehouse are nearing their end.

1962-04-16?, Gerde's Folk City?, New York, NY