Talkin' John Birch Paranoid Blues
Bob Dylan song / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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"Talkin' John Birch Paranoid Blues", also known as "Talkin' John Birch Society Blues" and "Talkin' John Birch Blues", is a protest song and talking blues song written by singer-songwriter Bob Dylan in 1962.[1] It is a satirical song, in which a paranoid narrator is convinced that communists, or "Reds" as he calls them, are infiltrating the country. He joins the John Birch Society, an anti-communist group, and begins searching for Reds everywhere. The narrator decries Betsy Ross as a communist and four U.S. Presidents as Russian spies, while lauding Adolf Hitler and George Lincoln Rockwell. After exhausting the possibilities of new places to find communists, he begins to investigate himself.
"Talkin' John Birch Paranoid Blues" | |
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Song by Bob Dylan | |
from the album The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan | |
Released | May 27, 1963 |
Recorded | April 24, 1962 |
Genre | |
Length | 4:25 |
Label | Columbia |
Songwriter(s) | Bob Dylan |
Dylan was given the opportunity to perform on The Ed Sullivan Show and wanted to sing "Talkin' John Birch Paranoid Blues" on the program. CBS worried that including the song on the show could result in a defamation suit from members of the John Birch Society. Dylan refused to perform a different song on the show, and he walked off its set; the incident garnered publicity. The controversy surrounding the song caused Columbia Records to remove "Talkin' John Birch Paranoid Blues" from subsequent copies of The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan (1963), though it was released on later Dylan albums. The song has been praised for its humor and deemed politically relevant decades after its release by both progressive and conservative publications.