Lyrics for Visions Of Johanna as interpreted by dreambox

Visions Of Johanna Lyrics
Ain't it just like the night to play tricks when you're tryin' to be so quiet?
We sit here stranded, though we're all doin' our best to deny it
And Louise holds a handful of rain, temptin' you to defy it
Lights flicker from the opposite loft
In this room the heat pipes just cough
The country music station plays soft
But there's nothing, really nothing to turn off
Just Louise and her lover so entwined
And these visions of Johanna that conquer my mind

In the empty lot where the ladies play blindman's bluff with the key chain
And the all-night girls they whisper of escapades out on the "D" train
We can hear the night watchman click his flashlight
Ask himself if it's him or them that's really insane
Louise, she's all right, she's just near
She's delicate and seems like the mirror
But she just makes it all too concise and too clear
That Johanna's not here
The ghost of 'lectricity howls in the bones of her face
Where these visions of Johanna have now taken my place

Now, little boy lost, he takes himself so seriously
He brags of his misery, he likes to live dangerously
And when bringing her name up
He speaks of a farewell kiss to me
He's sure got a lotta gall to be so useless and all
Muttering small talk at the wall while I'm in the hall
How can I explain?
Oh, it's so hard to get on
And these visions of Johanna, they kept me up past the dawn

Inside the museums, Infinity goes up on trial
Voices echo this is what salvation must be like after a while
But Mona Lisa musta had the highway blues
You can tell by the way she smiles
See the primitive wallflower freeze
When the jelly-faced women all sneeze
Hear the one with the mustache say, "Jeeze
I can't find my knees"
Oh, jewels and binoculars hang from the head of the mule
But these visions of Johanna, they make it all seem so cruel

The peddler now speaks to the countess who's pretending to care for him
Sayin', "Name me someone that's not a parasite and I'll go out and say a prayer for him"
But like Louise always says
"Ya can't look at much, can ya man?"
As she, herself, prepares for him
And Madonna, she still has not showed
We see this empty cage now corrode
Where her cape of the stage once had flowed
The fiddler, he now steps to the road
He writes ev'rything's been returned which was owed
On the back of the fish truck that loads
While my conscience explodes
The harmonicas play the skeleton keys and the rain
And these visions of Johanna are now all that remain



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dreambox
03-10-2002

 Rated  +1 
Best song ever wrote and played in my view. KNow everything about it might post it one day. ONe of Dylans Favs as well.

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2 Replies  · 
clashdude
04-16-2002

 Rated  0 
this is the greatest song ever written in the history of music. this is dylan at his peak. the intensity, the images, and the feelings it evokes are like nothing else. just the harmonica alone is so sultry that you can almost feel humidity from it. the song itself, of course, is the internal battle between lovers, in this case, louise, who is ready and willing, and the ephemeral johanna, whose prescense looms throughout the entire song. its just an amazing piece of music.

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5isa4letterword
07-18-2002

 Rated  0 
great song. i could be wrong but isn't this about joan baez?

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CrescentMoon
09-16-2002

 Rated  0 
I seriously doubt it's about Joan Baez. From what I understand, their affair was fleeting and he sort of came to be annoyed with her, and I just can't see him writing this song about her.
This song means a lot right for me right now. It's like, you would be alright and you could get over this person a lot faster if you could stop picturing them. And it's not as if you're merely lonely, because there are people around you who want your love, but it's not happening because "Louise, she's all right, she's just near
She's delicate and seems like the mirror
But she just makes it all too concise and too clear
That Johanna's not here"
It's the worst when you can't even lose yourself in another affair, because the only person you can stand to touch you isn't there, isn't going to be there, is gone.

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3 Replies  · 
CeeJai
10-14-2002

 Rated  0 
i think that is as close as anyone but bob will ever get to saying what that song is truely about.

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goodmorningmisterben
03-04-2003

 Rated  0 
Once, I was dumped by this guy so he could get back together with his ex-girlfriend, named Joanna. My middle name is Louise. I love this song, but I couldn't listen to it for MONTHS.
Can anyone tell me anything about the whole Bob Dylan-Joan Baez thing, or direct me to a place where I can find out about it?

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Turtle_Soup
03-20-2003

 Rated  0 
http://www.songmeanings.net/activate.php?uid=197951

I'm not sure about the meaning, but the title shows the influence of Jack Kerouac and the other beatnik writers. (Kerouac wrote a novel called Visions of Cody)

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theprynce
06-11-2003

 Rated  0 
I love this song an un-Godly amount. This and 'Sad-Eyed Lady of the Lowlands' are probably the two songs that make Blonde On Blonde the absolute BEST album ever. If you don't own the CD, go buy it. I promise you won't be disappointed.

-=The Prynce

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2 Replies  · 
queenjane
09-26-2004

 Rated  0 
In my opinion it sounds like its about him already having louise who is ready and willing to live him but wanting what he can't have which is johanna.

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GuitarJeezus
10-15-2004

 Rated  0 
The line that really does it for me is, "Mona Lisa musta had the highway blues, you can tell by the way she smiles."

Fantastic song.

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serge_67
11-17-2004

 Rated  +1 
I would love for Mr. Dylan to just stop being so closed and tell us how he came up with this song. Is it ramblings of a drug induced night? Is it about someone? Or was he just playing with words?
What ever it is about or not, it is simply grandiose!

"The ghost of electricity howls in the bones of her face" Holy fuck! What a line, what a line.

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montresor
11-18-2004

 Rated  +1 
This song is about the difference between imagined love, the singer's ideal, and what he really finds in the world. Of course, it is in the frame work of the romantic ideal - as if God's love came to us that way of necessity.
Stanza 1 - He wants to love and be loved, so he settles for someone he can have, as opposed to what he envisions.
Stanza 2 - There's always hookers and sluts, but he wants someone he "loves", so he'll just have to take Louise. You get the idea he has an actress or TV personality in mind - or maybe the electricity is all in his mind. Anyway, he's clearly lost in his fantasy.

3 - Hey, how can this other guy be her true love, when I am? He can't quite seem to solve the puzzle, although the answer is that this girl isn't really Johanna either.

4- Women have these same issues, and, what's worse, they get fat, grow facial hair and become ugly and one day you're at the Louvre with them and realize your not in love with them after all! What you can imagine is always going to out do what is real. And, you can never have it. Not if you live forever. Instead, living forever in separation from what you desire would probably really suck, since life really just goes down hill.

5- People are all trying to game one another in this thing they call love. They leach off one another for affection, all the while looking for something better, even when they point that out to you. And, in case you haven't noticed, you can look everywhere, Jesus symbols and all, and you ain't gonna find Johanna. However, and here's the hard part to swallow, he claims that belief in Johanna is what is really real, that it represents faith, and it is the only thing that is enduring. Skeleton keys open all the doors, and he's saying that this song has opened the door that shows you that "Beauty is truth and Truth is Beauty".
As a born-again Christian, I disagree that that is all you know on earth, and all you need to know. But I think it's a great and powerful song, nonetheless.

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alberts179
12-18-2004

 Rated  0 
This is a great song. Excellent job with perspective/point of view.

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jpond
12-21-2004

 Rated  0 
What about "jewels and binoculars" - what do you think that's all about. A heck of an image and great sound in the language, but what does it mean?

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montresor
12-21-2004

 Rated  +1 
Well, if you go the museum, you will see jelly-faced women, and they likely will have signs of material wealth (jewels) hanging from their heads. Binoculars makes me think of another activity I see these people at viewing art, that is where infinity goes up on trial - plays/opera. He menans to label them as common people dressed up like they should be something more who are merely observing the action of the meaningful characters. Of course, the most meaningful character, Joanna, doesn't even appear. In fact, you are supposed to wonder if she even exists. So, you are supposed to compare these women to the Mona Lisa - who you desire, and they desire to be. you can react as you see fit - cry, laugh, sneer at the absurdity of it all........

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HunterUk
03-02-2005

 Rated  0 
Excellent interpretation montresor

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Detective
03-24-2005

 Rated  -1 
Any relavance of emotion seems saturated. Must have been the highest quality skunk

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elephant_range
04-01-2005

 Rated  0 
This song is not 'about' anything. This is a painting.

Analysis is its antithesis. Congratulations, Bob.

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LuckCharm
04-01-2005

 Rated  0 
elephant_range, a song can have many different meanings, on different levels as well. It could be a song about a painting, but it could be something else as well. That's what makes music so unique - how it is interpreted by others.

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elephant_range
04-04-2005

 Rated  +1 
Agreed. Not to be esoteric or anything, but what I was getting at was that this is the closest Dylan ever got to attaining meaning through Keatsian/or Rimbaudian synesthesia... that is to say, the imagery coupled with the sounds of the words (as opposed to the words themselves alone) provoke the listener to create meaning. I did not say it was 'about a painting' (although it may be so, in part)... I said that it IS a painting.

Years later, around the time of 'Blood on the Tracks', Dylan said that he had finally learned to 'recreate consciously what [he] used to be able to do unconsciously' with his writing.

Much of this song was created unconsciously.

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johnnymac
04-05-2005

 Rated  0 
how the fck does he write this stuff? I wish there was a documentary film crew following him around during the entire song making process. this is so much more then music. mysterious and amazing.

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Lukethedrifter
06-24-2005

 Rated  -1 
DO NOT READ THE FOLLOWING UNLESS YOU WANT TO KNOW WHAT THE SONG IS REALLY ABOUT.




Ain't it just like the night to play tricks when you're tryin' to be so quiet?

Pre-WWII. America is attempting neutrality. Hitler and the Japanese won't allow it. "Night" - this was a dark time in history.

We sit here stranded, though we're all doin' our best to deny it

The ordinary American citizen. Depression = stranded. The american attitude does just that - deny it.

And Louise holds a handful of rain, temptin' you to defy it

Louise is the promise of escape from depression by means of war. She's tempting America to see what happens if she doesn't go to war. Isolationism is dangerous.

Lights flicker from the opposite loft

Lights like lightning flickering. The opposite loft from America would be Europe. The war is raging on in Europe.

In this room the heat pipes just cough

Again, America struggling to "stay warm". The imagery is important here. It screams of struggling America.

The country music station plays soft
But there's nothing, really nothing to turn off

What else could "country music station" be related to than America. Are there any other countries that remind you of "country music station" more that America?

Just Louise and her lover so entwined

Her lover being all those that have fallen into her arms. Remember what Louise was?

And these visions of Johanna that conquer my mind

These visions of Johanna - it's hard to say. It's a concept most of us find hard to grasp. A world we've never known. A kind of peace beyond imagination. There is no known time or place that has possessed "Johanna".

In the empty lot where the ladies play blindman's bluff with the key chain

The "empty lot" = Atlantic Ocean. "ladies" and their bickering. "Blindman's bluff" was what they called the Sub game in the atlantic. That with all of Hitler's U-boats and such. It is refered to as "Blind man's bluff". Look it up if you like.

And the all-night girls they whisper of escapades out on the "D" train

I'm going to leave this line for someone else to fill in. Come on, give a shot.

We can hear the night watchman click his flashlight
Ask himself if it's him or them that's really insane

Who's insane. Me, the American, No. No the Nazi's. No. The English, french, .... Hell, I don't know.

Louise, she's all right, she's just near

Yea, war to save ourselves from Depression or recession. It's been done throughout history, why stop now?

She's delicate and seems like the mirror

Louise is delicate indeed. Tread lightly when playing with war.

But she just makes it all too concise and too clear
That Johanna's not here

Of course she's not. We've yet to see Johanna.

The ghost of 'lectricity howls in the bones of her face

I can't stop thinking that this image was supposed to make me think of the dead. Ghost, bones, howls. It is the dead soilders after the war.

Where these visions of Johanna have now taken my place

Has bob lost himself to the idealogical thoughts. Is he so entwined with Johanna now that it's all his life's about. I think this is the most personal line in the song.

Now, little boy lost, he takes himself so seriously

The little boy is the new world after the war. Everythings different and America and Russia don't think it's a game. They're playing for all kinds of prizes. Europe mostly, we all know the ending.

He brags of his misery, he likes to live dangerously

Yes, Nuclear war is dangerous.

And when bringing her name up
He speaks of a farewell kiss to me

Now the question is: Did the little boy kiss Johanna or Louise. Easy answer: He kissed Louise and by speaking of it he's stating how badly he wants it back and all the glory that comes with it. War at this point will be a way of life to continue the economic prosperity.

He's sure got a lotta gall to be so useless and all

NO SHIT!

Muttering small talk at the wall while I'm in the hall

Yes Bob, there is little a man like yourself can do. Sing to the wall until you're blue in face but you know that you can't change the greed the world's been infected with at this point.


How can I explain?
Oh, it's so hard to get on
And these visions of Johanna, they kept me up past the dawn

Here we see that he's been thinking of lovely Johanna until the light begins to shine. What is this? Light shining on our world? How has this happened?

Like This: (figure the rest out for yourself you lazy song listeners. This one was easy)

Inside the museums, Infinity goes up on trial
Voices echo this is what salvation must be like after a while
But Mona Lisa musta had the highway blues
You can tell by the way she smiles
See the primitive wallflower freeze
When the jelly-faced women all sneeze
Hear the one with the mustache say, "Jeeze
I can't find my knees"
Oh, jewels and binoculars hang from the head of the mule
But these visions of Johanna, they make it all seem so cruel

The peddler now speaks to the countess who's pretending to care for him
Sayin', "Name me someone that's not a parasite and I'll go out and say a prayer for him"
But like Louise always says
"Ya can't look at much, can ya man?"
As she, herself, prepares for him
And Madonna, she still has not showed
We see this empty cage now corrode
Where her cape of the stage once had flowed
The fiddler, he now steps to the road
He writes ev'rything's been returned which was owed
On the back of the fish truck that loads
While my conscience explodes
The harmonicas play the skeleton keys and the rain
And these visions of Johanna are now all that remain

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4 Replies  · 
skakayla
06-28-2005

 Rated  +1 
I think the song is about wanting something you can't have and everything around you reminds you of it.

1 Stanza- if you read over it, it's metaphors for emptiness: lights flickering in the opposite hall, the heat pipes are making noise, and the country music station. Country music is mostly sad and depressing; when he says there's nothing to turn off, he means there's nothing that he hasn't heard or felt for himself.

2 Stanza- The girls playing blindman's bluff is kind of like the women are just playing around with men without the men knowing it, so in a way they're blind. He refers to Louise as the mirror. When he looks at her, he see's his misery in her because she reminds him of Johanna. Electricy is powerful and something hard to explain. He can't really explain the look on Louise's face.

3 Stanza- He's talking to Johanna's boyfriend and everytime he mentions her to him he trys to change the subject. He's useless to him.

4 Stanza- the museum is his memories. Johanna makes his good times hurt to remember.

5 Stanza- People let go of the things they once loved, and it's upsetting. "The harmonicas play the skeleton keys and the rain And these visions of Johanna are now all that remain." Music takes you anywhere you want to go and it controls the way you feel sometimes, but really the memory of Johanna is all that he has left.

-increase the peace

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1 Reply  · 
lookitsme
07-19-2005

 Rated  0 
i agree with montresor
also i heard johanna was nico

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noyes
07-19-2005

 Rated  0 
by johnnymac on 04-06-2005 @ 01:26:19 AM
how the fck does he write this stuff? I wish there was a documentary film crew following him around during the entire song making process. this is so much more then music. mysterious and amazing.

--------------------------------------------------------------


how? at 3am in some London hotel room, smoking a cig. haha. (watch Don't Look Back)

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