The Ballad of Hollis Brown
“Ex-Farm Family, now on WPA.” Photo credit: Dorothea Lange. Farm Security Administration, Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library Archives. |
This week we look at a song in which any romance is long dead and this motive is explicit — Bob Dylan’s “The Ballad of Hollis Brown,” the second track on The Times They Are a’Changin’.(It’s about time we dedicated some space to Dylan, don’t you think? And now is perfect as today marks the 50th anniversary of the release of Dylan’s first album, when he was just 20.)
I’ll start by saying directly about “The Ballad of Hollis Brown” what the song itself does not: Hollis Brown is a man who takes a shotgun and brutally shoots his five young children, his wife, and finally himself. Take a look and a listen (turn the volume way up, as the sound on this amazing original video isn’t great):
He lived on the outside of town
With his wife and five children
And his cabin fallin’ down
And you walked a rugged mile
You looked for work and money
And you walked a rugged mile
Your children are so hungry
That they don’t know how to smile
All around the cabin door
There’s seven breezes a-blowin’
All around the cabin door
Seven shots ring out
Like the ocean’s pounding roar
On a South Dakota farm
There’s seven people dead
On a South Dakota farm
Somewhere in the distance
There’s seven new people born
“Ms. Handley and Some of Her Children.” Photo credit: Farm Security Administration, Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library Archives. |
And doing so with incredible sympathy, given that “we’ve” done the unthinkable and just blown ourselves and our entire family away. (This is also our first familicide on the blog, I think…even the meddling parents we’ve looked at didn’t use so direct and brutal a hand.)
“The Ballad of Hollis Brown,” Nina Simone, 1965
“The Ballad of Hollis Brown,” Rise Against, 2012
> listen to the song on Spotify
> listen to the Chimes of Freedom album on Spotify
If only the Brown Girl had had such advocates for her desperate situation…
Next up: many more amazing covers of this song, which demonstrate how its message translated not just throughout the folk community, but also through the R&B, soul, rock, metal, and punk communities (yes, there’s more) — and what this genre-travel reminds us about Dylan’s own persona, messages, frustrations, and legacy.
Also: a picture of Hollis Brown alongside other desperate farmers in the ballad genre, and an unforgettable version of the song that doesn’t shy away from tying the desperate farmer more directly to his deeds.