Bob Dylan was already playing 4D chess with his songwriting by the time he reached his 1964 album Another Side of Bob Dylan. He was writing songs that could work on multiple levels and change meaning depending on how you perceived them.
Case in point: “It Ain’t Me Babe,” the closing track from that wonderful album. Was it a song about a suitor admitting he didn’t have the stuff to be a good boyfriend? Or was it a case of unreasonable expectations set by his former lover? Or maybe a little of both? Let’s explore the lyrics to this Dylan standard to see if we can find out.
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It’s probably not too good an idea to pigeonhole any Bob Dylan album, as they all tend to vary in both their musical and lyrical approaches. But the general take on Another Side of Bob Dylan is that it was a departure from the topical material he had been writing on his previous two records.
That’s where the album title (which Dylan didn’t choose and didn’t like) comes into play. The idea is that he was transitioning from the political to the personal. Many of the songs on Another Side of Bob Dylan, including “It Ain’t Me Babe,” were influenced by Dylan’s tempestuous relationship with Suze Rotolo, from whom he had separated by the time the album was released.
“It Ain’t Me Babe” caught the attention of many artists looking for material. It’s one of Dylan’s most-covered songs, with the most notable version being The Turtles’ folk-rocking take on it that hit the Top 10 in the U.S. in 1965. But did all those artists realize the games Dylan was playing with the song’s lyrics?
Is Babe to Blame?
“It Ain’t Me Babe” is an example of how a prominent chorus can sometimes skew the meaning of a song. When you hear Dylan singing that refrain, it tends to make you believe the narrator in the song is putting the blame on himself. He simply can’t hold up his end of the bargain in this relationship.
In much the same way, the opening lines can sometimes make a big impact on how a listener perceives a song. This one begins with the following: Go away from my window / Leave at your own chosen speed/ I’m not the one you want, babe / I’m not the one you need. Again, it feels like this guy is removing himself from the situation as an act of kindness. I’ll only let you down, he later admits.
But as you dive deeper into Dylan’s lyrics, you begin to realize this character might be getting out of this affair for his own self-protection. Little by little, as he peels away the layers, you can see the girl might be asking a bit too much. Perhaps it’s fair to expect that a partner is never weak, but always strong, although even that seems a little imposing.
It steadily gets worse from there. She wants to be defended, whether you are right or wrong. In addition, she needs Someone to close his eyes for you / Someone to close his heart. He’ll have to gather flowers constantly / And to come each time you call.
Dylan saves the most damning proof of her neediness for the lines right before the refrain. First: Someone who will die for you and more. What can be more than that? And then, again, that word more comes into place: A lover for your life and nothing more. In other words, his own hopes, desires, and dreams must be subjugated so that he can expend all efforts on making her happy.
“It Ain’t Me Babe” finds Dylan writing somewhat simply; you can easily understand what he means in each line. But when you add those lines up, you get a quite complicated picture. Whether you’re on the guy’s side or babe’s side probably depends upon your own life and love experiences.
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Photo by Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images
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