If Bob Dylan Was A Black Man He’d Be Working At McDonald’s

The first time I listened to Bob Dylan coincided with the first time I realized White Supremacy was real. The nigga can’t sing. Which is fine. It’s perfectly fine. But if Bob Dylan was a Black man he’d be working at McDonald’s.

Hear me out.

I’d like to expand this argument to encompass the whole of the American folk music revival of the 1960s. That is to say, the American folk music revival was an excuse for White Mediocrity, because they knew that shit wouldn’t slide in Jazz or RnB, which were both rapidly increasing in popularity at the time. Get where I’m going with this?

A lot of people say that no one knows exactly what chords or tunings Joni Mitchell used. Now, to me, that sounds like somebody who don’t know how to play the guitar.

I’ve never played the guitar a day in my life, but if you give me a guitar I bet I’ll play some new shit, too. That’s like a nigga spitting a verse so ass, no one knows how he did it. Joni Mitchell is the E40, or Silkk the Shocker, of White People.

Walk with me now.

A lot of people are shocked by the fact that Joni Mitchell did Blackface in her later career. I’m not. That fact becomes a lot less surprising when you begin to consider the idea that the Folk revival movement was a government coup.

At the same time, Black people need to stop putting so much importance on whether or not our artists can sing. White people obviously don’t give a fuck about that shit.

How many artistic innovations are we missing out on because we refuse to dance to any voice that’s not church trained? That’s why Brent Faiyaz is so important. And Frank Ocean. We need more niggas in RnB who can’t sing. Expecting every RnB nigga to sound like Jodeci would be like expecting every White pop artist to sound like Celine Dion. (I would’ve said Adele, instead, but I believe that she makes RnB music. I also believe Bon Iver makes RnB music. But that’s a separate piece.)

Here— Let’s imagine a young, black Bob Dylan. And, for the sake of immersion, let’s call him Bobby Blue Bland Dylan. He’s a little Black boy, born in 1941, raised in Minnesota.

He grows up enamored with the sounds of country music, blues, and 50s rockabilly music. Elvis Presley. Buddy Holly. Hank Williams. But, most importantly, above all, Little Richard.

That’s right. Little Bobby Blue Bland Dylan grows up wanting nothing more than to be Little Richard. He studies those eclectic sounds. The boogie-woogie chords. The vivacious voice. The trills. The screams. The man.

“Well, alright,” he thinks to himself one day. “Why not try to give it a go? If he can do it, why can’t I?” Right on, Little Bobby.

He plops himself down by the family piano, and begins to play.

And, let me tell you, reader, it is just incredible. I mean, this little nigga can play! Like, me, as the narrator, I couldn’t even hold myself back. I’m watching this, trying to be all omniscient and shit, and I just a-burst out speaking in tongues damn near! I start quoting Langston Hughes and shit— With his ebony hands on each ivory key/ He made that poor piano moan with melody/ O Blues!/ Swaying to and fro on his rickety stool/ He played that sad raggy tune like a musical fool/ Sweet Blues!/ Coming from a black man’s soul/ O Blues!—and almost wept.

His family hears this, too. And, by about two minutes of going on like this, the whole house is crowded around the piano.

The boy’s not just “good”. Sure, he’s proficient. Sure, he can play. But he’s creative too. He’s conjuring worlds, and characters, and stories, with the keys. He’s a songwriter.

Little Bobby is jazzed. He’s never gotten this much attention in his life. He starts to thinking, “Hey, maybe I can actually do this!”

But he knows Little Richard don’t just play the keys. No, no, no. Little Richard is Little Richard because of that voice.

And Little Bobby knows. He knows what he has to do.

And, so he does it. And, well, to quote Langston Hughes again—a dream deferred.

Yep. Just like that, his dream is killed.

His mother yells out, “Man, this nigga can’t sing. Turn on some R. Kelly!” And we never get Blood on the Tracks. Or Freewheelin’. Or Highway 61, or any of it.

All we get is another McDonald’s shift manager who once held musical ambitions, but, unfortunately, was born with black skin and a bad voice.

The End.

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