Book Excerpt: Counting Down Bob Dylan: His 100 Finest Songs

6. “Most Likely You Go Your Way (and I’ll Go Mine)” (from Blonde on Blonde, 1966)

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There are two versions of this song lodged deep in the hearts of most Dylan fans, each taking the song in their own direction. The version on Blonde on Blonde is laconic and bemused, with Bob sounding defeated and resigned to the fact that some love affairs just weren’t meant to be. This version plays up the black humor in the lyrics, with Kenny Buttrey whacking out a jaunty marching beat and the main riff doubled by Charlie McCoy on trumpet and Dylan on harmonica, a juxtaposition of instruments that sounds as insane as you might expect.

On Before the Flood, the tour document of Dylan’s 1974 trek with The Band, the song is serious business. It becomes a blistering testament to independence and defiance. That playful main riff gets transformed into an abrasive sound akin to gears grinding, and Dylan screams the words as if the severing of this relationship is a triumph.

Maybe “Most Likely You Go Your Way (and I’ll Go Mine)” is just too unassumingly profound to be limited to one definitive version. The lyrical dexterity on display here is easy and breezy, nothing too hard to follow, yet thrillingly nimble. Note that the rhymes are never forced to fit the storyline or vice versa; it seems like something you should be able to take for granted with rock songs, but it’s a rare accomplishment indeed.

The title may equivocate some, but there is no “most likely” to be found when Dylan sings the song; the separation is a fait accompli. All that’s left is to tally up the score at the end: “Then time will tell who has fell and who’s been left behind.” If those are the two alternatives, both sides seem to be on the losing end.

In the first verse, Dylan pokes a hole in everything the girl says to him, all her promises of fidelity and love laid bare as the deceptions that they are. The image that she presents is contrary to the unflattering portrait presented by the narrator: She lies, she’s weak, and she’s wrong about everything she says.

In the midst of these subtle accusations, the narrator takes time to reflect on the situation: “Sometimes it gets so hard to care / It just can’t be this way everywhere.” That line speaks volumes about a relationship on its last legs, where everything is a hassle and nothing comes easy anymore. The weary frustration in Dylan’s voice when he sings this line on the original album version punctures his trademark cool.

The last verse is a clever turn of the tables. This is the only time that he agrees with her, and it’s only because he’s confirming what he already knows: She’s been unfaithful, and she can’t be trusted. With trust severed so completely, this affair needs to be put out of its misery before any more damage can be done.

Dylan saves one more zinger as a kind of parting shot before the closing refrain, a bit of feistiness poking its head above the despair: “You say my kisses are not like his / But this time I’m not gonna tell you why that is.” Could it be because he checked out of this dead-end relationship long ago? Most likely, indeed.

By seemingly joking his way through the song, the narrator is attempting to soften the blow for his own good. Listening to the way he glides through it in a seemingly unaffected dissection of everything that went wrong, you get the sense that this guy is putting up a good front to keep from losing it completely. The bouncy music accentuates that laugh-to-keep-from-crying ethos.

When he switched the tone in ’74, Dylan transformed this song from an arm’s-length look at a spent relationship to an in-your-face wail of exasperation. The Band responds in kind, seemingly jolted by Bob’s powerful vocal. It’s a thrilling performance that takes the song, to paraphrase concert patter used during the electric transformation in the mid-’60s, from one that once went like that into one that goes like this.

What version is preferable probably depends on the personality of the listener and the current state of his or her own romantic entanglements. If you’re over an ex and are still standing in spite of the scars, you’re probably chuckling along with the original.

If, by contrast, you’re still in the thick of the misery, you’re probably howling right along with Dylan on the live version. Either way, “Most Likely You Go Your Way (and I’ll Go Mine)” really comes in handy.

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