Last Updated on 27 January 2026 by Massimo M.
John Wesley Harding is an album of original songs by Bob Dylan released on December 27, 1967 on Columbia Records.
The title of the album is inspired by the figure of the legendary Wild West outlaw John Wesley Hardin (1853–1895). John Wesley Harding is an album that can be defined as transitional, which marks the return of Dylan to typically folk acoustic sounds after some electric records, including the masterpiece Blonde on Blonde to which this John Wesley Harding does a bit to counterbalance.
This return to acoustic origins and a more intimate sound is probably due to an episode in the life of the singer-songwriter who, on July 29, 1966, was involved in a serious road accident on board his motorcycle and took several months to recover. In fact, a certain aura of mystery continues to surround the circumstances of the accident and the actual severity of Dylan’s injuries.
In the biography, Down the Highway: The Life Of Bob Dylan,Howard Sournes writes that no ambulance was called to the scene of the accident and that Dylan was not admitted to any hospital. Sournes comes to the conclusion that the accident offered Dylan the opportunity to escape the pressures, due to his already enormous success at the time, that afflicted him. Thus began a period of isolation from the attention of the public that will last eighteen months.
From the period of the symbolist songs of the albums produced in the period 1964-1966 he now sees the Bible as a primary and direct source of inspiration, and the return to personal serenity coincides with the return to the family joy of Woodstock after the motorcycle accident of 1966. And already in the Basement Tapes there are many songs that abound in biblical quotes such as Open the Door Homer, Lo and Behold, Sign on the Cross, This Wheel’s on Fire, Too Much of Nothing, I Shall beReleased etc.
With these premises between October and November 1967 Dylan returned to the studio in Nashville with only Charlie McCoy on bass, Kenny Buttrey on drums and Pete Drake on guitar. At the end of the year, John Wesley Harding was released. It is basically a collection of calm and contemplative short songs, in fact quite different from those previously released by Dylan.
John Wesley Harding was an outlaw of the old west, legendary figure but really existed, died in 1895 at the age of 43, and the songs of the record, although not a real concept album, tell stories of the character Harding, of outlaws, of religion, of good and evil, accompanied by a music in which it is necessary to immerse oneself totally to enjoy and understand the album as it should. This choice marks a decisive departure, as well as from the previous production, also from the nascent psychedelic music not particularly loved by Mr. Zimmerman.
Moreover, with this record, after being the spokesman of a generation in turmoil, ready to take to the streets to fight the war and defend civil rights, Dylan abandons the dispute, and he does, it is not clear how deliberately and how casually, just during that 1968 that will inflame consciences and overwhelm culture and society.
Among the songs of this album certainly stand out the famous I Dreamed I Saw St. Augustine, All Along the Watchtower, The Ballad of Frankie Lee and Judas Priest, with visionary and almost sermonistic lyrics (inspiration among other things for the legendary English heavy metal band) and the concluding ballad I’ll Be Your Baby Tonight.
Among these, the most famous is certainly All Along the Watchtower, whose text derives from the book of Isaiah 21,1-12. The song was almost immediately remade by Jimi Hendrix, whose famous version, included in Electric ladyland, was recognized by Dylan himself as definitive in the notes of the Biograph collection. As proof of this, as early as 1974 Dylan and his band played the song with an arrangement closer to Hendrix’s version than to that present in John Wesley Harding. It is therefore a record made of stories, ballads, tales and confessions, which finds its meaning in the lyrics and in dylan’s voice, with music and instruments that act as a bare outline.
The album achieved great success reaching number two in the US and number one in the UK.
Reviews were generally positive despite some criticism for the stylistic change of course.
Track list
Side one
1. John Wesley Harding 2:58
2. As I Went Out One Morning 2:49
3. I Dreamed I Saw St. Augustine 3:53
4. All Along the Watchtower 2:31
5. The Ballad of Frankie Lee and Judas Priest 5:35
6. Drifter’s Escape 2:52
Side two
1. Dear Landlord 3:16
2. I Am a Lonesome Hobo 3:19
3. I Pity the Poor Immigrant 4:12
4. The Wicked Messenger 2:02
5. Down Along the Cove 2:23
6. I’ll Be Your Baby Tonight 2:34
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