Saying Mean Things

Earlier this month, some news feeds did stories about Taylor Swift and one of the Jonas brothers [OMJ!] writing mean songs about each other. Blah, blah blah. For instance, here: Joe Jonas Fires Back At Taylor Swift With A Song

There are whole websites dedicated to celebrities feuding. For instance, here: CelebrityFeuds.com

Hilary Duff seems to fight with everyone, but she did get in some good lines about Faye Dunaway. For instance, here: New Hilary Duff Feud

I hope the young people who follow these feuds know that this kind of thing has been going on for generations. I’m not sure they do, because from the little I have seen of the lyrics from various new feud songs, nobody seems to be making any effort to live up to the great stuff feuds have generated in the past.

My pick for the best feud song ever is Bob Dylan’s “Idiot Wind,” off one of the best albums ever, "Blood on the Tracks."

First of all, he doesn’t beat around the bush, he flat out says what he thinks:

Idiot wind
Blowing every time you move your mouth
Blowing down the backroads heading south
Idiot wind
Blowing every time you move your teeth
You're an idiot, babe
It's a wonder that you still know how to breathe


Second, he doesn’t try to tone down his bitterness, rather he indulges it:

I woke up on the roadside
Daydreaming about the way things sometimes are
Visions of your chestnut mare
Shoot through my head and are making me see stars
You hurt the ones that I love best
And cover up the truth with lies
One day you'll be in the ditch
Flies buzzing around your eyes
Blood on your saddle


But thirdly, most importantly and most cool, Dylan still manages to see something bigger in the situation and still manages to look beyond his own personal emotions and his own personal perspective to grasp that everyone loses, everyone misses out, when emotions become so heated, and ends saying:

I can't feel you anymore,
I can't even touch the books you've read
Every time I crawl past your door
I've been wishing I was somebody else instead
Down the highway, down the tracks, down the road to ecstasy
I followed you beneath the stars, hounded by your memory
And all your raging glory

I've been double-crossed now
For the very last time and now I'm finally free
I kissed goodbye the howling beast
On the borderline which separated you from me
You'll never know the hurt I suffered
Nor the pain I rise above
And I'll never know the same about you
Your holiness or your kind of love
And it makes me feel so sorry

Idiot wind
Blowing through the buttons of our coats
Blowing through the letters that we wrote
Idiot wind
Blowing through the dust upon our shelves
We're idiots, babe
It's a wonder we can even feed ourselves