Dylan Song by Song: "It's Alright, Ma" Quiz

Answer: true

"It's Alright Ma (I'm Only Bleeding)" was first recorded on Bob Dylan's fifth studio album, "Bringing it All Back Home," which was released in 1965.

A live version of the song appears on "Before the Flood," which documents the joint tour of Bob Dylan and The Band in 1974. "Before the Flood" was the first live album Bob Dylan released.

Additional live versions of the song appear on "Bootleg Volume 6," which contains Dylan's live concert at Philharmonic Hall in 1964, on "The Rolling Thunder Revue," a box set containing live recordings from 1975, and "Bob Dylan at Budokon," which was recorded during the musician's 1978 world tour.

Finally, Dylan's live performance of the song at Madison Square Garden is included on "The 30th Anniversary Concert Celebration Album."

Answer: balloon

"Darkness at the break of noon
Shadows even the silver spoon
The handmade blade, the child's balloon
Eclipses both the sun and moon
To understand you know too soon
There is no sense in trying."

"Rolling Stone" magazine ranked "It's Alright, Ma" number seven on its list of the "10 Greatest Bob Dylan Songs." The song is a departure from Dylan's earlier protest songs. "Instead of pointing fingers at a particular flaw of culture," the article says, "the song tears down the entire decrepit thing."

Answer: horn

"Pointed threats, they bluff with scorn
Suicide remarks are torn
From the fool's gold mouthpiece the hollow horn
Plays wasted words, proves to warn
That he not busy being born is busy dying."

Alliteration is the repetition of the same initial letter sound in words that are close to one another. This verse of the song makes frequent use of alliteration. It repeats the "h" sound with "hollow horn," the "w" sound with "wasted words" and "warn," and the "b" sound with "being born" and "busy."

Answer: I'm only laughing

These lines, except for "I'm only laughing," can be found in the refrain of "It's alright, Ma," throughout the song:

"So don't fear if you hear
A foreign sound to your ear
It's alright, Ma, I'm only sighing."

"An' though the rules of the road have been lodged
It's only people's games that you got to dodge
And it's alright, Ma, I can make it."

"And if my thought-dreams could be seen
They'd probably put my head in a guillotine
But it's alright, Ma, it's life, and life only."

There's also a fourth ending to this refrain to be found in the song:

"But I mean no harm nor put fault
On anyone that lives in a vault
But it's alright, Ma, if I can't please him."

Despite the parenthetical song title, the lines "I'm only bleeding" are not in the lyrics of the song itself.

Answer: Ecclesiastes

Ecclesiastes 1:13-14 says, "And I gave my heart to seek and search out by wisdom concerning all things that are done under heaven. . . I have seen all the works that are done under the sun; and, behold, all is vanity and vexation of spirit." Bob Dylan puts it this way: "To understand you know too soon / There is no sense in trying."

Likewise, Dylan's line "Although the masters make the rules / For the wise man and the fools" may allude to Ecclesiastes 2:16: "The wise man dies, just like the fool."

Michael Gray, in his 2000 book "Song and Dance Man III," writes that in these lines, "Dylan refers to . . . the main themes explored in Ecclesiastes - the hopeless limits of our understanding . . . and the always unsatisfying way that the foolish and the wise so often get the same deal."

Answer: advertising signs

"Advertising signs they con
You into thinking you're the one
That can do what's never been done
That can win what's never been won
Meantime life outside goes on
All around you."

Deception is a recurring theme in the song, from "advertising songs," "propaganda," and "false morals" to "people's games," "drag disguise," and "false gods."

In his 2009 book "Revolution in the Air," Clinton Heylin quotes Bob Dylan as saying, in 1980, that he didn't think he could "sit down" and write this song again. "I wouldn't even know where to begin," Dylan said. "But I can still sing it."

Answer: Jimmy Carter

Jimmy Carter was the 37th president of the United States from 1977 to 1981. He quoted this verse in his acceptance speech at the 1976 Democratic National Convention:

"My vision of this nation and its future has been deepened and matured during the nineteen months that I've have campaigned among you for President. I've never had more faith in America than I do today. We have an America that, in Bob Dylan's phrase, is 'busy being born,' not 'busy dying.' We can have an American government that's turned away from scandal, and corruption, and official cynicism, and is once again as decent and competent as our people."

Although he didn't mention it in his speech, perhaps Jimmy Carter was struck by another line from the song: "But even the President of the United States / Sometimes must have to stand naked."

Answer: unclear

"You lose yourself, you reappear
You suddenly find you got nothing to fear
Alone you stand with nobody near
When a trembling distant voice, unclear
Startles your sleeping ears to hear
That somebody thinks they really found you."

BobDylan.com, Dylan's official website, reports that "It's Alright, Ma" was first played live by Dylan on September 1, 1964 and has been played live over 770 times since then.

Answer: Elvis Presley

The "Rolling Stone" article naming "It's Alright, Ma" the 7th greatest Dylan song says, "The lyrics incorporate nods to Arthur Koestler (author of "Darkness at Noon"), the Book of Ecclesiastes and even Dylan's beloved Elvis Presley (the title is just a hair shy of Presley's line 'That's all right, now, Mama')."

Elvis Presley did a cover of Bob Dylan's song "Tomorrow is a Long Time," which Dylan has referred to as a favorite cover, describing it as "the one recording I treasure the most." Elvis recorded the song for his 1966 album "How Great Thou Art."

Answer: it

"A question in your nerves is lit
Yet you know there is no answer fit
To satisfy, ensure you not to quit
To keep it in your mind and not forget
That it is not he or she or them or it
That you belong to."

"Rolling Stone" describes this song as "dazzling, with an incredibly complicated rhyme scheme and a melody that barrels along on two notes until the flourish at the end of each verse."

Answer: respect

The stanza concludes:

"Who despise their jobs, their destinies
Speak jealously of them that are free
Cultivate their flowers to be
Nothing more than something they invest in."

Dylan played "It's Alright, Ma" live with Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers on their 1986 "True Confessions" tour. The song can be seen on "Hard to Handle," a concert video filmed in Sydney, Australia and released as an HBO special.

Answer: society's pliers

"While one who sings with his tongue on fire
Gargles in the rat race choir
Bent out of shape from society's pliers
Cares not to come up any higher
But rather get you down in the hole
That he's in."

The subject of these lines might want to "get you down in the hole that he's in," but, as Booker T. Washington warned in his book "Up from Slavery": "You can't hold a man down without staying down with him."

Answer: money

"Old lady judges watch people in pairs
Limited in sex, they dare
To push fake morals, insult and stare
While money doesn't talk, it swears
Obscenity, who really cares
Propaganda, all is phony."

This line, "money doesn't talk, it swears," has made its way into "The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations," a lengthy tome first published in 1941, with subsequent editions adding and eliminating quotations. The 8th edition was published in 2014.

Answer: sacred

"Disillusioned words like bullets bark
As human gods aim for their mark
Make everything from toy guns that spark
To flesh-colored Christs that glow in the dark
It's easy to see without looking too far
That not much is really sacred."

R&B musician Billy Preston recorded a cover of "It's Alright, Ma" on his 1973 album "Everybody Likes Some Kind of Music." He was a keyboardist who backed many successful R&B musicians and co-wrote "You Are So Beautiful" for Joe Cocker.

Answer: Roger McGuinn

McGuinn's cover of "It's Alright Ma" is included on the soundtrack to the 1969 cult classic move "Easy Rider." Gene Parsons of the Byrds also plays harmonica on the song.

One of the other key songs on the carefully orchestrated soundtrack is "The Ballad of the Easy Rider," which was co-written by Bob Dylan and Roger McGuinn. The soundtrack also includes songs by Steppenwolf, The Jimi Hendrix Experience, The Electric Prunes, Procol Harum, The Moody Blues, and Joe Coker, among others.