Bob Dylan - Like a Rolling Stone - Lyrics Meaning

Released in 1965, this track plays for over six minutes and contains a lot of lyrics! The story told in the song is actually a small extract from a story written by Dylan about a debutante who falls out of high society and becomes a bit of a loner. The inspiration for the title came from a Hank Williams song `Lost Highway' which contains the lines, `I'm a rolling stone, I'm alone and lost.'

In 1970, Dylan recorded another version of the song and guitarist Ron Cornelius said of the experience, "...to ask him what he really meant by these lyrics, you're shooting in the dark because he's not going to tell you anyway. And he might be telling you the truth when he says, `I don't know, what does it mean to you?"'

There are many rumors associating this song with Edie Sedgwick, debutante at that time, and a tug-of-love between her, Dylan, and Andy Warhol. The lyrics certainly seem to be an angry rant about someone's behavior but they could just as easily be making a general statement about people who flit around from one `in crowd' to the next without sparing a thought for those they may trample on the way. There's a warning in there somewhere about a potential price to pay for such actions but unless Dylan himself chooses to tell us more one day, we'll never know for sure.