"Pay in Blood": The Revenge Tragedy?

Bob Dylan has many songs that people do not really listen to enough and one of those is “Pay in Blood” from the album “Tempest”. Until “Rough and Rowdy Ways” came out this year, “Tempest” was the last album to have new and original content by Bob Dylan and is not a cover album, a bootleg etc.

In my opinion, “Tempest” is one of his greatest albums because I’m not going to lie, I love his singing voice - it is so powerful and has so much character. It sounds like he has really been through life and come out the other side and making this album. It sounds angry, rage-induced and yet, is on that brink between being comfortable and getting up and decking someone. “Pay in Blood” is one of these prophetic songs in which Bob Dylan does not concentrate on a society but instead concentrates on a person. Bob Dylan covers the song making statements about who he is in comparison to the other person and tries to distinguish why he is going to confront this person. Let us have a look at this sweet revenge tragedy.

“Well I'm grinding my life out, steady and sure

Nothing more wretched than what I must endure

I'm drenched in the light that shines from the sun

I could stone you to death for the wrongs that you done…”

Look at this. There is a statement about who he is and what he does, there is something about what he has gotten himself into and what he has to be content with possibly because of this person. But, most importantly, there is a strange unrelenting act of violence that is perceived to be the outcome of being contented with his current position. It is definitely a theme in the song. Being contented because of a position that was induced by someone else results in an act of violence and this, in turn, is the revenge aspect.

“Sooner or later you make a mistake

I'll put you in a chain that you never will break

Legs and arms and body and bone

I pay in blood, but not my own.”

And there is the violence again. There is something he is now going to do about this and the other person should be prepared for it. This is a common theme in this part of the verse of the song. Just have a look at the next one in the same section:

“I got something in my pocket make your eyeballs swim

I got dogs could tear you limb from limb

I'm circling around the Southern Zone

I pay in blood, but not my own…”

But he is also explaining what happened to this other person. Someone must have corrupted them and most importantly, this suggests that the person he is talking to was probably different before this happens:

“Someone must of slipped a drug in yer wine

You gulped it down and you cross the line

Man can't live by bread alone

I pay in blood, but not my own…”

In the next verse, there is a definite reasoning for this but it is vague and does not really tell us why certain things happened. It just confirms that there was a different type of person before to now that he is talking to and because they have changed, the narrator is seeking revenge upon them.

“I've been thru Hell, What good did it do?

You bastard! I'm suppose to respect you!

I'll give you justice, I'll fathom your purse

Show me your moral that you reversed

Hear me holler and hear me moan

I pay in blood but not my own…”

The final verse shows us something that we have not seen in the song before and that is criminality. The ‘murder’ may not actually be physically actually a literal murder, but it could be something that the person committed against the narrator to let them know which side they were really on. I have a theory that he may be talking to an ex-lover, but that is just my theory. I do, however, know that this is supposed to be not only an act of violence but an act of revenge because one thing, done by the other person, is a catalyst for the narrator acting upon this:

“You get your lover in the bed

Come here I'll break your lousy head

Our nation must be saved and freed

You've been accused of murder, how do you plead?

This is how I spend my days

I came to bury, not to raise

I'll drink my fill and sleep alone

I play in blood, but not my own…”

So, what do you think this song is about? Do you agree with the way I have kind of explained that it is a revenge tragedy? Or, do you think it is something else entirely?