Bob Dylan Accused John Lennon of Accidentally Plagiarizing a Classic Beatles Song
Bob Dylan noted that John Lennon took much inspiration from his music. He also believed Lennon let another American artist inspire him. Dylan thought Lennon lifted the beginning guitar portion of The Beatles’ “Revolution” from a 1954 song from American guitarist Pee Wee Crayton. He didn’t think Lennon did it purposely, though.
Bob Dylan believed John Lennon borrowed from a 1954 song
In 2008, Dylan put together an album called The Music That Matters To Me. On it, he highlighted the 1954 song “Do Unto Others” by Pee Wee Crayton. Crayton was an American blues guitarist. Dylan noted on the album’s liner notes that Crayton, like the other artists on the compilation album, “somehow managed to turn lead into gold for a couple of minutes.”
Dylan believed the song was more influential than one might initially think. He thought it was likely that Lennon had lifted the song’s opening guitar riff and used it for “Revolution.”
“I bet that John Lennon heard this record at a party once and probably didn’t even know who did it, but that guitar just stuck in his head,” Dylan wrote. “The song was released in 1954. The ‘B’ side of ‘Hey Jude’ by The Beatles is called ‘Revolution,’ and it was released in 1968. The start of both of these recordings is identical.”
Bob Dylan believed John Lennon also borrowed from his music
Dylan believed that many artists ripped him off with their styles of music. When he heard The Beatles’ “Norwegian Wood,” for example, he knew the band took inspiration from him. In response, he wrote the song “Fourth Time Around” to parody “Norwegian Wood.” This initially concerned Lennon.
“I was very paranoid about that,” Lennon told Rolling Stone. “I remember he played it to me when he was in London. He said, ‘what do you think?’ I said, ‘I don’t like it.’ I didn’t like it. I was very paranoid. I just didn’t like what I felt I was feeling – I thought it was an out-and-out skit, you know, but it wasn’t. It was great. I mean, he wasn’t playing any tricks on me. I was just going through the bit.”
The former Beatle once wrote a parody of a Dylan song
Years after Dylan wrote “Fourth Time Around,” Lennon wrote a parody of a Dylan song. He expressed his distaste with Dylan’s song “Gotta Serve Somebody,” the opening track on Dylan’s Christian album Slow Train Coming.
Per Rolling Stone, Lennon called the song “pathetic” and “embarrassing” and then released the song “Serve Yourself” to mock it. In it, he critiques Dylan’s religious turn and the message of his song.
“You got to serve yourself/Ain’t nobody gonna do for you/ You got to serve yourself/ Ain’t nobody gonna do for you/ (That’s right, lad, you better get that straight into your f***in’ head)/ You got to serve yourself/ (You know that; who else is gonna do it for you?/ It ain’t me I tell you that),” he sang.
