The song has been noted for its length (11:21) and surreal lyrics in which Dylan weaves characters into a series of vignettes that suggest entropy and urban chaos.
[7] When asked where "Desolation Row" was located, at a TV press conference in San Francisco on December 3, 1965, Dylan replied: "Oh, that's some place in Mexico, it's across the border.
"[8] Al Kooper, who played electric guitar on the first recordings of "Desolation Row", suggested that it was located on a stretch of Eighth Avenue, Manhattan, "an area infested with whore houses, sleazy bars and porno supermarkets totally beyond renovation or redemption".
[9] Polizzotti suggests that both the inspiration and title of the song may have come from Desolation Angels by Jack Kerouac and Cannery Row by John Steinbeck.
"[10] The southwestern flavored acoustic guitar backing and eclecticism of the imagery led Polizzotti to describe "Desolation Row" as the "ultimate cowboy song, the 'Home On The Range' of the frightening territory that was mid-sixties America".
[17] In the New Oxford Companion to Music, Gammond described "Desolation Row" as an example of Dylan's work that achieved a "high level of poetical lyricism."
[18] When he reviewed the Highway 61 Revisited album for The Daily Telegraph in 1965, the English poet Philip Larkin described the song as a "marathon", with an "enchanting tune and mysterious, possibly half-baked words".
[19] For Andy Gill the song is "an 11-minute epic of entropy, which takes the form of a Felliniesque parade of grotesques and oddities featuring a huge cast of iconic characters, some historical (Albert Einstein, Nero), some biblical (Noah, Cain and Abel), some fictional (Ophelia, Romeo, Cinderella), some literary (T. S. Eliot and Ezra Pound), and some who fit into none of the above categories, notably Dr. Filth and his dubious nurse.
[24][25] Dylan played the Isle of Wight Festival 1969, and "Desolation Row" was the name given to the hillside area used by the 600,000 ticketless fans at the 1970 event, before the fence was torn down.
[26] Dylan debuted "Desolation Row" at Forest Hills Tennis Stadium in Queens, New York, on August 28, 1965, after he "controversially went electric" at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival.
It features the band playing in an old-school punk arena, with visual similarities to the "Pale Horse" concert referenced in the graphic novel.
During MCR's parts in the video multiple elements of Watchmen imagery (such as Rorschach's mask and The Comedian's smiley face button) are seen.
"[42] Chris Smither recorded the song on his 2003 album Train Home with Bonnie Raitt providing backup on vocals and slide guitar.
[47] In a foreword for the collected editions of the series, Dave Gibbons claims "it began with Bob Dylan", that the lyrics reproduced for chapter 1 were the "spark that would one day ignite WATCHMEN.
"[48] The title track of The War on Drugs' fifth album I Don't Live Here Anymore contains the lyrics, "Like when we went to see Bob Dylan/ We danced to "Desolation Row"".
[49] In the sixth part of Jojo's Bizarre Adventure, "Desolation Road" is one of the 14 phrases that are uttered by antagonist Enrico Pucchi in order to activate the Green Baby and acquire the Stand C-Moon.