Here DylanвЂ™s immersed in the Kennedy assassination (another black swan event), laying out the details of a royal murder thatвЂ™s presented as the terrible results of a power grab. The 17-minute elegy and album closer Murder Most Foul was first streamed in March вЂ“ the initial indication that there was a new album. Either way, the vulnerable lead vocal is a refutation of the myth that he can no longer nail pure melody. But when Dylan sings, вЂњIf I had the wings of a snow white dove/IвЂ™d preach the gospel/The gospel of love,вЂќ itвЂ™s possible the object of affection may be no mere mortal. Likewise, the gorgeous IвЂ™ve Made Up My Mind To Give Myself To You is, on the surface, a surrender-to-love ballad framed with tremulous, understated background вЂњoohsвЂќ. What are these songs ultimately about? About six to nine minutes. These beguiling layers are the stuff of endless debate вЂ“ Dylan fans have revelled in them since he first blew in the wind. Or, at its most literal, it might be DylanвЂ™s variation on Bride Of Frankenstein. My Own Version Of You is a wishful recreation of another person by the protagonist, implying the projection we employ when we have expectations for others. Key West (Philosopher Pirate) begins as paean to the southernmost tip of Florida, but turns into a bizarre tale worthy of Tennessee Williams. Or perhaps responses from a man whoвЂ™s been endlessly labelled by those attached to pedestals and finite definition. Tinged with DylanвЂ™s wry wit, loping blues-rocker False Prophet can be heard as virtue signalling from a braggart in the midst of an attempted seduction. In Mother of Muses he gives credit for creative spark to General George Patton, Elvis Presley and Martin Luther King as вЂњheroes who stood aloneвЂќ, while I Contain Multitudes is a solemn litany of our strengths and weaknesses: Anne Frank, Beethoven and William Blake bling, blood feuds, and вЂњBritish bad boys, The Rolling Stones.вЂќ The unifying theme for his 39th studio album is that Homo sapiens are a rough and rowdy species: self-destructive at our worst, wired for survival and transcendence at our best. Call it a vaccine against cultureвЂ™s shrinking expectations and the subsequent sapping of spirit.

ItвЂ™s not merely the novelty of new Bob songs that offers comfort in this black swan moment, itвЂ™s a set of songs that provides inspiration when itвЂ™s in short supply.

In the midst of a global pandemic, heвЂ™s released a new album вЂ“ his first collection of new compositions in eight years. DOES BOB DYLAN HAVE a wizened Romani palm reader on call? His timing is uncanny.

Rough and rowdy ways