Masters of War (1963) – Bob Dylan

“I’ve never written anything like that before. I don’t sing songs which hope people will die, but I couldn’t help it with this one. The song is a sort of striking out… a feeling of what can you do?”

– In the album notes to The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan

Masters of War stands as one of contemporary music’s most austere, bitter, and incisive anti-war anthems. Rarely has Dylan sounded so direct and merciless in his phrasing. Gone are the surrealism and poetic flourishes – here, the words spill out raw and unfiltered. Unlike his more prophetic works such as A Hard Rain’s a-Gonna Fall and Blowing in the Wind, where Dylan seems mature beyond his years, Masters of War contains youthful indignation and fury. That vulnerability – his age, his sarcasm, his anger – amplifies the power of the song against those who profit from conflict. It’s a cross generational outpouring which he would later revisit, but to a more nuanced degree in The Times They Are A-Changin.

Dylan wrote Masters of War over the winter of 1962–63 during the height of Cold War paranoia and the escalating arms race between the United States and the Soviet Union. He released it on the album The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan in the spring of 1963. It was set to the traditional melody of the folk song Nottamun Town, the arrangement by veteran folksinger Jean Ritchie. Unknown to Dylan, the song had been in Ritchie’s family for generations, and she wanted a writing credit for her arrangement. In a legal settlement, Dylan’s lawyers paid Ritchie $5,000 against any further claims.

Some of Dylan’s notable performances of Masters of War include:
–  At New York City’s Town Hall on April 12, 1963
– During the 1991 Grammy Awards ceremony where he received a Lifetime Achievement Award, and
– At his Hiroshima concert in Japan in 1994.

American folk revival musician Pete Seeger covered the song on his 1965 album Strangers and Cousins. Recorded live in Japan, the cover features Seeger playing an acoustic guitar, with each lyric followed by a spoken translation of the lyric by a Japanese translator. Seeger and Dylan had a close personal and professional relationship, with Dylan citing Seeger as a source of inspiration in both musical and political spheres. Additionally, Seeger shared many of the pacifist values expressed by Dylan in Masters of War.

Another noteworthy cover was Eddie Vedder (Pearl Jam) performing Masters of War at Bob Dylan’s 30th anniversary concert in Madison Square Garden, 1992. Just to think that less than 2 years previously Vedder was working as a security guard for a petroleum company in San Diego, California.  

In 2025, Rolling Stone ranked Masters of War as the 6th greatest protest song of all time.

[Verse 1]
Come, you masters of war, you that build the big guns
You that build the death planes, you that build all the bombs
You that hide behind walls, you that hide behind desks
I just want you to know I can see through your masks

[Verse 2]
You that never done nothing but build to destroy
You play with my world like it’s your little toy
You put a gun in my hand and you hide from my eyes
And you turn and run farther when the fast bullets fly

[Verse 3]
Like Judas of old, you lie and deceive
A world war can be won you want me to believe
But I see through your eyes and I see through your brain
Like I see through the water that runs down my drain

[Verse 4]
You fasten all the triggers for the others to fire
Then you set back and watch while the death count gets higher
You hide in your mansion while the young people’s blood
Flows out of their bodies and is buried in the mud

[Verse 5]
You’ve thrown the worst fear that can ever be hurled
Fear to bring children into the world
For threatening my baby, unborn and unnamed
You ain’t worth the blood that runs in your veins

[Verse 6]
How much do I know to talk out of turn?
You might say that I’m young, you might say I’m unlearned
But there’s one thing I know, though I’m younger than you
That even Jesus would never forgive what you do

[Verse 7]
Let me ask you one question is your money that good?
Will it buy you forgiveness? Do you think that it could?
I think you will find, when your death takes its toll
All the money you made will never buy back your soul

[Verse 8]
And I hope that you die and your death will come soon
I will follow your casket by the pale afternoon
And I’ll watch while you’re lowered down to your deathbed
And I’ll stand over your grave ’til I’m sure that you’re dead

References:
1. Masters of War – Wikipedia