en mi humilde opinion

Lyrics

Deep down Louisiana close to New Orleans
Way back up in the woods among the evergreens
There stood a log cabin made of earth and wood
Where lived a country boy named Johnny B. Goode
Who never ever learned to read or write so well
But he could play the [a] guitar just like a ringing a bell

Go go
Go Johnny go
Go
Go Johnny go
Go
Go Johnny go
Go
Go Johnny go
Go
Johnny B. Goode

He used to carry his guitar in a gunny sack
Go sit beneath the tree by the railroad track
Oh, the engineers would see him sitting in the shade
Strumming with the rhythm that the drivers made
[The]People passing by they would stop and say
Oh my [but]that little country boy could play

Go go
Go Johnny go
Go
Go Johnny go
Go
Go Johnny go
Go
Go Johnny go
Go
Johnny B. Goode

His mother told him "Someday you will be a man,
And you will be the leader of a big old band.
Many people coming from miles around
To hear you play your music when the sun go down
Maybe someday your name will be in lights
Saying Johnny B. Goode tonight."

Go go
Go Johnny go
Go go go Johnny go
Go go go Johnny go
Go go go Johnny go
Go
Johnny B. Goode
Written by Chuck Berry • Copyright © BMG Rights Management

Edit: After posting I gave a listen and seemed to find a few deviations from Berry's performance, which I give in [ ].
Also the verbs which close second verse seem to me an incoherent mix of tenses as punctuated. The people are commenting in the present and "could" seems out of time. But he clearly says "could play" and not " can play".
A possible fix is:

[The]People passing by they would stop and say
"Oh my!", [but]that little country boy could play.

The peoples' comment is the exclamatory "Oh my! " which was very common in the South at that time. "but that little country boy could play." is then Berry finishing his description of Goode in the past tense. It was also common to begin with "But" in this way as an intensifier- "But he was a real bad man."

Very speculative interpretation, I know.
But left as presented here, the line appears to be a puzzling flaw in an otherwise beautifully - crafted lyric.
Up there with anything Lennon - McCartney wrote, in my opinion.

of Dylan even more than I did 40 years ago. His insightful music and lyric seem to span generations, as relevant today as the day he first wrote them. There isn't much of anything he did, that I don't enjoy and I'm sure I spend more time listening to him these days than I did 40 years ago. He's timeless. Everyone, even the youngsters today, know and appreciate his work.

Another artist and prolific songwriter that will likely join the ranks of Dylan and others mentioned here is Jimmy Buffet. His songs are sung by old and young, but he's a decade or more behind Dylan and the others. As time passes, I'm sure future generations will see his unique style and genre a classic that will stand the test of time. And then again, maybe I'm just an old sailor who spent too much time changing latitudes, searching for cheeseburgers in paradise and getting wasted in Margaritaville!

Are lyrics literature? Yes, I think so. Some songs say as much as any book.

I particularly like John Lennon's Imagine. Speaks to what the world could be.

Imagine there's no Heaven
It's easy if you try
No Hell below us
Above us only sky

Imagine all the people
Livin' for today
Aaa haa

Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too

Imagine all the people
Livin' life in peace
Yoo hoo

You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one

I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will be as one

Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man

Imagine all the people
Sharin' all the world
Yoo hoo

You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will live as one

Given what is going on in Aleppo and the millions living in hunger and poverty, this song makes me wonder what the fuck is the matter with us.

many decades now I have thought that Dylan should be the poet laureate of the US. It turns out that I simply aimed a bit too low. Of course, it is poetry, meanwhile, a lot of verse that one hears chanted to music, most definitely isn't. Of course, a drum loop isn't relly music either, but let us not go there this fine morning.

Desolation Row
Bob Dylan
They're selling postcards of the hanging, they're painting the passports brown
The beauty parlor is filled with sailors, the circus is in town
Here comes the blind commissioner, they've got him in a trance
One hand is tied to the tight-rope walker, the other is in his pants
And the riot squad they're restless, they need somewhere to go
As Lady and I look out tonight, from Desolation Row

Cinderella, she seems so easy, "It takes one to know one, " she smiles
And puts her hands in her back pockets Bette Davis style
And in comes Romeo, he's moaning. "You Belong to Me I Believe"
And someone says, "You're in the wrong place, my friend, you'd better leave"
And the only sound that's left after the ambulances go
Is Cinderella sweeping up on Desolation Row

Now the moon is almost hidden, the stars are beginning to hide
The fortune telling lady has even taken all her things inside
All except for Cain and Abel and the hunchback of Notre Dame

Everybody is making love or else expecting rain
And the Good Samaritan, he's dressing, he's getting ready for the show
He's going to the carnival tonight on Desolation Row

Ophelia, she's 'neath the window for her I feel so afraid
On her twenty-second birthday she already is an old maid
To her, death is quite romantic she wears an iron vest
Her profession's her religion, her sin is her lifelessness
And though her eyes are fixed upon Noah's great rainbow
She spends her time peeking into Desolation Row

Einstein, disguised as Robin Hood with his memories in a trunk
Passed this way an hour ago with his friend, a jealous monk
Now he looked so immaculately frightful as he bummed a cigarette
And he when off sniffing drainpipes and reciting the alphabet
You would not think to look at him, but he was famous long ago
For playing the electric violin on Desolation Row

Dr. Filth, he keeps his world inside of a leather cup
But all his sexless patients, they're trying to blow it up
Now his nurse, some local loser, she's in charge of the cyanide hole
And she also keeps the cards that read, "Have Mercy on His Soul"
They all play on the penny whistles, you can hear them blow
If you lean your head out far enough from Desolation Row

Across the street they've nailed the curtains, they're getting ready for the feast
The Phantom of the Opera in a perfect image of a priest
They are spoon feeding Casanova to get him to feel more assured
Then they'll kill him with self-confidence after poisoning him with words
And the Phantom's shouting to skinny girls, "Get outta here if you don't know"
Casanova is just being punished for going to Desolation Row"

At midnight all the agents and the superhuman crew
Come out and round up everyone that knows more than they do
Then they bring them to the factory where the heart-attack machine
Is strapped across their shoulders and then the kerosene
Is brought down from the castles by insurance men who go
Check to see that nobody is escaping to Desolation Row

Praise be to Nero's Neptune, the Titanic sails at dawn
Everybody's shouting, "Which side are you on?!"
And Ezra Pound and T.S. Eliot fighting in the captain's tower
While calypso singers laugh at them and fishermen hold flowers
Between the windows of the sea where lovely mermaids flow
And nobody has to think too much about Desolation Row

Yes, I received your letter yesterday, about the time the doorknob broke
When you asked me how I was doing, was that some kind of joke
All these people that you mention, yes, I know them, they're quite lame
I had to rearrange their faces and give them all another name
Right now, I can't read too good, don't send me no more letters no
Not unless you mail them from Desolation Row

Songwriters: Bob Dylan
Desolation Row lyrics © Bob Dylan Music Co.

from the 80's

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2pS8rM_MsIY]

there's also an American masters by Martin Scorsese called No Direction Home on pbs.