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March, 28

Bob Dylan drops new song about JFK assassination, his first original release in 8 years

Bob Dylan just released an original song for the first time in eight years.

The legendary artist, 78, dropped "Murder Most Foul," a 17-minute ballad about the John F. Kennedy assassination via Twitter on Thursday.

“Greetings to my fans and followers with gratitude for all your support and loyalty across the years,” he wrote, adding, “This is an unreleased song we recorded a while back that you might find interesting. Stay safe, stay observant and may God be with you.”

"Twas a dark day in Dallas, November '63 / A day that will live on in infamy," Dylan sings in his trademark gravel to open the song. "Shot down like a dog in broad daylight / Was a matter of timin' and the timin' was right / You gotta pay debts we've come to collect / We're going to kill you with hatred, without any respect."

ust weeks after the Kennedy assassination, Dylan garnered controversy when he seemed to suggest he saw some of himself in the man who murdered the president, Lee Harvey Oswald. While accepting the Tom Paine Award, Dylan, critical of the U.S. ban on travel to Cuba, famously told a shocked audience, "I got to admit that the man who shot President Kennedy, Lee Oswald, I don't know exactly where — what he thought he was doing, but I got to admit honestly that I too — I saw some of myself in him."

He added, "I don't think it would have gone — I don't think it could go that far. But I got to stand up and say I saw things that he felt, in me – not to go that far and shoot." Dylan walked back the statement shortly thereafter.

While recorded some time ago, "Murder Most Foul" is the first original music Dylan's released since his 2012 album Tempest. He’s dropped several albums of standards since, including 2015's Shadows in the Night, 2016's Fallen Angels, and 2017'sand Triplicate. Last year, he released the latest edition of his Bootleg Series: Travelin’ Thru, Featuring Johnny Cash: The Bootleg Series Vol. 15.

Listen to the song below: