dead aim at an ugly injustice: the imprisonment of an innocent man. Columbia Records rush-released it as a single in early November, well in advance of Dylan’s forthcoming album Desire . More than eight minutes long with certain words bleeped out, “Hurricane” was unlikely to join the soundtrack of the holiday season – but it did. Roaring out of car speakers and dormitory radios, it fought for airplay against songs by David Bowie and Elton John. It eventually reached number 33 on the Billboard Hot 100. But would the song have any effect on Carter’s predicament? In 1966, Carter and another man, John Artis, were arrested for the murder of three people in a Paterson, New Jersey, barroom. Though both denied any part in the slayings, they were found guilty. Calling the crime a “cold-blooded massacre,” Judge Samuel A. Larner handed Carter and Artis three life sentences apiece. However, when two witnesses for the state recanted their testimonies, support for Carter and Artis grew. Carter published a book about his situation, and by 1975 his cause had attracted a legion of celebrity activists. With his shaved head, tinted granny glasses and drooping mustache, Carter looked the part of an angry Black revolutionary ready to fight his oppressors. The country was soon awash in “Free Rubin” T-shirts and bumper stickers. The move was on to secure Carter a new trial. With Dylan’s song on the airwaves, plans were made for him to headline a fundraiser for Carter at Madison Square Garden. But first, Dylan, Joni Mitchell and others sang at the Clinton Correctional Institution where Carter was held. The set of hippie folk-rock bombed with the prison audience, though Carter declared “Hurricane” was “a fantastic piece of work.” On December 8, 1975, Dylan’s Rolling Thunder Revue performed at Madison Square Garden, proceeds going to Carter’s appeal for a retrial. It was a star-studded event with an appearance by Muhammad Ali as a guest speaker. Ali had been named co-chairman of the Hurricane Trust Fund and had led rallies for Carter in Newark and Trenton. The audience of 20,000 cheered Ali at first, but they’d paid the then-outrageous price of $12.50 per ticket and didn’t want to hear Ali talk. It was an odd mix: Ali reportedly didn’t know who Dylan was, while audience members surveyed by the United Press showed no particular interest in Carter. At one point, Ali phoned Carter at CCI, inviting Carter’s family members onstage to talk to him. This went over well, but when Ali brought a Tennessee politician up to speak, the crowd booed them both off the stage. Fortunately, Dylan gave a high-spirited performance, and the night was considered a success. But even as the movement to free Carter gained momentum, music critics were divided by “Hurricane.” Many admired it, but some felt it was trivial and, as rock critic Dave Marsh described it, “a little sophomoric.” Dylan had sung about boxers in the past – his 1963 song “Who Killed Davey Moore?” lamented the death of a fighter in the ring – but in 1975, the Dylan
Natasha Jonas (left) and Lauren Price will clash at London’s famed Royal Albert Hall. campaign, later claimed Carter was dismissive of the help he’d received. According to Lois’ book $ellebrity, Carter felt the celebs who had supported him were merely “motivated to gain attention for themselves, or to reap profits.” Indeed, many celebrities appeared to distance themselves from Carter after the reconviction. It was also revealed that Ali, a key supporter of the cause, disliked Carter. (Though Carter was usually gracious to him, a 2019 BBC World Service podcast, “The Hurricane Tapes,” featured a recording of Carter badmouthing Ali.) Even Dylan seemed to pull away. The secretive singer was uneasy with the Carter camp’s disarray. The popular myth of Carter lingered, though, culminating in a somewhat fictionalized 1999 movie with Denzel Washington as Carter. Ultimately, Carter was a difficult man to know. Some praised him, others called him a con artist. He became an activist himself, working for others who had been wrongfully convicted. He died in 2014. As for Dylan, he hasn’t performed “Hurricane” since the 1970s, explaining that the song’s “moment” had come and gone.
acolytes wanted more than a song about a railroaded middleweight. Adversaries dismissed “Hurricane” because it told only Carter’s side of the story. Patty Valentine, a witness mentioned unfavorably in the song’s lyrics, filed a lawsuit against Columbia Records, Dylan and others. Her case was dismissed, but it attracted more bad press. The Carter campaign’s slick packaging was also unraveling. Some of Carter’s earliest supporters resigned because there was so much infighting. They felt they’d made Carter into a folk hero but had lost sight of the judicial issues. Worse, the leader of the defense committee, Carolyn Kelley, accused Carter of assaulting her while he was out on bail. She didn’t press charges, though Kelley’s claim hurt Carter’s image. Meanwhile, the ambitious New York concert was followed by a
A FIFTY-YEAR HURRICANE ONE OF BOB DYLAN’S MOST FAMOUS SONGS PUT A SPOTLIGHT ON THE IMPRISONMENT OF MIDDLEWEIGHT CONTENDER RUBIN “HURRICANE” CARTER By Don Stradley B ob Dylan’s explanation was simple. He’d read about Rubin “Hurricane” Carter, the former middleweight contender serving prison time for a triple murder, and felt the man was innocent. Dylan’s song “Hurricane,” written in collaboration with Jacques Levy, became a staple of FM rock radio during the winter of 1975. Fifty years later, Dylan’s angry voice, backed by the ominous violin of Scarlet Rivera, still sounds like a righteous call to action: “Here comes the story of the Hurricane / The man the authorities came to blame / For somethin’ that he never done / Put in a prison cell, but one time he could-a been / The champion of the world …” Dylan loaded the song with images of men lying in pools of blood and bigoted cops in the hot New Jersey night, taking
He did meet with Carter a couple of times over the years, at concerts for quick photo ops. Yet as Dylan told journalist Bill Flanagan in 1985, anything to do with Carter, whether the case, his personality
Top: Bob Dylan and Joan Baez onstage in 1975. Below: Muhammad Ali at a rally to support Rubin Carter.
disastrous, money-losing sequel at the Houston Astrodome. Plans for other “Free Rubin” events were dropped. “Hurricane Carter has been a healthy carcass of a cause,” reported Rolling Stone, “picked over by a lot of people.” Carter and Artis eventually earned a joint retrial in 1976, only to be reconvicted. Prolonged legal hearings would ultimately see Artis released in 1981, while Carter was freed in 1985. The Passaic County Superior Court dismissed the murder charges against both men in 1988. George Lois, the advertising guru behind the “Free Rubin”
or the efforts to free him, was “complicated.” But even if he dropped the song from his repertoire, Dylan played it when it most counted. Fifty years on, the song is still a reminder of music’s power to communicate. It may not have been entirely accurate, but the song wasn’t meant to be Carter’s biography. It was an anthem, a news headline set to music and raised like a flag before going into battle. Celebrities may have forgotten Carter, but the song stayed in the head of anyone who heard it, embedded there like a stake in the dirt. If Dylan moved on, it was only because his work was done.
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