In July 1965 , the single " Like a Rolling Stone " peaked at two in the U.S. and at four in the UK charts . At over six minutes , the song altered what a pop single could convey . Bruce Springsteen , in his speech for Dylan 's inauguration into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame , said that on first hearing the single , " that snare shot sounded like somebody 'd kicked open the door to your mind " . In 2004 and in 2011 , Rolling Stone listed it as number one of " The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time " . The song opened Dylan 's next album , Highway 61 Revisited , named after the road that led from Dylan 's Minnesota to the musical hotbed of New Orleans . The songs was in the same vein as the hit single , flavored by Mike Bloomfield 's blues guitar and Al Kooper 's organ riffs . " Desolation Row " , backed by acoustic guitar and understated bass , offer the sole exception , with Dylan alluding to figures in Western culture in a song described by Andy Gill as " an 11 @-@ minute epic of entropy , which take the form of a Fellini @-@ esque parade of grotesques and oddities featuring a huge cast of celebrated characters , some historical ( Einstein , Nero ) , some biblical ( Noah , Cain and Abel ) , some fictional ( Ophelia , Romeo , Cinderella ) , some literary ( T.S. Eliot and Ezra Pound ) , and some who fit into none of the above categories , notably Dr. Filth and his dubious nurse . "