In his hundreds of songs, Bob Dylan has referenced dozens of destinations, from Santa Fe to Memphis, from Mozambique to Rome. We’re calling out some of our favorites, each one matched with a great hotel located in the place mentioned in the lyrics.
LessThe streets of Rome feature prominently in “When I Paint My Masterpiece.” Appropriately for the Oscars, film director Luca Guadagnino’s vision features prominently at Rome’s Palazzo Talìa. His design studio created the hotel, seamlessly weaving together period architecture with contemporary elements, resulting in a hospitality experience that’s genuinely memorable, even unique.
In his SNL performance, Timothée Chalamet shined a spotlight on some lesser known Dylan songs, including “Outlaw Blues.” If you also wish you were on an Australian mountain range, a stay at Spicers Sangoma, located in Australia’s Blue Mountains, should do the trick. With long views over the valley below and African-inspired interiors, it certainly is some kind of change.
If you’re already “Goin’ to Acapulco,” might as well go a bit further up the coast to Loma Bonita. It’s here, where the rugged Sierra Madre mountains meet the Pacific, that a pair of creative entrepreneurs founded the Modern Utopian Society of Adventurers, a design-focused hospitality project. One of the first elements completed was the beachfront Hotelito at MUSA.
If Bob was writing “Mozambique” today, he’d surely like to spend some time at Kisawa Sanctuary. On the island of Benguerra, which is everything you want from an escape, Kisawa Sanctuary is everything you need from a resort: a thoroughly sustainable operation whose aesthetics combine modern construction methods and traditional crafts alike.
“Nashville Skyline Rag” is instrumental, so technically there are no lyrics that include Nashville. We’ll go with another appropriate song from the Nashville Skyline album then: “Tonight, I’ll Be Staying Here With You.” Similarly, Southall isn’t technically in Nashville. 25 miles to the south, the modern-rustic getaway is not just a lodging, but a working farm as well. Stay there tonight.
Santa Fe. Dear, dear, dear, dear, dear Santa Fe. Bob says it’s the best food he’s ever had, in “Santa-Fe.” And the Inn of the Anasazi has been one of the town’s best hotels for quite a while. It has a perfectly central location, and on the inside, the work of New Mexican and Native American artists and craftspeople features prominently throughout.
We don’t know much about being “Stuck Inside of Mobile With the Memphis Blues Again,” but we do know that Palisociety expanded their offerings to include the ARRIVE hotels. Inside a lovely old industrial building on South Main, ARRIVE Memphis has 62 sunny, spacious rooms that feature Pali founder Avi Brosh’s trademark eclectic mix of fixtures and furnishings.
“Tangled Up in Blue” is notable for how the narrator plays with time and shifting perspectives (and for how he gets a job on a fishing boat in New Orleans). Similar narrative trickery can be found at Hotel St. Vincent in New Orleans’ Lower Garden District, where the interiors are full of retro inspiration and historical detail, while being anything but old-fashioned.
No one doubts that the “Caribbean Wind” still blows from Nassau to Mexico, just as no one should doubt that Nassau’s SLS Baha Mar resort envisions itself as a tropical sanctuary for connoisseurs of the best global luxury has to offer. 299 gleaming rooms overlook two swimming pools, resplendent in sunshine, and over 3,000 feet of uninterrupted white-sand beachfront.
According to the song “Sara,” Bob stayed up for days at the Chelsea Hotel writing “Sad-Eyed Lady of the Lowlands.” But if that’s all too on the nose for the New York entry in this list, let’s instead end on this legendary lyric from “Just Like Tom Thumb’s Blues”: I’m going back to New York City, I do believe I’ve had enough. As far as the hotel, what’s really left to say about this legendary place?