Like a Rolling Stone
Live performances

Dylan performed the song live for the first time within days of its release, when he appeared at the Newport Folk Festival on July 25, 1965, in Newport, Rhode Island. Many of the audience's folk enthusiasts objected to Dylan's use of electric guitars, looking down on rock 'n roll, as Bloomfield put it, as popular amongst "greasers, heads, dancers, people who got drunk and boogied". According to Dylan's friend, music critic Paul Nelson, "The audience booing and yelling 'Get rid of the electric guitar ' ", while Dylan and his backing musicians gave an uncertain rendition of their new single. Al Kooper, who offers a different version of the crowd's reaction, claims that it was due to the length of the set they had just played, being only 15 minutes while other artists had done 45 minute sets.

Highway 61 Revisited was issued at the end of August 1965. When Dylan went on tour that fall he asked the future members of The Band to accompany him in performing the electric half of the concerts. "Like a Rolling Stone" took the closing slot on his setlist and held it, with rare exceptions, through the end of his 1966 "world tour". On May 17, 1966, during the last leg of the tour, Dylan and his band performed at Free Trade Hall in Manchester, England. Just before they started to play the track, an audience member yelled "Judas!", apparently referring to Dylan's supposed "betrayal" of folk music. Dylan responded, "I don't believe you... You're a liar!" With that, he turned to the band, ordering them to "play it fucking loud!".

Since then, "Like a Rolling Stone" has remained a staple in Dylan's concerts, often with revised arrangements. It was included in his 1969 Isle of Wight show and in both his reunion tour with The Band in 1974 and the Rolling Thunder Revue tour in 1975–76. The song continued to be featured in other tours throughout the 1970s and 1980s. According to Dylan's official website, he performed the song live over 2,000 times, as of 2019.

Live performances of the song are included on Self Portrait (recorded at the Isle of Wight, August 31, 1969), Before the Flood (recorded February 13, 1974), Bob Dylan at Budokan (recorded March 1, 1978), MTV Unplugged (recorded November 18, 1994), The Bootleg Series Vol. 4: Bob Dylan Live 1966, The "Royal Albert Hall" Concert (recorded in Manchester, UK, May 17, 1966; same recording also available on The Bootleg Series Vol. 7: No Direction Home: The Soundtrack), The Band's 2001 reissue of Rock of Ages (recorded January 1, 1972), and The Bootleg Series Vol. 13: Trouble No More 1979–1981 (Deluxe Edition) (recorded June 27, 1981). In 2016, all Dylan's recorded live performances of the song from 1966 were released in the boxed set The 1966 Live Recordings, with the May 26, 1966 Royal Albert Hall performance released separately on the album The Real Royal Albert Hall 1966 Concert.

The July 1965 Newport performance of the song is included in Murray Lerner 's film The Other Side of the Mirror, while a May 21, 1966, performance in Newcastle, England is featured in Martin Scorsese 's documentary No Direction Home, along with footage of the above-mentioned May 17 heckling incident.

During the 1988 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony, Dylan performed "Like a Rolling Stone" and " Satisfaction " with Mick Jagger and approximately 30 other people. In 1998 Dylan performed the song with the Stones, who he was the opening act for, with Jagger stating that "Like a Rolling Stone" was written by Dylan for them. This claim was repeated again by Jagger during a Rolling Stones concert in Las Vegas in 2024.

Besides appearing on Highway 61 Revisited, the song's standard release can be found on the compilations Bob Dylan's Greatest Hits, Biograph, The Best of Bob Dylan (1997), The Essential Bob Dylan, The Best of Bob Dylan (2005), and Dylan. The mono version appears on The Original Mono Recordings. In addition, the early, incomplete studio recording in time appears on The Bootleg Series Vol. 2.
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