Blonde on Blonde is Bob Dylan's seventh studio album, a double LP released in June 1966. Early sessions in New York produced only one track for the final album, so Dylan moved with producer Bob Johnston's team to Nashville, where session musicians helped finish the rest in February and March 1966. It completed a trilogy of rock albums that began with Bringing It All Back Home and Highway 61 Revisited. Its lyrics mix visionary imagery with everyday language, and the songs are built on a large musical scale. It reached number nine in the US and number three in the UK.

Hampi is a UNESCO World Heritage Site in Karnataka, India, with more than 1,600 surviving remains spread over 4,100 hectares. It was the capital of the Vijayanagara Empire from 1336 to 1565. Travellers from Persia and Portugal described it as a prosperous, wealthy and grand city with temples, markets and farms along the Tungabhadra River. By 1500 it was estimated to be the world's second-largest city after Beijing, and probably India's richest at the time. In 1565 a coalition of Muslim sultanates defeated the Vijayanagara Empire, its capital was conquered and destroyed, and the city was left in ruins. Hampi remains a religious centre, with the active Virupaksha Temple at its heart.