The Covers We Missed: Blind Willie McTell – Part One

I don’t know what it means either: an index to the current series appearing on this website.

————–

A list of all the cover reviews from the original series of articles on covers of Dylan songs, can be found at the end of the final article in that series.   Details of the articles from this series (“The Covers We Missed”)  are given at the end of this article.

By Jurg Lehmann

Covers Blind Willie McTell – part one

Like Mississippi and Make You Feel My Love, Blind Willie McTell is one of the songs for which the cover was released before the original. Dylan recorded the song in 1983, during the sessions for the album Infidels; however, it was ultimately left off the album and did not receive an official release until 1991.

The psychedelic punks from the Dream Syndicate were the first to release Blind Willie McTell in 1988. Bandleader Steve Wynn recalls:

“In 1984 the Dream Syndicate was on a TV show in Germany. After the show, I ended up hanging out with the show’s host and we listened to records at his pad until dawn…He also played an unreleased Dylan outtake from “Infidels” called “Blind Willie McTell.” It blew my mind and a few years later we covered the song…for the UK mag “Bucketful of Brains”.

All good except that since the song had never been officially released, we needed permission from Bob’s publishing company. We sent our version and not long after got the go-ahead.

Flash forward 30 years: I’m at the Beacon Theatre for a Bob Dylan show and ended up backstage after the gig. I meet Bob’s manager Jeff Rosen and said, “You know, my band was the first to record “Blind Willie McTell” and he responded, “Yes, I know. Your request came to me when I was running the publishing company. I played it for Bob and told him ‘See, Bob? You should have released this song!’”

Few bands have bid farewell with more fanfare than The Band when they said goodbye in 1976 with the all-star concert preserved in LP and movie form as “The Last Waltz. De facto leader Robbie Robertson retired for a time but The Band soon played on and hit the road in 1983. They eventually returned to the studio in 1993. “Jericho” proves that The Band can function just fine without Robertson, critics wrote, although the album lacks the mythic resonance of their greatest work. Their version of Blind Willie McTell makes the weighty composition approachable with Rick Danko and Levon Helm trading off on the verses almost playfully.

Rick Danko was an essential part of The Band. Apart from his bass work, he shared vocal duties with Levon Helm and Richard Manuel. After the band broke up, Danko was involved in the reunion projects and he also played on the album Jericho. His solo career, however, never really took off.

The album Double Live was released in 2018 while the two live performances were recorded in 1989 and 1997, two years before Danko passed away. Both records are bootlegs; they suffer from sloppy packaging and there are errors in the track listing. Worse is the audio quality, especially on the first disc, but this is made up for by an intimate and warm performance with plenty of chat to add atmosphere.

Most critics agree that this is not Richard Danko at his very best. The presence of Aaron Hurwitz on keyboards, notes Dai Jeffries, helps keep Rick on the straight and narrow for most of the time although you can hear him straining at the leash…But: for all its faults there are some magic moments – like ‘Blind Willie McTell’.

That fits in with Tony Attwood’s appraisal: Now this I really do like because it is a proper re-think of what’s there. Of course Rick would have a feel for what Bob was up to, and that clearly gives him a total insight…Just listen to the instrumental break. How did they get that sound? In fact you really don’t have to go too far away from the original to add a new element to the song to add something that offers a new insight and of course, entertainment. Music can be about a clear message, but the best music is about emotion – expressing something that cannot be said in words alone. This is what I find here. This is both entertainment and expression, insight and elegance, meaning and feeling. This is beautiful.

In the early 1990s singer Barb Jungr met producer and musician Kuljit Bhamra. Barb was, at the time, working with pianist Russell Churney. Together they formed a trio and released a CD, Durga Rising, an amalgam of all of their respective influences and interests.

Durga Rising was recorded in 1996 but not properly released at the time and only available via mail order. For some years, the recording was considered a cult CD and ahead of its time. Russell Churney died in 2007, but both Kuljit and Barb felt keen to play the material again, anew, and they approached jazz pianist Simon Wallace, who was thrilled to be involved with the re-emergence of an expanded Durga Rising.

Now that Jungr enjoys an undisputed reputation as a Dylan interpreter, this version of Blind Willie McTell is noteworthy as her first recording of a Dylan song. At nearly nine minutes, it is the album’s longest and most memorable track, raves John Eyles in his BBC review.

A slow burner, it begins in stately fashion, with Jungr caressing each syllable of every phrase to convey the nuances of their meaning. Steadily rising in intensity throughout, the song builds to a dramatic climax with piano and cello solos leading into a blues-wailing harmonica solo before a final impassioned reading of the song’s chorus. Phew!

I’m a Jungr fan myself, many of their numerous Dylan covers are outstanding, but what the critic praises here is exactly my problem: the dramatic climax is way over the top. Blind Willie is not Hollis Brown, there’s no drama enfolding that would leave seven dead people behind. In contrast the song seems, as Peter Tabakis poetically describes it, performed in an open field at midnight. With its spare piano backbone by Dylan himself, accented with Knopfler’s haunting guitar the tableau is as cinematic as Dylan gets. An arrow swings on a doorpost. An owl hoots. Feathered maidens strut. Martyrs fall…At the very top is the unnamed Maker, who watches over us all. We all, apparently, covet ‘what’s His.’

Barb Jungr has recorded another Blind Willie in 2006, a kind of a Take Five version in a 5/4 beat. That sounds like a risky experiment – probably it is -, but in my opinion, it works. Barb Jungr’s version on her album “Walking in the Sun” is one of the most interesting and innovative Blind Willie covers.

Former Bluesbreaker’s and Rolling Stones’ guitarist Mick Taylor has quite a history with Blind Willie McTell: In 1983 Dylan also recorded a full band version (unrelated to the Springtime in New York version) for which he teamed up with Mark Knopfler, Sly Dunbar, Robbie Shakespeare – and Mick Taylor, who played the slide guitar. This version was electric, powerful. Dylan does cough or laugh mid-vocal, which is part of why this take was not made official.

Blind Willie was part of Taylor’s live repertoire for many years, in 1998 he recorded the song for his album A Stone’s Throw. Together with Finnish Wentus Blues Band Taylor, who never really broke through in his post-Stones career, released another live cover version for the album Family Meeting in 2017. He hasn’t changed his interpretation much over time, at about 2 minutes there is always a break before the song restarts as a rock number with Taylor showcasing all his virtuosity as a guitarist (unfortunately not as a singer, he is lacking a bit). After more than 8 minutes we have heard a lot from Taylor, but we haven’t heard much of the song. But it is Mick Taylor – and it is history.

Part two of this series on  the covers of Bline Willie McTell will be published shortly.

Previously in the “Covers we missed” series…

 

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *