It Takes A Lot To Laugh, It Takes A Train To Cry: 9. “It’s not such a terrible song to do”

by Jochen Markhorst

IX         “It’s not such a terrible song to do”

With the wisdom of hindsight, it is the recording that marks Elvis Costello’s entrance pass to the Pantheon, the opening song of the album with which Costello promotes himself from Great Songwriter to one of the Gods: “Beyond Belief”, from Imperial Bedroom (1982, the album title that, incidentally, seems to have had some influence on Dylan’s naming of Empire Burlesque, three years later). Costello sings the song, which in the first takes is still called “The Land Of Give And Take”, initially “normally”, like the angry young Costello of “Less Than Zero” and “(I Don’t Want To Go To) Chelsea”, of “Green Shirt” and “High Fidelity”, the brilliant, aggressive Buddy Holly, sharply and cynically snarling his intelligent lyrics, like the Costello we have loved for five years at that point. But that’s the Costello that Costello is about to shake off:

“I felt that while the playing was fine, the vocal was just a lot of high pitched ranting. The decision to lower the register of the voice by an octave and thereby re-write both title and song, was taken after leaving AIR studios for a bracing stroll along Portland Place. Staff from the nearby B.B.C. would hurry past as they saw me mumbling to myself.”
(liner notes Girls Girls Girls, 1989)

It’s an exceptional song in its own right, of course. Those hypnotically meandering melody lines and especially that brilliant arrangement, the unnerving dynamics of the practically stationary bass on the one hand and the increasingly neurotic, ferocious drumming of an unleashed Pete Thomas on the other. But into the stratosphere comes “Beyond Belief” thanks to that epiphany to descend to baritone, that insight of singing an octave lower and adapt the lyrics accordingly, transforming “The Land Of Give And Take” into “Beyond Belief” – similar in both respects to Dylan’s radical intervention in “Phantom Engineer”.

Revolutionary it is not, of course. On any given day in any given studio on this planet, some musician gets stuck and then decides to seek salvation in radically changing tempo, or key, or instrumentation or whatever. The same applies to Dylan, although it doesn’t seem to be in keeping with his self-image: over the decades, Dylan seems to feel a need to maintain the image of One-Take-Bob for some reason.

It is one of the many, many surprising, insightful anecdotes of the wonderful interview series Life with Bob Dylan, UK Uncut‘s autumn 2008 special. Speaking is Dylan’s regular studio engineer Chris Shaw:

“For him, a recording is a document of the song at that moment in time. My favourite Bob Dylan song is probably ‘It’s Alright Ma (I’m Only Bleeding)’. He has this wicked way of playing it live now, and I saw him backstage once after a show, and I said, ‘Hey, I love the new version of “It’s Alright Ma” – but do you ever play it like the original recording?’ And he looked at me, and he said: Well, y’know, a record is just a recording of what you were doing that day. You don’t wanna live the same day over and over again, now. Do ya?”

… which Dylan must have said sometime in the early 21st century (Shaw has known Dylan since “Things Have Changed”, 2000), but it’s an attitude Dylan has been exhibiting for decades. “A record is not that monumental for me to make,” he tells Ron Rosenbaum in 1977 for the Playboy interview, “it’s just a record of songs.”

Posed, thankfully. Fortunately, for instance, Dylan does not think at the end of recording day 15 June 1965 “just a recording of what I was doing today,” then putting the last take of “Like A Rolling Stone” in waltz rhythm, in three-four time, on the LP. We are all glad that “Not Dark Yet” was revised a few more times, that the New York “Tangled Up In Blue” recordings from September ‘74 were discarded after the perfect remakes in Minneapolis in December, we are grateful that Dylan thought at the end of 30 November 1965, after five complete takes, “No, there’s more to “Visions Of Johanna”. Let’s try it another way in a few months in Nashville.’

And the same gratitude will be felt by fans at Dylan’s decision to completely overhaul “Phantom Engineer”.

In the first takes, the song still chafes at boogie-woogie, but by the time we get to Take 5, Dylan finally seems to realise that we have Mike Bloomfield in the studio; he leaves the piano, grabs an electric guitar and, like a metronome, rams staccato chords in an uptempo Howlin’ Wolf rhythm, over which Bloomfield then gets to show off his rollicks & frolics. We are in Chicago. We hear Bloomfield coming into his element – those same licks and the same urgency as in “Mellow Down Easy”, for instance, on the record he recorded in this same year 1965, The Paul Butterfield Blues Band, the same overwhelming fills as in “Good Morning Little School Girl”. By the time we get to Take 9, Bloomfield’s guitar has now captured the spotlight alongside Dylan – it is steaming and mean and exciting, and light years away from the mercurial sound.

For now, Dylan seems content with it. Six weeks later, when he performs the song with Bloomfield 25 July in Newport, he has not changed a thing (except that it is played even faster – but that will be due to adrenaline, rather than artistic considerations). Despite this, the song in this form does not appear on Highway 61 Revisited, Dylan again not thinking “just a recording of what I was doing today”, but apparently still missing something; the first song on the next studio session, four days after Newport, is again “Phantom Engineer”.

That third recording day for H61, Thursday 29 July, six weeks after the previous recording day, the day “Like A Rolling Stone” was realised, begins with a first: producer Tom Wilson has been replaced by Bob Johnston. Which is the biggest change for now; the re-take of “Phantom Engineer” is only slightly different from Newport and the final 15 June takes. A little more rock ‘n’ roll perhaps, but still with a spotlight on Bloomfield. The first take is semi-serious. Dylan starts laughing along the way, and before the last verse the take bogs down. The musicians hesitate and Dylan laughs again, we can even hear him hooting and then chuckling something like “What the … what are we doing to this song, man – it’s not such a terrible song to do”. The giggly mood now created also ruins the next (and last) attempt of the morning session. Dylan mangles the lyrics, we hear laughter, corny humbug (“Rockefeller Center calling!”), and then it’s left at that; the rest of the morning is for “Tombstone Blues”. Which, after a few takes, is done perfectly before the lunch break.

A first radical change after that lunch break does not come out of Dylan’s hat either. Bassist Joe Macho and pianist Paul Griffin apparently have commitments elsewhere, and new producer Bob Johnston has – presumably – picked the replacements from the rolodex: Russ Savakus and Frank Owens. At least… Savakus and Owens are on the payroll and are also listed in all sources as the bassist and pianist of that afternoon session. Quite remarkable, as neither is a rock or blues musician. Also noteworthy is the awkward, cloistered position of both their names on the LP’s back cover:

Bob Dylan, guitar, harmonica, piano and police car
Mike Bloomfield, guitar
Alan Kooper, organ and piano
Paul Griffin, piano and organ
Bobby Gregg, drums
Harvey Goldstein, bass                  Frank Owens, piano
Charley McCoy, guitar                    Russ Savakus, bass

… in which more things stand out, by the way. The misspelling of Charlie McCoy’s first name, for instance, and that the contributions of bassist Joe Macho and guitarist Al Gorgoni are omitted, that Al Kooper’s stage name is only half-honoured (his real name is Alan Peter Kuperschmidt), that Harvey Goldstein is not yet called Harvey Brooks, and the cornyness of “police car” (referring to the Comedy Capers-like police whistle in “Highway 61 Revisited”, no doubt).

Still, it remains a question whether Owens and Savakus can actually be heard on the songs whose perfect take is realised on that fruitful Thursday (apart from “It Takes A Lot” also “Tombstone Blues” and “Positively 4th Street” are realised today). There are now more than a few testimonials and recollections, including from Owens himself, that warrant some considerable doubt….

To be continued. Next up It Takes A Lot Part 10: No one had any idea what to do

Jochen is a regular reviewer of Dylan’s work on Untold. His books, in English, Dutch and German, are available via Amazon both in paperback and on Kindle:

• Blood on the Tracks: Dylan’s Masterpiece in Blue
• Blonde On Blonde: Bob Dylan’s mercurial masterpiece
• Where Are You Tonight? Bob Dylan’s hushed-up classic from 1978
• Desolation Row: Bob Dylan’s poetic letter from 1965
• Basement Tapes: Bob Dylan’s Summer of 1967
• Mississippi: Bob Dylan’s midlife masterpiece
• Bob Dylan’s Greatest Hits
• John Wesley Harding: Bob Dylan meets Kafka in Nashville
• Tombstone Blues b/w Jet Pilot: Dylan’s lookin’ for the fuse
• Street-Legal: Bob Dylan’s unpolished gem from 1978
• Bringing It All Back Home: Bob Dylan’s 2^nd Big Bang
• Time Out Of Mind: The Rising of an Old Master
• Crossing The Rubicon: Dylan’s latter-day classic
• Nashville Skyline: Bob Dylan’s other type of music
• Nick Drake’s River Man: A very British Masterpiece
• I Contain Multitudes: Bob Dylan’s Account of the Long Strange Trip
• Bob Dylan’s Rough And Rowdy Ways – Side B
• Bob Dylan’s High Water (for Charley Patton)
• Bob Dylan’s 1971
• Like A Rolling Stone b/w Gates Of Eden: Bob Dylan kicks open the door