by Jochen Markhorst
In this series, we shine a spotlight on a thriving, fascinating, and polarizing fringe phenomenon within Dylanology: the semi-professional cover artist. And more specifically, on a veteran from the southern part of a small country on the North Sea: Jan Barten from Breda, the Netherlands.
Jan: “A moody, intense track in three-four time… As usual, I started with a simple drum track on my TR-626 for singer Fons. Then I added lots of hand-played drum licks and cymbals. Tough! In the background a guitar pattern by guest guitarist Arnold Hoekstra. There’s also a little Wurly pattern and a slightly ominous string melody. A tricky final mix, but an atmospheric result (the original already had plenty of atmosphere, of course).”
Dylan, too, took the song very seriously at the time. It was the first track recorded in Nashville during the second go at recording the songs for Blonde On Blonde on 14 February 1966, and he tried to tackle it no fewer than twenty times in a row. That twentieth take was the final one (by way of comparison, the subsequent “Visions Of Johanna” was recorded in just four takes). The final recording session, on 16 June, was also devoted to “4th Time Around”, but the overdubs recorded then (harpsichord and drums) were not used. Presumably, by that time producer Bob Johnston had realised that he’d already hit the mark with the idea of contrasting that sweet, lovely guitar lick with the sarcastic lyrics.
It is, by Dylan’s standards anyway, a song that is rarely covered. And the few artists who do venture to perform it generally stick close to the original. The waltz rhythm, the baroque guitar part – apparently, it’s hard to improve on. The lads from Calexico, the Tex-Mex specialists from Arizona, opt for a lingering slide and a melancholic accordion, thereby suddenly giving the song a sorrowful, lost-love dimension. Even more poignant is the late Texan Chris Whitley, the exceptional guitarist who, with his unique, raspy voice, can sneer so beautifully, on a live recording from 2003. The best-known cover is certainly lovely; Yo La Tengo is subdued, sultry and hypnotic on the I’m Not There soundtrack (2007). The most remarkable – and particularly appealing – is the version by The Young Relics, again from Texas, on their eponymous EP from 2009. Jittery, neurotic and infectiously energetic, with a pleasant surprise in the form of a completely unexpected shift in rhythm; halfway through, a full organ descends to calm the nervous guitar, covering all the restlessness – like oil on the waves.
Jan leans towards the dualism of The Young Relics, but in a more ingenious way – not an alternation of frenzy and stillness, but rather in perfect synchrony. The drums from the second verse onwards promise chaos, and bring to mind what Dylan remarked about Daniel Lanois’ ideas for Time Out Of Mind:
“He took it down the Afro-polyrhythm route — multirhythm drumming, that sort of thing. (…) he had his own way of looking at things, and in the end I had to reject this because I thought too highly of the expressive meaning behind the lyrics to bury them in some steamy cauldron of drum theory.”
(David Fricke interview for Rolling Stone, 2001)
The spectacular outtake “Series Of Dreams”, which Dylan rejected at the time, is a first argument in favour of Lanois’s view and against Dylan’s opinion, whilst Jan’s “steamy cauldron of drum theory” in “4th Time Around” provides a second, equally convincing piece of evidence that “multirhythm drumming” can work brilliantly in a Dylan song. In addition, Jan lays down a hallucinatory little pattern on the Wurly underneath, but still doesn’t go off the rails: the stately, unaffected organ spans the commotion below like a cathedral, keeping everything in check.
I stood there and hummed, and tapped on her drum.
To be continued. Next up Jan’s Take 4: To Be Alone With You