Dylan cover a day number 53: I threw it all away

Posted on February 19, 2022 by TonyAttwood

By Tony Attwood

A list of the previous articles in this series is given at the end of the article.

The point about “I threw it all away”  is that musically it has two outstanding features.  One is the melody (not always Bob’s strongest suit) and the other is the chord sequence.  In fact in this song the chord sequence drives the unexpected developments in the melody.

The song is generally played in the key of C and the opening lines are accompanied by exactly the normal chords from that key: C, A minor, F and G.

But then suddenly with the line “But I was cruel” Bob throws in the utterly unexpected chord of A major, and then instantly returns to the normal and expected chords of a piece written in this key.

The middle 8 (the section that is different from the rest of the piece, starting “Love is all there is”, he again introduces the A major chord, utterly unexpectedly (this time with the lyrics “it can’t be denied”).

There is also one other chord that doesn’t belong in the key of C in a classical sense (the chord of B flat which is used at the start of “Take a tip from” in the middle 8, but that has been used so many times in the blues and rock, that it doesn’t leap out and slap one around the face as the A major chord does.

I’ve never been sure it really works – it sounds too artificial for me – but then who am I to criticise the way Bob writes?

But it is the chord sequence and the melody that marks out the song, and by listening to it in Swedish (one of the infinite number of languages I don’t speak) there is a chance to let the words slip away and appreciate the music.

This is “Jag sumpade alltihop” by Georga

https://youtu.be/66tOUBePP0g

We know what it is going to be straight away because of the melody – but what really puzzles me is the use of the organ after the vocals in the opening lines.  What is that doing there?  What does it add?  (To really appreciate this point, and if you don’t fancy listening to four versions of this song, skip through to the last example and you’ll hear the contrast I am trying to make in my normal laboured way.)

If it is to wake us up, fine we are now awake, so why have it in the second verse as well?  Take out that answering organ chord, and it is a perfectly fine rendition – but with it… well, no.  It sounds like someone trying too hard to do something different.

Moving on, the Peter Viskinde Band want to do something different – and the held chords of the organ do that – but this time it fits perfectly.   It is a straight rendition but the vocalist makes me feel he means it – he is not just going through the motions.  It’s restrained, gentle, and when the second vocalist joins in later on, in a way that one can only just make out, that is a lovely additional touch.

Everyone knows his place, no one gets carried away, and even the late guitar solo fits perfectly (and I say “even” because so often in songs like this the guitarist just uses the occasion to show off – but not here.)  Beautiful.

Jimmy LaFave, in the next example, takes us into a very gentle version, although with maybe a temptation to fill in every moment without the vocals.  But it doesn’t do as much for me as the Viskinde version, because I feel the vocalist is trying to put too much emotion into the song.  The emotion is there anyway, and he has a fine voice, so nothing needs to be pushed.  It just feels a touch overdone to me, and doesn’t quite add the gentle nuances that the previous version offers.

And finally to what is for me the best version of all.

Jacqui Dankworth MBE has all the heritage to have a beautiful voice and an ability to recognise an exquisite arrangement for a beautiful song when she finds one, and she shows that here.  This tears my heartstrings about as far as I am willing to let them be torn on a Saturday morning before I venture into the task of driving the 85 miles to London.

And I think that because Ms Dankworth was born in the county town (Northampton) of the English county I live in (Northamptonshire).  I do love to find trivial connections!   And if you are English and an aficionado of jazz you will know she is the daughter of Cleo Laine and John Dankworth.

This is just gorgeous.  I love it.

I doubt anything could improve on this version, so this is the moment I stop.

—–

Untold Dylan was created in 2008 and is currently published once or twice a day –  sometimes more, sometimes less.  Details of some of our series are given at the top of the page and in the Recent Posts list, which appears both on the right side of the page and at the very foot of the page (helpful if you are reading on a phone).  Some of our past articles which form part of a series are also included on the home page.

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Peggy Day (1969) part 5: What more can I say

Posted on February 18, 2022 by TonyAttwood

Peggy Day (1969) part 5 (final)

by Jochen Markhorst

V          What more can I say

A talent for self-mockery he had as well, Elvis. On the bootleg I Sing All Kinds – The Nashville Sessions 1971, there is an incomplete take of “Johnny B. Goode”. When the final chord is fading away, Elvis suddenly starts again, now at half speed: “I said… Johnny…”. Obediently, the obliging band picks it up right away, The King bursts into laughter and waves it away cheerfully, with a just kidding-undertone: “No, no, no, no”. It is clear that the band has been conditioned to an “Elvis ending”. Like the rest of the rock-loving world since 1956, for that matter.

It is the third track on Side 1 of the 1956 comet impact, the Elvis Presley album, the first rock and roll record to reach the top spot on Billboard, and the first rock and roll record to sell more than a million copies. The historical monument opens with “Blue Suede Shoes”, followed by “I’m Counting On You”, and then: “I Got A Woman”.

Thanks to the moving “Bucklen tape”, the earliest-known tape of Bob Dylan, recorded when he was around sixteen, we know that as a schoolboy Dylan was already starting to build his inner music encyclopaedia. In between rumbling through songs like “Jenny Take A Ride” and “Blue Moon”, we hear young Robert Zimmerman chatting with his buddy John Bucklen;

Zimmerman: You know they get all their songs, they get all their songs from little groups. They copy all the little groups. Same thing with Elvis Presley. Elvis Presley, who did he copy? He copied Clyde McPhatter, he copied Little Richard, …
Bucklen: Wait a minute, wait a minute!
Zimmerman: …he copied the Drifters
Bucklen: Wait a minute, name, name, name four songs that Elvis Presley’s copied from those, from those little groups.
Zimmerman: He copied all the Richard songs.
Bucklen: Like what?
Zimmerman: “Rip It Up”, “Long Tall Sally”, “Ready Teddy”, err … what’s the other one…
Bucklen: “Money Honey”?
Zimmerman: No, “Money Honey” he copied from Clyde McPhatter. He copied “I Was The One” – he copied that from the Coasters. He copied, ahhh, “I Got A Woman” from Ray Charles.
Bucklen: Er, listen that song was written for him.

Young Zimmerman is largely right. “I Was The One” is not a Coasters song, but everything else is right. The choice of words is debatable, though. “Copied”, in particular, is a bit harsh. “I Got A Woman” is indeed a Ray Charles song, but Elvis does more than just copy; he makes the song his own, like in fact only Sinatra can make a song his own, and he does add something: at 2’08” we hear a closing bang, the song seems finished, but at 2’09” Elvis kicks in again, at half speed, for another twelve-second coda: the first “Elvis ending” is a fact.

 

The fans call it an “I Got A Woman-ending” as well, and that may be more accurate. Elvis recorded 767 songs, and only about ten to fourteen of them (depending on your definition) have such a dramatic coda at half speed. They are, however, spread throughout his career; “Got A Lot O’ Livin’ To Do” in ’57 is the next one, in the ’60s in about seven songs (including in the 68 Comeback Special version of “Jailhouse Rock”), then in the ultimate kitsch “Winter Wonderland” (1971), and the last studio recording in which he applies this finale is “I Can Help” from ’75.

All in all, less than 2% of Elvis’ recordings have an “Elvis ending”, so to call it an “I Got A Woman-ending” is defensible. Moreover, “I Got A Woman” is indisputably one of the main pillars of his oeuvre. The man from Tupelo played it already in his Sun years (the recording is lost), it’s the first song he recorded for RCA, and it was on the set list right up to his very last concert (Indianapolis 26 June 1977).

It is a bit of a mystery why Dylan chooses an Elvis ending in “Peggy Day” of all places. An open application? According to Dylan, Elvis is the greatest compliment his songs can receive:

JW: Are there any particular artists that you like to see do your songs?
BD: Yeah, Elvis Presley. I liked Elvis Presley… Elvis Presley recorded a song of mine. That’s the one recording I treasure the most… It was called “Tomorrow Is A Long Time”. I wrote it but never recorded it.

 

… that’s what Dylan says in the Rolling Stone interview with Jann Wenner on 26 June 1969, four months after recording “Peggy Day”. But Dylan must have acknowledged that “Peggy Day” is not Elvis-worthy. Without being able to define exactly what an “Elvis-worthy” song is, of course – but “Peggy Day” really isn’t.

Maybe Dylan does it just to stretch the song a bit more, though. When he’s finished, when the verses, twice the bridge and a repeat of the first verse have been completed, the clock only stands at 1’40” … which would make it the shortest song in Dylan’s oeuvre. Shorter still than “Oxford Town” on The Freewheelin’, which is a mere 1’50”. With the Elvis ending from 1’41”, Dylan stretches the tune another eighteen seconds, to 1’59”, and then another 6 seconds of lead-out groove… final score 2’05”. Longer now than “Oxford Town” and ex aequo with Dylan’s second-shortest song, “The Wicked Messenger”.

Elvis, despite the enticing finale, unsurprisingly ignores the song. But Dylan’s Elvis dream still comes true again soon after: The King records “Don’t Think Twice” in March ’71, which will be released on the 1973 Elvis album. Making the song his own again, of course.

Dylan’s bow to The King is elegant. When he himself adopts a country-rock approach to his live performances of “Don’t Think Twice” in the 1990s, he is obviously reminded of his hero: he concludes the often long, drawn-out versions with an Elvis ending. Bloomington November ’96, Atlantic City November ’99, Cardiff September 2000… the Worcester ’99 version is one of the longest, by the way – Dylan stretches the song to over seven minutes with a harmonica solo, and then throws in an Elvis ending of over half a minute.

“Don’t Think Twice” has been performed more than 1100 times by Dylan. With and without an “I Got A Woman ending”. “Peggy Day” has never been performed. That girl is out of sight.

—————

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:

 

 

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More On Bob Dylan’s Famous Cook Book

Posted on February 18, 2022 by TonyAttwood

This follows on from Bob Dylan’s Original Recipes and Cookbook

By Larry Fyffe

From the “Untold Archives”, and exclusively reproduced below  for the interest of our readers, here are the original lyrics of

“All I Really Want To Do”, first published in “Bob Dylan’s Cook Book”:

I ain't cooking to compete with you
Eat you, heat you, or whole-wheat you
Jelly roll, or casserole you
Freeze-dry, deep fry, porkie pie you
All I really want to do
Is Bacon be Eggs with you
No, I ain't cooking to fry you up
To glutton you, or gluten you
Or spread you around, or drain you down
Or knead you up, or strain you down
All I really want to do
Is Bacon be Eggs with you
No, I ain't cooking to paste you up
Shake or bake you, or yeast you up
Or super-size you, franchise you
Or yoke you up, or smoke you up
All I really want to do
Is Bacon be Eggs with you
Now, I don't want to butter baste you 
Grease you, mince you, strip, or taste you
Or mayonnaise or glaze you
Or dine or drink red wine with you
All I really want to do
Is Bacon be Eggs with you
I don't want to make you lean and thin
Anorex, or be next to you
Fatten you nice, or dough you in
Or hop you up, or chop you up
All I really want to do
Is Bacon be Eggs with you

Note:

There are other variants of  ‘All I Really Want To Do” locked in the Untold vaults, but this is the one from the Cook Book – that’s also locked away in the vaults.

 

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Bromberg and Dylan – the missing album, part 5

Posted on February 17, 2022 by TonyAttwood

by Jochen Markhorst

We are continuing looking at songs that might have made it onto the Dylan / Bromberg album had it ever been completed and released.

  1. Young Westley 

First release by Mary McCaslin (1974), but moreover another song from Bromberg’s repertoire – like “New Lee Highway Blues”, “The Main Street Moan”, “Kaatskill Serenade”, “Sloppy Drunk” and “Summer wages” to be found on Bromberg’s How Late’ll Ya Play ‘Til? from 1976. The Dylan/Bromberg session presumably uses Bromberg’s version as a template, which is nice enough – but the McCaslin original is truly enchanting.

  1. The Lady Came From Baltimore 

https://youtu.be/g1g0ukp58nU

Scott Walker, Joan Baez, Ricky Nelson, Cliff Richard… half the Premier League has this evergreen from the unforgettable Tim Hardin in their repertoire. As does Dylan himself – he performs the song a couple of times in ’94. The best known version is probably the one by Johnny Cash, who had a hit with the song in 1974. Still, it’s hard to beat the original.

  1. New Lee Highway Blues 

Bromberg’s third LP, 1974’s Wanted Dead or Alive, is one of the purveyors of the Bromberg/Dylan session. Understandably so; it is one of Bromberg’s most infectious, colourful records.

It’s the album that opens with the George Harrison/Bromberg collaboration “The Holdup”, the album that features the Dylan song “Wallflower” (at the time an obscurity known only through Doug Sahm’s premiere), and the album that features a brilliant live version of one of Dylan’s favourite songs, “Kansas City” – and the album that provides three songs for this 1992 session. In addition to “Send Me to the ‘Lectric Chair” and “The Main Street Moan”, this “New Lee Highway Blues”. A derivative of the old bluegrass standard “Goin’ Down the Lee Highway”, and embellished and provided with lyrics by Bromberg, with an exciting acceleration halfway through – a worthy album finale.

  1. Rise Again https://youtu.be/r6s6VJIKss8

One of the few songs on the list that doesn’t seem to have any Bromberg link. Dylan is a fan of the Dallas Holm song – he plays it a few times in his gospel years, in 1980 and 1981. And then abandons the song, but takes one of its strongholds, the remarkable, unusual G+ chord, to “God Knows” in 1990.

“Rise Again” is a beautiful song from 1977 that CCM Magazine considers to be one of the 100 Greatest Songs In Christian Music. When Dylan performs the song, Clydie King sings along, and those performances are all utterly beautiful (Portland, December 3, 1980 is a very successful one).

For The Bootleg Series 13 – Trouble No More 1979-1981 (2017) unfortunately only a rehearsal is selected. That is a wonderful, sober version, with excellent vocals of King and Dylan, merely accompanied by Dylan’s acoustic guitar – illuminating that heavenly, “lost” chord all the better (it is the second chord, on “drive the nails”, for instance, and on “say it isn’t me”).

  1. Duncan & Brady 

The old murder ballad (first recorded in 1929) that we know from Leadbelly, Dave Van Ronk, Jerry Garcia and dozens of others, but now also from Dylan himself – the 1992 Dylan/Bromberg recording is on the bonus disc from Tell Tale Signs (2008).

  1. The Main Street Moan 

Jerry Garcia plays on the original 1974 Bromberg version. On the “Dead side” (the four songs on the A-side were recorded in the studio with members of the Grateful Dead, the four songs on the B-side are live recordings – hence the title Wanted Dead Or Alive). “The Main Street Moan” is a nice little tune, as Dylan would say, and has a sympathetic Self Portrait vibe. But still seems a less exciting choice than, say, the brilliantly arranged “Someone Else’s Blues”, another Bromberg original on the Dead side.

  1. Nobody’s Fault But Mine 

Blind Willie Johnson’s pièce de résistance, the A-side of the song that as of 2021 is past the outer boundary of the heliosphere in interstellar space: “Dark Was The Night”, one of the 27 samples of music included on the Voyager Golden Record.
In our solar system, the A-side “Nobody’s Fault But Mine” is equally celestial. In any version; Led Zeppelin’s overblown, Ry Cooder’s terrifying, Grateful Dead’s intimate or Nina Simone’s heartbreakingly lonely… let’s hope one day we can add Dylan/Bromberg’s version to that list.

  1. Miss The Mississippi And You 

The old Jimmie Rodgers song (1932), just like “Duncan & Brady” eventually released, on the bonus disc of Tell Tale Signs.

 

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NET, 2003, part 6: The Ragged Clown

Posted on February 16, 2022 by TonyAttwood

This is part of a series covering the whole of the Never Ending Tour.  You can find an index to all the articles here.

So far in 2003 we have had

By Mike Johnson (Kiwipoet)

In my last post, I quoted Dylan commentator Professor Christopher Ricks that the album version of ‘The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll’ is ‘a perfect song perfectly rendered once and for all.’ I have some sympathy with Ricks as I felt the same way about the album version of ‘Visions of Johanna‘– until I heard some of the 1966 solo acoustic performances. Then I felt that the collective performances from 1966 qualified as ‘the perfect song perfectly rendered (several times)’ and still do.

On reflection, I realized that in the early years when Dylan played solo, with just his guitar and harmonica, he could change the tempo of a song while he was singing it, in other words he could slow the song down or speed it up to fit the vocal line as he wished. He certainly does this on the album version of ‘Hattie Carroll’, which lends weight to Ricks’ contention that only once did Dylan achieve the magic formula in which the vocal line is most perfectly expressed in musical form.

As soon as Dylan began singing with a band, he had to adapt the song to a single tempo and so lose that sensitivity of vocal line to the musical line. He could vary the timing of the vocal but not the tempo.

‘It’s All Over Now Baby Blue’ is another example that gives me a Ricks moment. The album version does have some subtle variations of tempo, but for me it is not until we get to 1995, and the Prague concert, that we find ‘the perfect song perfectly rendered.’

By 2003, the song is in trouble. Dylan’s attempt to put a baroque, and therefore quite rigid, structure to the song, which works so well with ‘Love Minus Zero’, does not lead to a satisfying performance despite the richness of the opening chords. It sounds too constrained, too choppy, and he struggles to fit the vocal lines, themselves of varying length, into that rigid structure. This performance is from Birmingham (21st Nov)

Baby Blue

We could say the same for ‘Mr Tambourine Man’, those lovely free flowing lines of the original album version, and 1966 live performances, were an integral part of the meaning and impact of the song. The more rigid structure of the following performance does not suit the song so well, although we find a powerful and blistering performance, using the same tempo and chord progression, in 2001 (See NET, 2001, Part 1). This 2003 performance is from Niagara Falls (23rd August).

Mr T Man

We could argue that this song announces Dylan’s move away from protest songs rather than ‘It’s All Over Now Baby Blue’ (‘it’s not aimed at anyone, it’s just escaping on the run…’), for the song has wider terms of reference, famously giving voice to our desire to escape from our dull and humdrum lives.

It’s disappointing that Dylan has chosen to drop the ‘ragged clown’ verse from later performances of the song. It could be read as a self-portrait, a portrait of a troubled young rhymester chasing shadows in the dark, in ‘evening’s empire’:

Though you might hear laughing, spinning, swinging madly across the sun
It's not aimed at anyone
It's just escaping on the run
And but for the sky there are no fences facing
And if you hear vague traces of skipping reels of rhyme
To your tambourine in time
It's just a ragged clown behind
I wouldn't pay it any mind
It's just a shadow you're seeing that he's chasing

‘Skipping reels of rhyme’ is a perfect description of the song itself, the ‘ragged clown’ the perfect circus Dylan.

‘My Back Pages’ is another song from the same solo Dylan era. It fares better than ‘Baby Blue’ and ‘Mr T Man’ although he does tie it to a lumbering tempo, more rigid than the original album version. We might still feel that he’s struggling to fit the vocal line into the musical line, having to break up the vocal line to do it. The violin backing helps to pull up this Red Bluff performance and give the performance a bit of a country twist (7th Oct).

My Back Pages (A)

Dylan may not have been entirely happy with this lumbering tempo, as a few weeks later, in London (23rd Nov) he speeds it up, uses some nice fat chords on the piano to push the song along. This turns it into a foot-tapper, but does the vocal line better suit the musical line? He’s still breaking the vocal line up. I’ll leave it to my dear reader to decide.

My Back Pages (B)

We don’t get the same issue with ‘Masters of War,’ another from Dylan’s solo era, as it has always had a firm, almost military tempo, and has adapted well to having a backing band. Bass and drums make it sound threatening and funereal at the same time. This song has been evolving successfully as a slow-paced dirge, which seems to fit the song better than the fast-paced, hard rock versions of 1978 and 1986. This one’s from Sydney, 17th Feb. The most enduring protest song of all time, given perfect expression here (almost – check out the 1995 Brixton performance).

Masters of War

Now along comes a rarity. ‘Heavy and a Bottle of Bread’ from the Basement Tapes was only performed twice during the NET, once in 2002 (see NET, 2002, part 2) and once in 2003, in London (25th Nov). There’s plenty of tempo changing going on in the Basement Tapes, as fits its casual, throwaway feel. I discern behind the nonsense rhymes of ‘Heavy and a Bottle of Bread’, a song about addiction. Addiction and a certain madness.

Well, the comic book and me, just us, we caught the bus
The poor little chauffeur, though, she was back in bed
On the very next day, with a nose full of pus

Cocaine anyone? And again:

Now, pull that drummer out from behind that bottle
Bring me my pipe, we’re gonna shake it
Slap that drummer with a pie that smells
Take me down to California, baby

Booze and dope, anyone? It’s a very zonked song.

Heavy and a Bottle of Bread

Dylan has tried out a number of different approaches to ‘If Not For You,’ from the New Morning album. I love the forlorn, solo version from Another Self Portrait, (official Bootleg Series Vol 10); the more swinging version he did with George Harrison is fun to listen to, as is the upbeat New Morning version. This version from London (23rd Nov) also swings, and Dylan does a great vocal. For my ear, the guitar break is a little harsh for the sweetness of the song.

If not for you

(I’m sorry if I have created some confusion over the London dates. Dylan did three concerts in London, Shepherd’s Bush 23 Nov, Hammersmith, 24th Nov, and The Brixton Academy 25th Nov.)

This performance of ‘Under The Red Sky’ is from Shepherd’s Bush, and while I always enjoy this song, its fairy-tale inspired lyrics, and its hint of despair and broken innocence, I feel that the long instrumental break adds little to the song, and merely pads it out.

Under the Red Sky

Dylan kicked off the St Paul (30th Oct) concert with ‘Seeing the Real You At Last’ from Empire Burlesque r(1985). (According to the official website, which is often wrong, Dylan only played this song once in 2003, at Melbourne 8th Feb)

It’s a great rocker, with plenty of bounce. Anybody who’s mistaken about somebody, maybe has an idealized picture of them, must eventually have a moment when the scales fall from their eyes and they see the real person. The sirens’ call can create powerful illusions around the loved one’s goodness, virtues and prowess while the past remains hidden:

When I met you, baby
You didn't show no visible scars
You could ride like Annie Oakley
You could shoot like Belle Star.

Dylan belts it out fine style.

Seeing the real you

In my first post for 2003, I grumbled that Dylan tends to use his New Zealand concerts as rehearsals, but it isn’t all bad. This ‘Simple Twist of Fate’ is from Auckland 23rd of Feb. It’s a gentle, muted performance, well suited to this hymn to love and chance. It’s all about the poignancy of those chance meetings, those one-night stands that are so bitter sweet. We’re all blind men at the gate when it comes to the whim of the gods.

Simple twist of fate

‘Cat’s in the Well’ from Under the Red Sky is a ferocious song and a real hard hitting rocker. There is a typical Dylan wildness to the lyrics, but it’s an easy song to overlook as, like ‘Silvio,’ it can sound like a filler. If you don’t know them, I recommend that you pull up the lyrics and read as you listen.

The cat's in the well and the servant is at the door
the drinks are ready and the dogs are going to war

Classic Dylan lyrics, as true now as the day they were written back in1990.  I speculate that the first Gulf War (1990 – 1991) helped forge the passion behind this song. ‘May the lord have mercy on us all.’ Indeed. (This one’s from Berlin, 3O Oct)

Cat’s in the Well (A)

That’s a great performance, but unfortunately, the recording is a little muted if not fuzzy. You may prefer this one from Hammersmith. I don’t know that it’s that much better in terms of performance, but the sound is much clearer and sharper.

Cat’s in the Well (B)

Since Dylan often closes his concert with ‘All Along the Watchtower’ I have fallen into the pattern of finishing up a particular year with the song. To go out in a blizzard of screaming apocalyptic guitars is fitting, as it returns us to one of Dylan’s most enduring themes – the imminence of war. (Isn’t that what’s driving ‘Cat’s in the Well’?) Whenever I hear this song done well, I think of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and his ‘ancestral voices prophesying war.’ (From ‘Kubla Khan’) There may well be no way ‘out of here.’

Again I’ve got two offerings. The first is from that wonderful Red Bluff concert. It reeks of Jimi Hendrix.

Watchtower (A)

And this from the equally wonderful Hammersmith concert. Note the theme song from Exodus at the start. Cool descending riff backs up the verses.

Watchtower (B)

A perfect song perfectly rendered – twice?

That brings my survey of 2003 to a close. A year of innovation and rambunctious energy. There’s a loose, tearaway element to the year’s performances. Dylan’s occasional slurring, his vocal roughness, his urgent piano. This is not a peak year for polished performances such as we saw in 2000 and 2001, but there is a rugged, jaggy energy here unmatched by any other year we’ve so far encountered.

I’ll be back soon to see what happened in the following year – 2004.

Kia Ora

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A Dylan Cover a Day: I shall be released

Posted on February 16, 2022 by TonyAttwood

by Tony Attwood

There is a list of previous covers in this series at the very foot of the page.

OK, it is getting more like being a Dylan Cover a Week, or maybe a Dylan Cover a Fortnight, but here’s another one…  And in writing this little series what I have discovered is that I particularly like exploring Dylan songs that I’m not especially fond of.  Not that I mean I don’t like the songs but rather that I don’t particularly choose to play them; they are not among my favourites.

“I shall be released” is one of those songs – it just doesn’t do anything much for me.  Of course, that is my failing, no one else’s, but that’s just how it is.

So I was keen to find someone who could give me a new insight into the song, but really it was hard going.

One technique often used is by having an unexpected opening, but then in comes that melody and chord sequence and we are totally within the song.  With an album cover like that above I had hoped for more inventiveness.

Bob Margolin certainly does have a go at changing the instrumentation, and his voice is very unusual (at least it seems so for me) so it does have me listening.  Love the howling wolves on the cover.

But Bert Dockx really does deserve a mention from the off, not least for that totally unexpected note in the opening bars which if I heard it in rehearsal I’d say the guitarist had slipped, but clearly he hadn’t.

So is this “I shall be released”?  Well yes it is as we find when he starts singing, and I’m giving this performance 10 out of 10, because he has done what no one else seems capable of doing – finding other heights and depths within the song which Dylan didn’t really expect when he wrote it.  (Of course I don’t know that, but it’s just the feeling I get, and I am feeling quite positive this morning as finally it has stopped raining and we have blue skies in the English Midlands.)

A beautiful beautiful voice as well as a remarkable and original way of playing the accompaniment.  This, for me is what it is all about – finding that person out there who has an exquisite talent, and who can take a song and transform it.  Keeping some elements of the original he goes in a completely different direction and delivers a different feel.

And as for the instrumental break after 4 minutes 30 seconds… oh that had me rushing back to the computer to take the recording back and play it again.  Truly remarkable.  I learn more about his song through this one performance than I have ever learned about it over the years.

Bert Dockx is not a performer I’ve come across before (my failing I’m sure) but it appears he is a Belgian composer, singer and jazz guitarist who attended the Royal Conservatory of Brussels.

Wiki tells me that in 2008 he founded Flying Horseman, a band that was nominated for two Music Industry Awards (“album of the year” and “alternative”) in 2013. Dockx himself was nominated in the ‘best musician’ category in 2013 and 2014. He also won the biennial KU Leuven Culture Prize 2015-2016.

Elsewhere, very very few people have played with the chord sequence or tried to speed up the song, but here is a version that does both…  I really quite like this, although that may be because I have just listened to so many people faithfully sticking to the lyrics, chords and timing.  And yes I know that is the point – but only up to a point.  It is not vital.

———————–

Untold Dylan was created in 2008 and is currently published twice a day –  sometimes more, sometimes less.  Details of some of our series are given at the top of the page and in the Recent Posts list, which appears both on the right side of the page and at the very foot of the page (helpful if you are reading on a phone).  Some of our past articles which form part of a series are also included on the home page.

Articles are written by a variety of volunteers and you can read more about them here    If you would like to write for Untold Dylan, do email with your idea or article to Tony@schools.co.uk.  Our readership is rather large (many thanks to Rolling Stone for help in that regard). Details of some of our past articles are also included on the home page.

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Peggy Day (1969) part 4: Hobbling the opposition

Posted on February 15, 2022 by TonyAttwood

by Jochen Markhorst

IV         Hobbling the opposition

 “If a Martian came to Earth tomorrow and asked me, Cliff, how many iconic rock and roll songs have you made? I would say, One – Move It.” Cliff Richard is not exactly blessed with the literary talent of a Dylan or even a Keith Richards (“A Martian”? Couldn’t any earthling from, say, old Honolulu or Ashtabula ask the same question?), but still, his autobiography The Dreamer (2020) is entertaining, pleasantly modest and, well, charming. And he cherishes John Lennon’s comment about his “only iconic rock and roll song”;

“A few years later, John Lennon was kind enough to say: “Before Cliff and “Move It”, there was nothing worth listening to in British music” (you have to admit – he has great taste!). I was flattered by the comment – and I still am. Being called the first British rock and roller by such a legendary musician is an honour that I will take to my grave.”

“Living Doll”, on the other hand, says Sir Cliff, “was a weak, pseudo-rock song,” but contractually he has to release a song from his debut film Serious Charge on single. Shadows guitarist Bruce Welch manages to overcome Cliff’s reluctance: “ʻWhy not do it another way?’ He picked at a few chords. ʻWhy not do it as … a country song?’”

The Beatles appear often enough in Cliff’s autobiography; Richard describes an amicable camaraderie. There are no links to The Stones, though. Except once, when Cliff “by mistake” scores a hit with a Jagger/Richards song…

“The tape didn’t have any songwriters’ names on it but we thought it was a nice song, and would suit me and The Shadows, so we shifted it from the ‘Maybe’ to the ‘Yes’ pile. It wasn’t until after we recorded it that we knew it had been written by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards. Well, we’d have done it anyway – we had our own sound and our own approach to songs.”

In Life, his 2010 autobiography, Keith Richards remembers that music-history fact too, but Keith is – of course – a bit more sardonic than Sir Cliff. In Chapter 5, the Glimmer Twin recounts the first unsteady steps on the songwriting path, a skill that Jagger and Richards only mastered after months of toil and “some terrible songs”. Still, as Richards recalls with amazement, their manager managed to sell those “terrible songs” to other artists, who actually scored some minor hits with them:

“We ended Cliff Richard’s run of hits when he recorded our “Blue Turns to Grey”–it was one of the rare times one of his records went into the top thirty instead of the top ten. And when the Searchers did “Take It Or Leave It,” it torpedoed them as well. Our songwriting had this other function of hobbling the opposition while we got paid for it. It had the opposite effect on Marianne Faithfull. It made her into a star with “As Tears Go By”– the title changed by Andrew Oldham from the Casablanca song “As Time Goes By”–written on a twelve-string guitar. We thought, what a terrible piece of tripe. We came out and played it to Andrew, and he said, “It’s a hit.” We actually sold this stuff, and it actually made money. Mick and I were thinking, this is money for old rope!”

Keef has a particularly infectious, quite musical, narrative style. “Our songwriting had this other function of hobbling the opposition while we got paid for it” is a wonderfully assonant, almost poetic line, for example. But in terms of content, the Stone rather exaggerates. Cliff’s “Blue Turns To Grey” is a No. 1 hit in Israel, scores second place in Malaysia and Singapore, reaches the Top 20 in the Netherlands, New Zealand and Australia (when Dylan is in Australia), and in England it is also a neat No. 15 – in May ’66, that is, when Dylan is in England. Cliff calling it “a hit” is in fact correct, and it certainly doesn’t end his run of hits – the next four singles in this year 1966 all make the Top 10 again. Besides, Keith’s salty qualifications like “this stuff” and “old rope” are really a bit too cynical; “Blue Turns To Grey” is actually a very nice song.

 

… and when the Stones record it themselves and Brian Jones brings in his twelve-string guitar, the nice song even gets a very charming, folk-rockin’ Byrds colour.

However, the metaphor “blue turns to grey” remains somewhat awkward. After all, since the Middle Ages, “blue” has been the poetic, or synesthetic, synonym for “sad, depressed”. So it is a bit confusing when Cliff and Mick Jagger sing:

So now that she is gone
You won't be sad for long
For maybe just an hour or just a moment
Of the day

Then blue turns to grey
And try as you may
You just don't feel good
You don't feel alright
And you know that you must find her

… which communicates a confusing, incoherent message; the first stanza explicitly states that the narrator has been abandoned and that he is therefore “sad” – he is blue. But that won’t last long, and “then blue turns to grey”. “Grey”? “Feeling grey” is, also according to researchers at the University Hospital South Manchester (2010) exactly the same as “feeling blue”, only more accurate, more in line with the actual perception of depressed people:

“When asked to pick a hue that reflected their mood, healthy participants selected a shade of yellow, but depressed ones, for the most part, chose grey. According to the researchers, the colour grey implies “a dark state of mind, a colourless and monotonous life, gloom, misery or a disinterest in life.”

Dylan reuses the phrase in the penultimate verse of “Peggy Day”, resolving the ambiguity in one fell swoop:

Peggy Day stole my poor heart away
Turned my skies to blue from grey
Love to spend the night with Peggy Day

… by the simple expedient of adding “skies” to the inverted metaphor. As it should be, of course. As Dylan remembers from such evergreens as “In a Little Spanish Town” (Many skies have turned to grey / Because we’re far apart). And as it is done with appropriate melancholy by one of the most talented exponents of the 90s falsetto hype, by Travis in “The Last Laugh Of The Laughter”;

When the spotlight fades away
Ma vie, c'est la vie
When the blue skies turn to grey
Ma vie, my oh my

Yep, my life was clouded and colourless, before I knew Peggy, and now the sun is shining, now my life is good. Pretty clear. Still not too uplifting poetry. Quite corny even. Which the master himself probably thinks too. “Peggy Day” is hardly a candidate, if a Martian came to Earth tomorrow and asked him: “Bob, how many iconic country songs have you made?”

——————–

To be continued. Next up: Peggy Day part 5

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:

 

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Dylan released and unreleased: the filmed rehearsals.

Posted on February 15, 2022 by TonyAttwood

By Aaron Galbraith and Tony Attwood

An index to the previous episodes in this series is given at the end of the article.

Aaron: Here’s a couple of filmed rehearsals from Bob over the years.

First up , from the Concert for Bangladesh, it’s “If Not For You” with George Harrison.

Tony: I’d love to know what George Harrison said to Bob just as they were going to start.  And judging by the way Bob is looking at George at the beginning I’d guess they had only had one previous run through before this rehearsal.   I’d say this clearly isn’t the first run-through, because the sudden stop and the harmonies work, but the way George doesn’t come in immediately after the harmonica break suggests they were not quite there yet.   That also suggests why the arrangement is so simple – it’s a rule of live performances.  If you’ve not had time to rehearse fully, keep it simple.

And the simplicity certainly works for me.  It is a song that stands up on its own merits and doesn’t need a huge production to make it come alive.

Aaron: Next from Unplugged it’s I Want You and With God On Our Side

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=tiZOqEF2HCQ

Tony: I love the way Bob is as nonchalant in rehearsal as he is on stage in performance.

It’s a totally different arrangement from any I have heard before; I’m not too sure about the effectiveness of the long pauses within the verse, although I must admit by the second verse it grows on me, despite the sudden change in approach with the band dropping out.

If that is a planned part of the arrangement then it most certainly is one of Bob’s most curious re-arranging of a song; if it wasn’t for the lyrics I’d take another moment to recognise what the song is.

But even if it is curious, I must say it certainly grows on me; who else could have thought of turning this song around in such a way.  By the four-minute mark, I’m thinking this is how it ought to be.  Extraordinary.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=hqlnxD0uCwE

Tony:  After “I want you” I am ready for anything in terms of “With God on Our Side”, but this is a much more recognisable version of the song compared with the original.  And yet, once again, immediately I am drawn to this.  There is an extra variation or two but mostly it is the power and certainty in Bob’s voice against the stability of the instrumental accompaniment that makes this a truly remarkable performance.

There is so much written about Dylan that I have not had time to read, so I don’t know if anyone has done a study of how Dylan’s re-arrangements come about.  I mean, does Bob turn up and say, “ok this is how I’m going to sing it, what can you do?” and then make suggestions?   Or does he come in with an understanding of how he wants it to sound and gradually moves the band to that type of performance?

I rather think the latter, and the rehearsal tapes and videos seem to suggest this is what happens, and most certainly I get the feeling of that here.  I’d rank this as one of the best if not the best version of the song I’ve ever heard.

(Incidentally, after the performance stops the video continues for several minutes but not too much happens, so don’t feel obliged to keep watching!)

Aaron: Last one this time is a bit of fun from Bob’s surprise guest appearance on the US comedy show Dharma & Greg. The episode was called Play Lady Play.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=iUk6jVl5Z-s

Tony:  I don’t know anything about the show, and it looks to me as if Bob isn’t too sure about it all, although it does look as if this was the first rehearsal; it could even be ad-libbed all the way through.   Certainly reminds me of the chaos within many of the rehearsals that I was in (but sadly no one famous ever turned up to help us).

The lady really isn’t that much of a drummer in my view, but maybe that’s the point.  (Or maybe she is a famous drummer, pretending to be not very accomplished; sorry I don’t know).

But how nice to see Bob smiling!    Aaron, can you get a copy of the actual programme that was put out?  That would be fun to compare with the rehearsal.  Or was this the actual programme, pretending to be a rehearsal?  (Life gets so complex sometimes).

Dylan released and unreleased: the series

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Can’t Escape from you part 2

Posted on February 14, 2022 by TonyAttwood

This article continues from “Can’t Escape from you, part 1”

In the seventh verse:

“I'm neither sad nor sorry
I'm all dressed up in black
I fought for fame and glory
And you tried to break my back”

So, Dylan or DYLAN is resigned to his fate as he is “neither sad nor sorry” and he certainly knows his ultimate fate, as he is “all dressed up in black.” And while he lived to gain “fame and glory”, “you”, this time maybe his lost love, maybe Sara, who tried to get Dylan or DYLAN to see the folly of his ways. Now one can say that DYLAN in his resigned state, has given up that fight for fame and glory.

I find the eighth verse a little ambiguous (and what else is new):

“In the far off sweet forever
The sunshine peeking through
We should've walked together
I can't escape from you”

The “far off sweet forever” is likely the hereafter. Is DYLAN saying to his lost love that “we should’ve walked together” and never been apart or is he saying they will or should walk together in the hereafter. DYLAN says, “I can’t escape from you”. Does he mean lovesickness or that his lost love is fated to be with him forever in the hereafter?

Connecting this thought to Psalm 49, the lost love may refer to someone that DYLAN is actually grieving, ie. a person or a relationship that has died. By reciting the mourning prayers, in Judaism, it is understood that he is connecting forevermore, to those who are dear and have gone before him. Hence, “can’t escape from you” ties into Psalm 49.

In the tenth verse, life is uncertain and changing with its “winding path”:

“The path is ever winding
The stars they never age
The morning light is blinding
All the world's a stage”

Here, by contrast, the stars are not “falling” but represent something that is permanent. I find, “All the world’s a stage” interesting because Dylan treats his concert performances, in costume, and playing roles, like in a stage play. And never-ending concert touring is virtually the “world” for Dylan.

As Tony Attwood points out, this last line of the last verse, alludes to Shakespeare’s As You Like It:

“All the world’s is a stage,
And all the men and women merely players; 
They have their exits and their entrances,     
And one man in his time plays many parts”  
       (ie. Man is always changing)

Certainly, it is evident that Dylan has changed enormously over time. This might also explain DYLAN’s description of his lost lover’s “ever changing face” further down, in the second to last verse.

In the next verse, the eleventh, Dylan recognizes there are two forces in the world:

“Should be the time of gladness
Happy faces everywhere
The mystery of madness
Is propagating in the air”

Dylan is removed from or can’t relate to those people who are happy. He is more affected by the madness that propagates “in the air”.

The twelfth verse is also worth considering:

“I don't like the city
Not like some folks do
Isn't it a pity
I can't escape from you?”

Contrast DYLAN’s “I don’t like the city”, where he now lives, with Country BOB DYLAN when he is starting to feel the urge to leave the country for the city, as in “Wish I was back in the city” from Watching the River Flow.

I got to believe, “Isn’t it a pity” is a reference to his good buddy, George Harrison and his song, Isn’t it a Pity, where two lovers can’t help themselves by breaking each other’s hearts.

In the Bible, when words or phrases are repeated in the same passage, they usually signify special importance and meaning. No different here, when DYLAN repeats the song title, “I can’t escape from you?”, except in this verse there is a question mark added to the end of the phrase. I may be stretching it (again) but when I read the first line in the next verse, “We ploughed the fields of heaven”, I think of Isaiah (2:4):

“God shall judge between the nations, and shall decide for many peoples; and they shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation; neither shall they learn war anymore.”

I think Dylan is wishing that he and his lost lover can turn their personal battlefield of war into a field of peace.

The same verse ends with words of regret:

“I hope I can be forgiven
If any words of mine offend”

Is this verse personal? Is it Dylan talking to Sara? The following verse accentuates this idea:

“All our days were splendid
They were simple, they were plain
It never should have ended
I should’ve kissed you in the rain”

Maybe I am missing something, but I can’t help remembering that Dylan and Sara lived happily when they lived together, for some time, simply and plainly, in the country. Their relationship, in Dylan’s or DYLAN’s mind, should never have ended, and he should have kissed her during their spat, to make up with her.

With “primrose and clover”, I believe Dylan or DYLAN is alluding to a simple life of pleasures, bequeathed to them by G-d.

Note in the last verse Dylan or DYLAN deliberately ends with “I can’t escape from you.”:

“Can't help looking at you
You made love with God knows who
Never found a gal to match you
I can't escape from you”

Dylan or DYLAN acknowledges that his lost lover likely had many lovers after him, like him, but he still has never found a girl to match her.

But if “can’t escape from you” is connected to the mourning psalm 49, and Sara is still alive, then the lost love is not Sara. Possibly Suze Rotolo. Or again, it is DYLAN because it describes the condition of anyone who is grieving over a lost one. Or it is not the physical loss but the conceded permanent loss of a relationship?

Can’t Escape from You (Studio Outtake – 2005) and included in The Bootleg Series Volume 8, Tell Tale Signs, Rare and Unrealized, 1989-2006.

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Bob Dylan And  Patti Page

Posted on February 14, 2022 by TonyAttwood

By Larry Fyffe

Editor’s note: at the time of publishing I couldn’t find a version of Patti’s gone to Laredo freely available to publish here… except this one.  Go to 4 minutes 50 seconds and you should find it.

————————–

Metonymy, allusion, ambiguity, paradox, word association, story fragmentation, and the stream of consciousness technique be hallmarks of Post Modernist writing:

Patty gone to Laredo
But she be back soon
(Bob Dylan: Patty's Gone To Laredo)

An allusion made to the following song:

I was rambling through
Through the streets of Laredo
Just another stranger that day
On my way to anywhere
(Patti Page: Streets Of Laredo)

The Dylan song rambles along:

Left Jamaica this morning
On a boat, body blue
(Bob Dylan: Patty's Gone To Laredo)

Referencing song lyrics quoted beneath:

But I'm sad to say I'm on my way
Won't be back for many a day
My heart is down
My head's turning around
I had to leave a girl in Kingston town
(Harry Belafonte: Jamaica Farewell)

On and on, the stream of consciousness flows:

Morning let's take his timber
Up where the eagles fly
(Bob Dylan: Patty's Gone To Laredo)

Bringing to mind the following association:

There she stood in the doorway
I heard the mission bell
And I was thinking to myself
"This could he Heaven, or this could be Hell"
(The Eagles: Hotel California)

Paradoxical diction floats on by:

Then make him tell it never
But she don't cry
(Bob Dylan: Patty's Gone To Laredo

Makes an association with the poem below:

Till the dirges of his hope that melancholy burden bore
Of: "Never - nevermore"
(Edgar Poe: The Raven)

Fragmentation breaks out all over:

And Laurel's playing for money
On your ribbon wide
(Bob Dylan: Patty's Gone To Laredo)

With metonymy from as far away as Cleopatra’s cataclysm:

The strongest poison ever known
Came from Caesar's laurel crown
(William Blake: Auguries Of Innocence)

And so it goes:

Get on his side
It's a doorway
(Bob Dylan: Patty's Gone To Laredo)

The doorway leads to a traditional song verse:

My daddy was a miner
And I'm a miner's son
He'll be with you, fellow workers
Until this battle's won
Which side are you on
(Pete Seeger: Which Side Are You On)

Where there’s a key left to unlock the puzzle:

The door is locked
But the key's inside
(Bob Dylan: Patty's Gone To Laredo)

An allusion to the poetic lyrics beneath:

If the doors of perception were cleansed
Everything would appear as it is - Infinite
For man has closed himself up
(William Blake: The Marriage Of Heaven And Hell)

What’s a striving and starving artist to do?

What would Caesar do?

He crosses the Red River, and Dylaneus does too:

I feel the holy spirit inside
See the light that freedom brings
I believe it's in the reach of 
Every man who lives
Keep as far away as possible
It's darkest 'fore the dawn - oh, Lord
I turned the key, I broke it off
And I crossed the Rubicon
(Bob Dylan: Crossing The Rubicon)

And it’s all over now, baby blue; you’re the one that’s got the key.

 

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Bromberg and Dylan – the missing album, part 4.

Posted on February 13, 2022 by TonyAttwood

by Jochen Markhorst

We are continuing looking at songs that might have made it onto the Dylan / Bromberg album had it ever been completed and released.

11 “Northeast Texas Woman”

“Northeast Texas Woman” is probably best known in Jerry Jeff Walker’s version, for whom it is something of a signature song, but the original by cult legend Willis Alan Ramsey deserves the spotlight. Closing track of his 1972 self-titled debut album, the one with “Muskrat Candlelight”, and the one on which half of Dylan’s elite collaborators support Ramsey (Leon Russel, Carl Radle, Jim Keltner, Russ Kunkel). Bromberg also had the song on his repertoire in the seventies, and a wonderful live recording can be found on Bromberg’s Bandit In A Bathing Suit from 1978 (for obscure reasons renamed “Northeast Texas Women”).

12 “Sail On” 

There are many “Sail Ons”, but we can rule out most of them. It’s very unlikely, in any case, that Bromberg and Dylan would feel inclined to interpret the Commodores hit, for example. Beach Boys idem ditto. The best candidate, especially given the surrounding songs, is Lightnin’ Hopkins’-“Sail On, Little Girl, Sail On”, from one of his rare country blues records (Blues In My Bottle, 1961), when Samuel John “Lightnin'” Hopkins leaves his electric guitar in the case and takes up an acoustic.

13 “Can’t Lose What You Never Had” 

The Allman Brothers have made a successful coup attempt, but it is and remains a Muddy Waters song. Hard to beat. Not even, with all due respect, by Dylan & Bromberg.

  1. World Of Fools 

Been on Bromberg’s set list for decades, and the studio recording on Only Slightly Mad (2013) is the crowning glory. Wonderful sixties vibe. Sounds like it should have been the B-side to Richard Harris’ “MacArthur Park”.

  1. Everybody’s Crying Mercy 

The immortal Mose Allison is rarely seen in Dylan’s oeuvre, and seems to be a soulmate of Bromberg. Any Mose song will do, and this is certainly not a bad choice for a Dylan & Bromberg session – but “Rolling Stone” would have been nicer, of course.

  1. Tennessee Blues 

From the same corner as Ramsey’s “Northeast Texas Woman”: Bobby Charles’ “Tennessee Blues”. DJ Dylan plays his “He’s Got All The Whiskey” on Theme Time Radio Hour (in the bonus broadcast “Whiskey” in 2020), a song that appears on the same self-titled 1972 debut album as the brilliant “Tennessee Blues”. Charles was part of the Woodstock entourage – hence the men from The Band playing along. “Another guy who likes simple was our good friend Bobby Charles. He never got fancy, but he always got his point across,” says the DJ appreciatively.

Dylan’s buddy Doug Sahm recorded the song too, by the way (released on Texas Tornado, 1973), during the sessions to which both Dylan and Bromberg contributed.

17 Summer Wages 

Another old Bromberg song, written by Ian Tyson. With a strong tears in my beer vibe, which Dylan does not feel is beneath him, as we know.

https://youtu.be/Rrkgk7yhgrw

18 Casey Jones 

The Grateful Dead song is a candidate, but given the surrounding songs, the primal version, the nineteenth-century folk song, is more likely. DJ Dylan plays both the Grateful Dead song and the 1940s Jubalaires’, but neither seems a candidate for a Dylan & Bromberg approach. Johnny Cash’s beauty from 1963 is already a better one, but Mississippi John Hurt’s version is the most likely.

19 Morning Blues 

A first association is of course the monument “Good Morning Blues” by Leadbelly. But after “Sail On, Little Girl, Sail On”, another Lightnin’ Hopkins song is more likely. Moreover, the title would then be completely correct.

 

—————–

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:

 

 

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Can’t Escape From You part 1

Posted on February 12, 2022 by TonyAttwood

By Allan Cheskes

Dylan only recorded two songs in 2005. “Tell Ol’ Bill” was one of them and Tony Attwood whose work I admire, puts this song, musically and lyrically, at the pinnacle of Dylan’s prolific song output. Out of esteem for Mr. Attwood, I included some coverage of Tel Ol’ Bill in my Dylan music appreciation course, but I must admit, my heart was not in it.

It was easier for me to get my arms around the second song Dylan recorded in 2005, Can’t Escape From You which Tony is puzzled by when comparing it to Tell Ol Bill. For him, Can’t Escape From You is musically, too simple and the lyrics lack punch and loses interest along the way.

I believe there is an intangible and subjective quality in evaluating music and even the lyrics. From my perspective, this song deserves more attention.

I agree with Margotin and Guesdon in Bob Dylan, All The Songs, that this “is a romantic song, but with a dark message (“All my dreams have gone away”). It is reminiscent of the rhythmic structure of My Prayer, by the Platters:

For me, Can’t Escape From You, is nostalgic.  Since Time Out of Mind, I think Dylan has given up on the old world, or at least has given up the fight to try and change it. He freely draws inspiration from the past. His songs during his classic phase focus less on the future and more on the past, where he can at least draw some comfort, although many times, this comes with painful reminders of love lost and regrettable mistakes.

Through the album, Time Out Mind, I thought Dylan was struggling with his faith in G-d, but at the end of the album, he reached a “eureka” moment with the realization that he can still cling to G-d, not by conventional religion, but simply through music. In his own way, I think that is where Dylan has comfortably settled in.

Let’s chew on the first verse:

“Oh, the evening train is rollin'
All along the homeward way
All my hopes are over the horizon
All my dreams have gone away”

The first utterance is “oh”, which is gratuitous except that it conveys, in my mind, an acceptance or resignation of what is to come

What is coming is “the evening train (which) is rollin’”. The train is just “rollin’”, so it is like A Slow Train Coming, except it is not coming, necessarily, for all of humankind, but coming for DYLAN, personally. (“DYLAN” is the made-up narrator, a character or actor in a role, Dylan adds to each song). “All along the homeward way”, in my mind, triggers, All Along the Watchtower, but again, this is not a message necessarily for all of humankind that G-d is coming for them, but that G-d is coming for DYLAN. With the line, “All my hopes are over the horizon”, one thinks of Beyond the Horizon, which soon follows this song in the upcoming Modern Times album. Just like in the Beyond the Horizon, “over the horizon” likely means beyond life on earth. If “all (his) hopes” are there, then DYLAN is hopeful of an afterlife.

In his current life on earth, there is no future, as “All (his) dreams have gone away”. Again, DYLAN’s focus is no longer on changing the future in this world.

The next verse also gives us something to chew on:

“The hillside darkly shaded
Stars fallin' from above
All the joys of earth have faded
The night's untouched, my love”

With “The hillside darkly shaded”, like the reference in Cold Irons Bound to a muddy hillside, Dylan steps away from the common use in literature of a hillside being a backdrop for blooming flowers and carefree summers in love. The hillside is “shaded” paints a gloomy image. (In Dirt Road Blues, DYLAN is also near the end of his life journey, also “looking at (his) shadow”. A star usually symbolizes, in many cultures, divinity and hope. For example, the Star of Bethlehem. However, a falling star, could metaphorically mean in some cultures, bad luck or that something is ending or even an ascent to heaven.

That is the meaning I derive in “Stars fallin’ from above/ All the joys of earth have faded”. The last line of the second verse, for the first time, references “my love,” and at least allows for some, perhaps little time, left on this earth, as “The night’s untouched”. (Is this the time needed to repair a lost relationship?) At this point, it would not be hard to guess that “my love” is DYLAN’s lost love. (Dylan has a proclivity for the “Lost love” theme during his classic phase of writing songs).

Rolling along, as Dylan would say, to the third verse:

“I'll be here 'til tomorrow
Beneath a shroud of gray
I pretend I'm free of sorrow
My heart is miles away”

“Beneath a shroud”, makes me think of the Jewish custom to bury all Jews in a simple white shroud. DYLAN is not quite buried though, because he is not beneath a white shroud. However, we get the sense that DYLAN is close to being buried. From this verse, we know DYLAN is in despair and he is removed from the world. His “heart is miles away” echoes Million Miles (away) in Time Out of Mind.

In the fourth verse, the train is near:

“The dead bells are ringing
My train is overdue
To your memory I'm clingin'
I can't escape from you”

In Ring Them Bells, the bells are a warning from G-d. “Dead bells” are more like the bells that ring at churches to announce the death of someone. DYLAN’s bells are ringing as his “train is overdue.” The last lines of the verse, suggests DYLAN is suffering from lovesickness, in the memory of a lost relationship.

In the fifth verse, we can understand where Dylan’s head space is at:

“Well, I hear the sound of thunder
Roaring loud and long
Sometimes you got to wonder
God knows I've done no wrong”

“Thunder”, “roaring” and “God” references, again makes me think of Thunder on The Mountain in Dylan’s upcoming album, Modern Times. However, this time, the stern and loud message from G-d is directed at DYLAN personally, even as he seemingly pleads his case that he has done nothing wrong.

In the song, especially beginning in the next verse, I get the feeling that Dylan’s writing might be personal. Is DYLAN, Dylan in this song? I try not to fall into this trap where many people interpret Dylan songs to be personal, about himself and others he intimately knows, much to Dylan’s chagrin. Sometimes though, Dylan has only himself to blame as the writings can be taken as indicative of his personal life. As he is addressing “you” in the song, is DYLAN talking to Dylan in the next and sixth verse:

“Have you wasted all your power
You threw out the Christmas pie
Now you're withering like a flower
You'll play the fool and die”

With all his gained fame and power that comes with it, is Dylan or DYLAN is asking himself if he has wasted it? Throwing “out the Christmas pie” might mean he is no longer celebrating Christmas as Christmas pie is associated with that Christian holiday. Like a flower that is fragile and temporary, now the time is coming to an end.

This last verse is very powerful for me because I connect it to Psalm 49, which traditionally, in Judaism, is recited in mourning, immediately after a loved one’s death. Let’s look at some lines from this Psalm which I gather from the Silverman edition:

“They who rely on their worldly power,/ And boast of their great wealth,/Verily, not one of them can save himself from death/ By offering God a ransom for his life.”

Also from Psalm 49:

“Can man expect to live forever/ And never go down to the grave-/ When he sees that even the wise die, / Just as the fool and the knave do perish;/ And all leave their wealth to others?”

Clearly and humorously, DYLAN doesn’t see himself as wise as “You’ll play the fool and die”. He also realizes that despite his power and fame, he will not take his wealth with him when he dies. When a community of Jews recite this prayer in memory of the dead, one is really reading this prayer for oneself and collectively, to remind us that we all shall die. Reciting the prayer also forms a spiritual bond with our lost personal relationships and our collective past. This latter concept ties directly with the song’s title, Can’t Escape From You.

 

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Peggy Day (1969) part 3: This record tears out your backbone

Posted on February 11, 2022 by TonyAttwood

by Jochen Markhorst

III         This record tears out your backbone

Paris Jackson, Michael’s daughter, is very angry. “I’m so incredibly offended by it, as i’m sure plenty of people are as well, and it honestly makes me want to vomit,” she tweets on Wednesday 11 January 2017. The outburst doesn’t relieve her as yet; moments later, she twitters on: “it angers me to see how obviously intentional it was for them to be this insulting, not just towards my father, but my godmother liz as well.” And nephew Taj Jackson also chips in: “No words could express the blatant disrespect.” The anger has been triggered by, incredibly, the honourable Ralph Fiennes. Specifically, by the makers of the terrific Sky Arts series Urban Myths, who have announced the airing of the episode “Elizabeth, Michael and Marlon”, a light-hearted portrayal of an alleged road-trip taken by Marlon Brando, Elizabeth Taylor and Michael Jackson. The in itself intriguing fact that the King of Pop is played by the white Ralph Fiennes proves unpalatable.

Sky Arts is discouraged by all the fuss, and cancels the episode, sadly. The controversy somewhat overshadows the success of the series. A week after the shitstorm on Twitter, on 19 January 2017, is the broadcast of the first episode, that will turn out to be one of the most successful: “Knockin’ On Dave’s Door”. Which is a “true-ish” staging of the apocryphal story of Dylan visiting Dave Stewart in London in 1987, but ringing the wrong doorbell. The lady who opens the door does not recognise him and says “Dave” has been called away. This Dave is, of course, another Dave altogether. Bob gets a cuppa tea and is allowed to wait for “Dave” in the front room.  The episode is packed with small, witty, well-documented references to Dylan’s biography, and here in the front room the next one follows: Billy Lee Riley, Dylan’s rockabilly hero.

“Dylan” (great role by Eddie Marsan) rummages through the record collection, finds a Billy Lee Riley LP and soon “Red Hot” is blaring through the small working-class house at 145 Crouch Hill. Ange, the lady of the house, enters to check on things.

“This record tears out your backbone and kinda makes you feel grateful that it did all at the same time!” shouts “Dylan” above the music, a beautiful paraphrase of Dylan’s actual words in the MusiCares Speech, 2015:

“So Billy became what is known in the industry – a condescending term, by the way – as a one-hit wonder. But sometimes, just sometimes, once in a while, a one-hit wonder can make a more powerful impact than a recording star who’s got 20 or 30 hits behind him. And Billy’s hit song was called “Red Hot,” and it was red hot. It could blast you out of your skull and make you feel happy about it. Change your life. He did it with power and style and grace.”

Ange can also appreciate Billy Lee. Still: “It’s a great album, yes, but I prefer No Name Girl.” Bob looks at Ange for a moment, then turns off “Red Hot”, closes his eyes and sings “The girl I got ain’t got no name.” Amused, Ange sings along, which takes us to the bridge of “Peggy Day”:

The girl I love ain't got no name
But I love her just the same
She's a little peculiar but it ain't no sin
She never know where she going but know were she's been

… and Dylan sighs in conclusion: “Oh man, he was a real deal.”

The bridge of “Peggy Day” offers, at least in terms of content, the only peculiar verse of the song;

Well, you know that even before I learned her name
You know I loved her just the same
An’ I tell ’em all, wherever I may go
Just so they’ll know, that she’s my little lady
And I love her so

… insinuating that the name Peggy Day is so overwhelming that you inevitably fall in love with its bearer – but as it so happens, Peggy is lovely to such an inconceivable extent that I fell in love with her even before I learned her name. Peculiar. Nameless ladies are often enough sung about, and usually it is considered a factor that contributes to the attractiveness of the lady. Adding to her mysteriousness, something like that. The best known is probably “The French Girl” by Ian & Sylvia, a song for which Dylan has an abiding fascination. He played it in ’67 in the Basement, rehearsed it in 1987 with the Grateful Dead (but eventually cut it from the setlist), the French girl appears in “Stuck Inside Of Mobile”, and twenty years later again in “Dark Eyes”. And she never gets a name, in line with Ian Tyson’s primal French Girl;

So you may find above the border
A girl with silver rings, I never knew her name
You're bound to lose, she's too much for you
She'll leave you lost one rainy morn, you won't be the same

A beautiful, melancholic song, by the way, which somehow Dylan just can’t get hold of. The unforgettable Gene Clark does a better job – especially on the stereo remix of 1991, from which the hideous backing vocals from the mono original of 1967 have fortunately been radically cut out.

Anyway, there are many ladies who, like their male counterpart tall dark stranger, apparently become all the more exciting when we don’t know her name. “East Virginia Blues”, the song Dylan will play with Earl Scruggs in May 1970 (There I met the fairest maiden and her name I did not know), The Stones’ “Silver Train”, Thin Lizzy’s “Cowboy Song”… but the superlative is, obviously, Steve Winwood’s indestructible masterpiece for Traffic, “No Face, No Name, No Number” (1967);

 Dylan himself has also been toying around with that sought-after mystery of anonymity before, in “Outlaw Blues” (1965);

I got a woman in Jackson,
I ain't gonna say her name
She's a brown-skin woman,
But I love her just the same

… where it is of course striking that Dylan uses an identical line in “Peggy Day” to arrive at the rhyme; “I loved her just the same” versus “I love her just the same”. It reinforces the impression that the illogic of the bridge is due to uninspired rhyming, cutting and pasting by an improvising Dylan. Indeed, in both takes, the official one from Nashville Skyline and the first take found on CD1 of Travelin’ Thru: The Bootleg Series Vol. 15 1967-1969 (2019), we hear Dylan stumble and hesitate a bit, and both versions deviate from the published lyrics in the same place;

Well you know ever even before I learned her name

… Dylan sings on Nashville Skyline. And in that first take on Travelin’ Thru:

Well you know ever since before I learned her name

Clumsy. And just as clumsy, in fact, as rhyming with Billy Lee Riley’s “I loved her just the same” – a phrase used only to express “but still”. Like in Deep Purple’s “Hush” (She broke my heart but I love her just the same), in Conway Twitty’s “Hey Miss Ruby” (She don’t love me but I love her just the same), in The Everly Brothers’ heck of a melodrama “Rockin’ Alone” (The ones who forgot her she loves just the same), and in Dylan’s own “Outlaw Blues”, not least – just to name a few. Always songs, anyway, where the “I love her just the same” phrasing communicates a perfectly logical “yet”-message. More coherent than this weird variation in “Peggy Day”, the variation that seems to want to express in a failed way that it was love at first sight, that Peggy had already stolen my heart before I got to know her.

Yeah well, Dylan seems to think, while stumbling over his words.  It’s just an album filler. I’ll never play it again anyhow. But just to be sure, he steers back to safe, uncomplicated country clichés to complete the bridge.  “My little lady” from Jimmie Rodgers’ “My Rough And Rowdy Ways”, “I love her so” from thousands of songs, a snippet of Stanley Brothers (wherever I may go from “Riding That Midnight Train”)… no, this one won’t earn him a Nobel Prize. But what the heck.

To be continued. Next up: Peggy Day part 4

—————–

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:

 

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Bob Dylan And Cindy Walker

Posted on February 10, 2022 by TonyAttwood

by Larry Fyffe

Along with classics of literature, singer/songwriter/musician Bob Dylan draws from the deep well of country music:

For I never knew the art of making love
Though my heart aches with love for you
Afraid and shy, I let my chance go by
The chance that you might have loved me too
(Cindy Walker: You Don't Know Me)

In his rendition beneath, the lyrics are manned-up a bit:

For I never knew the art of making love
For my heart it burns for you
Alone and shy, I let my chance go by
The chance that you would love me too
(Bob Dylan: You Don't Know Me ~ C. Walker)

https://youtu.be/GXxNPe04aCY

Later on, the song gets souped up; flipped over in modern times:

I've been sitting down studying in the art of love
I think it will fit me like a glove
I want some real good woman to do just what I say
Everybody got to wonder what's the matter with this
cruel world today

(Bob Dylan: Thunder On The Mountain

The romantic feeling of old turns cold:

Don’t talk to me about men

Just fill up my glass again
I want to forget every man that I met
And the trouble that they've got me in
Don't mention love to me
I know the game from A to Zee
I'll carry the torch until there's just a scorch
In the place where my heart ought to be
(Cindy Walker: Don't Talk To Me About Men)

Echoed in the cynical lyrics below:

When a man he serves the Lord
It makes his life worthwhile
It don't matter 'bout his position
Don't matter 'bout his lifestyle
Talk about perfection
I ain't never seen none
And there ain't no man that's righteous
No not one
(Bob Dylan: Ain't No Man Righteous, No Not One)

That’s just the way reality is; not the way it’s transcendentally depicted to be:

Across the way they call me
And I'm lonesome, and so blue
For the blue Canadian Rockies
And the one I love so true
(Cindy Walker: The Blue Canadian Rockies)

Time marches on; it’s time to get real.

Sentimentalism be damned.

So says the narrator in the following song lyrics

And the sun is coming up over the Rockies
Now I know she ain't you, but she's here
And she's got that dark rhythm in her soul
But I'm too far over the edge
And I ain't in the mood anymore
To remember the times when I was your only man
(Bob Dylan: Brownsville Girl ~ Dylan/Shepard)

———————–

Untold Dylan was created in 2008 and is currently published once or twice a day.  Details of some of our series are given at the top of the page and in the Recent Posts list, which appears both on the right side of the page and at the very foot of the page (helpful if you are reading on a phone).  Some of our past articles which form part of a series are also included on the home page.

Articles are written by a variety of volunteers and you can read more about them here    If you would like to write for Untold Dylan, do email with your idea or article to Tony@schools.co.uk.  Our readership is rather large (many thanks to Rolling Stone for help in that regard). Details of some of our past articles are also included on the home page.

We also have a Facebook site with over 14,000 members.

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Never Ending Tour, 2003, Part 5 Can there be a perfect performance?

Posted on February 10, 2022 by TonyAttwood

So far in 2003….

By Mike Johnson (Kiwipoet)

The more we dig into 2003, the fifteenth year of the NET, the more treasures we unearth. You might think that, given the last four posts have covered some fifty-two performances from that year, we would have run out of material, but that’s not so. I have enough interesting material for another two posts, and I’m nowhere near the bottom of the barrel. It’s a hard year to leave behind, but I hope that by now you can understand why this is one of my favourite years of the NET. (Other favourite years are 1989, 1995 and 2000.)

I’ve no particular logic or theme for this post, so I’m just going to kick off with a couple of performances that caught my attention and follow my nose from there.

That ever-reliable rocker ‘Highway 61 Revisited’ is guaranteed to pump up the energy. Dylan’s on the piano but you don’t hear much of it, it is very much about arse-kicking guitar work, and you get plenty of it here (23rd August Niagara Falls). This song has never lost its wild, anarchic edge; the lyrics come hurling at you out of a fast-paced whirl of sound. I’m glad Dylan’s never tried to tame this song, in which we find all the sinister madness of the modern world.

Rovin' gambler, he was very bored
Tryin' to create a next world war
He found a promoter who nearly fell off the floor
"I never did engage in this kind of thing before
But yeah, I think it can be very easily done"

Dylan mounts a scathing attack on the mindless materialism of the age with vicious satirical humour:

Mack the Finger said to Louie the King
"I got forty red, white and blue shoe strings
And a thousand telephones that don't ring
Do you know where I can get rid of these things?"

Highway 61 Revisited (A)

However you might prefer this version from Berlin (20th Oct). Even though the Niagara Falls recording is sharper, Dylan’s Berlin vocal might have the edge, and the piano is a little more evident. Anyway, it’s fun trying to figure out which is the best.

Highway 61 Revisited (B)

If we want to keep up the pace, we can’t do better than drop into Hammersmith (24th November) for a catchy performance of ‘Tough Mama’ which is a wonderful tribute to a woman. It’s worth keeping in mind that while Dylan wrote his share of ‘attack’ songs, in which a woman comes under fire (‘Rolling Stone,’ ‘Just Like a Woman,’ ‘Positively 4th Street’) he has also written some tender tribute songs in praise of a woman (‘Shelter from the Storm,’ ‘Sara,’ and ‘Girl from the North Country’).

‘Tough Mamma’ has its own tough tenderness. A song full of admiration and praise.

Ashes in the furnace, dust on the rise,
You came through it all the way
flyin' through the skies.
Dark beauty
With that long night's journey in your eyes.

Tough Mama

While in Hammersmith, let’s stay for ‘The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll,’ a song straight out of Dylan’s early protest period when he was still writing topical protest songs, a song that earns huge praise from Christopher Ricks in his Dylan’s Visions of Sin. Ricks’ argument is that Dylan’s performance of the song on the album (Times They Are A-Changing) reaches a perfection that could never be matched in later performances.

‘Every song, by definition, is realized only in performance. True. A more elusive matter is whether every song is suited to re-performance…What (for me) is gained in a particular re-performing of this particular song, has always fallen short of what had to be sacrificed. Any performance, like any translation, necessitates sacrifice…Does it not make sense then to believe, or to argue, that Dylan’s realizing of Hattie Carroll was perfect, a perfect song perfectly rendered once and for all.’ (Ricks, p 15)

Ricks sees performances of the song as ‘translations’ from the perfect original found on the album. It is therefore unlikely that Ricks would enjoy this 2003 performance of the song, which has been completely rearranged for the piano. In the spirit of Ricks we have to ask if the piano riff, a little on the dumpty-dum side, that sets the tempo, offers the best structure for the lyrics. Dylan’s half-spoken, hushed performance maybe a little too emphatic, a little rushed perhaps? Something less than perfection?

(On the other hand, of course, we could say that the album version is just another performance in a string of nearly 300 performances to date, and that perfection is an illusion, like my constant discovery of ‘best ever’ performances of certain songs…)

Hattie Carroll

It seems natural to move from ‘Hattie Carroll’ to ‘Hard Rain.’ Both are protest songs, but ‘Hard Rain’ has a much wider range. Some of the imagery is very direct, ‘I saw guns and sharp swords in the hands of young children,’ and some images are elusive, ‘I saw a white ladder all covered in water,’ but all together they make up the most powerfully prophetic song ever written.

This recording comes from the London concert (25th Nov). Again, those dark bluesy chords on the piano swing the song along. Dylan uses the same singing style as he does for ‘Hattie Carroll’, starting off half talking, a little breathless, hushed and intimate, slowly building up as the song progresses. When we get to the last verse, note how Dylan uses upsinging and downsinging, in contrast, to raise the dramatic tension. A wonderful vocal climax.

Hard Rain

Let’s stay in the sixties for the next one, ‘Tombstone Blues’, another song which, like ‘Highway 61 Revisited’, has a wild, anarchic edge and is best played fast, the  surreal images flashing by almost before you can catch them. When, in Shadow Kingdom (2021),Dylan sang the song in a slow, solemn, measured, sepulchral voice, as if it were a classical composition, the effect was quite dissonant. I might ask Professor Ricks, is this the way the song should sound? Surely it should sound more like this, driven by fast vamping on the piano, back of the throat vocals, letting it rip.

Tombstone Blues

Here he uses it to kick off the Niagara Falls concert.

‘Don’t Think Twice’ is a song Dylan has played both fast and slow, with some peppy performances back in 1964, and more mournful performances in the 90’s.

As I’ve suggested before, the instruction to ‘don’t think twice’ is really an invitation to do so, and the song works the edge of this paradox. Interestingly here (sorry, date unknown) Dylan leaves the piano and returns to the guitar for this fine mid-tempo performance. Again we face the issue of Dylan’s upsinging, which many of his fans find infuriating. I can hear, in these raised notes, origins of Dylan’s later crooning, the octave jumping style he’ll need to handle Frank Sinatra songs. I also note as before that judiciously used upsinging can contrast with downsinging, balance the vocal and the emotion of the song. I think it works okay here, he’s in such good voice, but it is noticeable.

Don’t Think Twice

The issue rises again in this Red Bluff performance of ‘One Too Many Mornings,’ a song I often like to pair with ‘Don’t Think Twice’ as they both seem to come from the same place, from the same basket.  If you think twice you might end up feeling the way Dylan does in this song. Again, he keeps off the piano and, in doing so, makes these performances of his acoustic material sound more like the Dylan of old, the Dylan his audience is nostalgic for, one kid and his guitar against the world… but the upsinging…?

One too many mornings

When you boil it down, even though it’s steeped in regret, ‘One Too Many Mornings’ is a love song. Although he is accused of it, Dylan never lost the power to write love songs. ‘I’ve Made Up My Mind,’ from Rough and Rowdy Ways is an exquisite love song, as is ‘To Make You Feel My Love’ from Time Out of Mind (1997).

Adele’s perfect performance of this song has thrown Dylan’s own performances into the shadow, but, if I may say so, perhaps Adele’s performance is a little too perfect, a little too smooth. This performance from Niagara Falls (23rd August) is certainly not smooth, but Dylan’s gentle vamping on the piano suits the song and the era it evokes better than guitars do. A rare and unexpected harp break at the end sounds sad and frail. And that much-reviled upsinging… it’s as if he were trying to pull the emotion of the song up out of the mire of that very same sadness.

To make you feel my love

‘Every Grain of Sand’ could be read as a love song, to that invisible presence that animates it.

I hear the ancient footsteps like the motion of the sea
Sometimes I turn, there’s someone there, at times it’s only me

This song sounds best slow and stately, with a melancholy undertone. It well suits the big, rich piano chords Dylan puts behind it. I’ve got two offerings of this song. The first is from Berlin and, although the sound is a little muted, it’s a fine performance, with a rare harp break to introduce it.

 Every Grain of Sand (A)

The second one, from Paris (13th Nov), is more clearly recorded. Another powerful performance, with the harp break at the end. This hushed, intimate, half-talking  epitomizes the best of Dylan’s 2003 vocal style. A great place to end this post.

Every Grain of Sand (B)

Until next time.

Kia Ora

———————–

Untold Dylan was created in 2008 and is currently published once or twice a day.  Details of some of our series are given at the top of the page and in the Recent Posts list, which appears both on the right side of the page and at the very foot of the page (helpful if you are reading on a phone).  Some of our past articles which form part of a series are also included on the home page.

Articles are written by a variety of volunteers and you can read more about them here    If you would like to write for Untold Dylan, do email with your idea or article to Tony@schools.co.uk.  Our readership is rather large (many thanks to Rolling Stone for help in that regard). Details of some of our past articles are also included on the home page.

We also have a Facebook site with over 14,000 members.

 

 

 

 

 

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The lost Dylan Bromberg album part 3. The source material.

Posted on February 9, 2022 by TonyAttwood

By Tony Attwood with data provided by Jochen Markhorst and Aaron Galbraith

Note, due to the publisher’s incompetence the recording of “Rock me Baby” was omitted originally. It has now been added.  Sorry about that.

In the earlier episodes of this little series (above) we looked at three recordings that were possibly part of a new album.   There are a number of articles on the internet about the songs that were recorded, and details of the musicians, but there is no universal agreement as to what was what, and for the most part the articles are statements of fact without any backup evidence.  And more to the point, no recordings.

So it is all a spot of guesswork.   And in that mode, we’re offering some recordings of tracks that might or might not have been part of the sessions.  Just to complete the album, as it were.

Mobile Line 

Jochen notes, “A song that is close to Dylan’s heart anyway, of course. I have a couple of versions. I think Jim Kweskin is closest to a Bromberg/Dylan approach. But Willie Dixon and John Sebastian are nice too, of course.”

Here’s John Sebastian

It certainly sounds like a song that Dylan would engage with and enjoy.

Just Because You Didn’t Answer 

Jochen: “Was recorded by Bromberg, and also by the writer himself, Thom Bishop (Bromberg regularly played along in the Tom Bishop Band). Great song, by the way.”

Tony: This is interesting for me, because I can’t quite imagine what Bob would have done with this, except for sing it straight.  It’s the chorus I can’t quite place with Bob’s voice and his style of arrangements.  But that’s probably my lack of musical imagination.

Would You Lay With Me 

Jochen: Dylan probably had the original by David Allen Coe or the Willie Nelson version in his head, but I like Johnny Cash, who put the song on Solitary Man (American Recordings part III) in 2000.

Tony: I agree Bob would have been influenced by the Johnny Cash version, but I find the David Allen Coe version a much more approachable version, but that’s just me.

Annie’s Going To Sing Her Song 

And here of course we have a Dylan recording.

Tony: This is just an early run through and I suspect Bob would have wanted to make a few changes if he was going to release it formally.  But if you listen from about 1 minute 33 onward there is a much greater certainty of how the whole performance should work.  Another couple of run-throughs and I think they would have had a really superb version of this.

And to be clear I am not trying to suggest I have a superior musical knowledge to Bob – the speed at which he can often get to the finished version is amazing.  A couple of run-throughs would be a very little time to get to the finished version.

Jugband Song 

This is a David Bromberg song.  And here he is… and oh yes I can hear Dylan doing this…

Rock Me Baby 

Jochen: This was also on Bromberg’s repertoire. I suspect that Dylan has B.B. King’s under his skin. Or Lightnin’ Hopkins. Or Jimi Hendrix.

Tony: BB King will do for me.

Send Me To The ‘lectric Chair 

Jochen: Another Bromberg favourite. Dylan appreciates the original by Bessie Smith, I suppose. I myself am fond of Hugh Laurie’s version.

Tony: The Bessie Smith version was the original…

But my vote is with Jochen with Hugh Laurie and Jean McClain

Gotta Do My Time (Doin’ My Time) 

Jochen: On number 9 is “Gotta Do My Time”, which must be “Doin’ My Time”. Has been under Dylan’s skin since Johnny Cash’s first LP. I actually like every version. Jeff Johnson, Flatt and Scruggs, Marty Stuart… indestructible song. Makes me curious to hear what Dylan and Bromberg make of it.

Tony: All the way through I am trying to imagine Dylan doing the songs.  I could do it to a degree at the start, but this is all too overwhelming.  I’ll need to go back and take it more slowly.  Which is what makes these joint writing ventures rather fun.  I do enjoy trying to write and listen at the same time, but the real pleasure comes later in the day, just listening.

Jochen: As a bonus, I added Bromberg’s “It Takes A Lot To Laugh, It Takes A Train To Cry”. Boy, what a tasteful, elegant guitar player that guy is.

Tony: Dylan has always innovated so having all the tracks by not by Dylan, and then adding Bromberg covering Bob as the last item, (or if the unimaginative lunatic advertising department got hold of it and Bob wasn’t looking, “The bonus track”) would be an ideal ending to the album.

But it is far more than just a last track.  This is a total reimagining of the song – exactly the sort of thing I’ve been looking for in my little “Dylan Cover a Day” series.   This is staggering, gorgeous, imaginative, exquisite… and just carry on using words of that type because it is all of those things and then some.

This is the music to put on very last thing at night, when all is quiet, and it’s been an ok day, no unexpected bills have arrived, the family are doing all right, the heating is still working, the car will probably start in the morning, and there is some hope out there that tomorrow could be an ok day, but first, one just has to have a little sleep.

And so the album ends.

But just watch out if you have turned up the volume – the song ends and drops straight into another Bromberg video.  Really worth hearing maybe another time, but the volume is utterly different.  And besides, it spoils the effect of having this version as the last track.

Very many thanks to Jochen and Aaron.  I’ve written the piece above, but all the credit should go to them for coming up with the idea and finding the tracks.

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Bob Dylan released and unreleased: Song and Dance Man

Posted on February 9, 2022 by TonyAttwood

By Aaron Galbraith (in the USA) and Tony Attwood (in the UK).

Aaron: Bob once described himself as a song and dance man. I thought I’d take that literally this time!

So, first up the Songs!

Only A Pawn in their Game – Bob performed the song at the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom before Martin Luther Kings famous “I have a dream speech”.

“I looked up from the podium and I thought to myself, ‘I’ve never seen such a large crowd.’ I was up close when King was giving that speech. To this day, it still affects me in a profound way.”

Tony: I love the way Bob, at this young age, can just get on up on this extraordinary occasion and go straight into the song, without any preparation, no comment, no sign of nerves, straight in.   This is really a most extraordinary film from every angle – the occasion, the importance of the event, the fact that it is the start of Dylan’s career.

Dylan in fact always has had the ability to appear without any nerves and deliver.  It is amazing from every angle, whichever way you look and listen.  I find it utterly moving.

Aaron:  Mr Tambourine Man – Bob performed the song in 1964 at the Newport Folk Festival. Luckily it was captured on film and included as part of the documentary The Other Side Of The Mirror.

Tony: A nice bit of fun with “Where is Bob” and the microphone man who didn’t realise Bob is only 5 feet 6 inches tall, so the mics have to be lowered a bit.

But more seriously, the comment above (and you’ll know if you’ve been following the series, Aaron delivers the clips and I just write up my odd notes as I listen and watch – I knew that training as a touch typist would come in useful one day) about Bob having no nerves in terms of performance is so apparent.

Indeed I suppose it is utterly obvious: no one who suffered from nerves would create the Never Ending Tour.  Performing is, I guess, what motivates and energises Bob Dylan – rather an obvious thing to say but it only just occurred to me.

I do enjoy these early performances with a respectful audience.  If you listen to the performances that Michael covers in the “Never Ending Tour” series you’ll realise how noisy the crowd can be at a Dylan show.  As others have commented before me many times, “Why do people go to a Dylan concert and talk all the way through it?” and apart from making very personal comments about their psychological problems, I have no idea.

So truly good to see an audience that knows how to listen.

Aaron: And now for the Dance!

I found this recently and thought it might be right up Tony’s street! I’m really looking forward to reading his thoughts on this!!

In 1978 Dylan had a sizable UK hit single on his hands with Baby Stop Crying (#13). This meant an appearance on “Top Of The Pops” was on offer. Unfortunately, Bob was not available to appear. Those of us about at this time know what that meant…that’s right…Legs & Co.!!

Over to you Tony!

Tony:  Before digitisation came along TV stations were licenced by the government in the UK.  Initially with the government funded BBC as the monopoly supplier and then with the one licensed commercial channel ITV.   Which meant that we got a very limited amount of pop and rock music on TV (and indeed radio) in the country – the one main pop TV programme being Top of the Pops where performers mimed their current hit to the record.

However not every artist was available, and so each week on song was danced to by the resident dance company.

Now I am going to go on a bit of a meander talking about dance, which I hope you’ll stay with (but I thought I would warn you about, since this doesn’t have anything to do with Dylan, but does explain why Aaron picked up on this(.

I should explain, (in case you haven’t caught up on the issue), that besides running this blog I work professionally as a writer, which means sitting at my desk through the day writing away at the computer.  And since this has been my life for many years, I long ago realised that if I was going to avoid complete atrophy of all muscles and a significant increase in my waist size, I would need to keep up with what had been my hobby in my youth: dancing  Not of the type we see here, but what is known in England (and maybe elsewhere) modern jive.   Which means that it has many more variations than 1950s jive, and a much more inventive part for the lead (usually but not always, the man) and is much more practical a dance for older people.  (And I mean older).

Fortunately, in England, we have a very large number of jive clubs and I tend to dance for two or three hours maybe four or five evenings a week.  I was in south Birmingham last night, and will in be the small East Midlands town of Melton Mowbray tonight, dancing at a modern jive club.  And where there is a modern dance show (which is of course quite different from modern jive) on somewhere, I do go and watch.  So that’s the explanation.

Anyway, one of my thoughts on what we have here, is that it is an arrangement that is written more to show off what the dancers can do, rather than anything that fits with the concept of the music.  And I don’t mean that the dancers should describe in movement what the lyrics are saying (although that does happen here when Dylan sings “go down to the river babe” and the ladies in blue come on doing swimming motions and I really find that a bit naff).

But since I am here writing, and it is just possible that you are still there reading, I would take an opportunity to say something about dance, because it has been an absolute lifesaver for me (literally), always knowing that if things were not working out in my personal affairs, or at work or whatever, I could always go out that evening and lose myself in dance.  And lose myself is what I mean: from the moment of the first dance I am taken into another world.  (And it is lot better for one’s health than going to a bar for a drink).

I should also add that in modern jive clubs in the UK the tradition is that people change partners throughout the evening – last night I guess I danced with about 20 different ladies; although tonight it will only be one, but that’s a different issue, which delicacy forbids me to cover here.

Of course, most of my friends are not dancers, and many of them know that I was a musician and then became a writer, and that now I dance for enjoyment.  So occasionally the situation has arisen in which with friends at a party we’ve chatted about such things.  If I talk about being a musician the common answer is “I always wish my mother had made me keep on practising the piano when I was young”.   With writing it is “I always thought I could write a book”.   But with dance it is “I can’t do that: two left feet”.

Yet dance is so much much easier to learn and enjoy in the company of others than other art forms.  I’ve made so many friends through dance, it keeps one fit, and which gives everyone who does it a real buzz. Better still modern jive dance is not that hard to learn; certainly, you can have more fun more quickly with dance than you can with being a writer (very solitary) or a musician (hours and hours and hours of practising, and if with a band, arguing.)

So just from my own perspective, if you ever feel a bit lonely, or in need of a way of keeping fit that is actually enjoyable and not tedious, you could try modern jive.

All of which has nothing to do with Dylan, and I’ll hope you’ll excuse that, but it’s not very often I meander quite so much off-topic.   Thanks for the opportunity Aaron.

Dylan released and unreleased: the series

 

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A Dylan cover a Day: I pity the poor immigrant and all the fun of the fair

Posted on February 8, 2022 by TonyAttwood

By Tony Attwood

A list of past episodes from this series is given at the end.

I must admit to being ready to skip over this particular song in this series of articles because I simply couldn’t imagine what one could do to the work by way of variation, without destroying the integrity of the lyrics.  And if you going to read this little piece all the way through may I ask you to recall that opening comment when you get to the end.

Certainly, listening to a multiplicity of covers today, I think most of the artists who have taken the project and whose recordings are noted below, have thought about that a lot too.

And with this collection I am stunned by what some of them have done.  After all the melody is very distinctive, the lyrics demand the slow plodding tune (to do anything else turns the whole song into nonsense) but even so hearing what a few artists have done with really valiant attempts to deliver the song in a different way is worthwhile.  And that’s before considering a band that has deliberately turned it all upside down.

In fact, to my surprise, there is a surprisingly large number of such covers which do actually try and rework the piece in a new way, either while or without retaining the message of the lyrics.  In fact doing anything meaningful with this song turns out to be a very difficult task, yet some do, and deliver a result far beyond anything I could imagine.

Interesting that the video above looks like one that might be set up by the amateur performers who get themselves on google page one by creating endless videos of themselves playing Dylan tracks.

But no, give the man time. It’s the video that is misleading – unless you know this band of highly talented multi-instrumentalists.   And it is the accompaniment that really makes this recording – not that the double-tracked vocalist doesn’t do an excellent job, it is just the inventiveness behind him that really makes this version happen.

They take the plodding nature of the song to its ultimate and contrast that with the choral effects.  One of those recordings I am not sure I will ever play again, but will remember for a long old time.

Valdemar featuring Ulf Dageby & Totta put this recording on their wonderfully named album “Not Dark Yet In Gothenburg”, and I think it is worth mentioning them just for that name.   The slowness is beguiling at first, but ultimately I’m left thinking, “OK I’ve got what you are doing… but can you do something else now?  They are on the way to that point, but somehow didn’t quite turn the final page.

If you have found yourself reading a variety of my ramblings on this site, you’ll know that Thea Gilmore’s reworking of the entire Dylan album contains (in my view) one of the greatest reworking of a Dylan song ever (Drifter’s Escape).  And the opening chord here is exactly the same as on that extraordinary cover.  She must have known that Escape was the absolute highlight of the album.

The plodding nature of the song is kept, but is made fully acceptable and indeed entertaining by what the band does, and of course by the beauty of the singer’s voice and expression.   Somehow without me noticing how she removes then removes that plodding nature of the song – and that despite the percussion giving us a reminder of the beat throughout.  I think it is once again that extraordinary lead guitar performance.  I would urge you to listen all the way through – if for nothing else than to catch the instrumental verse, and what Thea does after it.  To say it is “very moving” is to underplay it far too much, but I’m not sure what else to say.

It’s four and three-quarter minutes long – do listen all the way through if you can.

OK after that I had to find something completely different.  What troubles me here is the lead guitar in between each vocal line.  I really wonder if the performer quite knew what he was doing.   I guess so, in which case I wonder what the other instrumentalists thought of it all.

For me it is a perfect example of a producer’s idea (“can’t we have a bit of guitar in the background to keep it going?”) which should have been rejected but never was.  (These producers can be wretched fellows if left to  their own devices!)

Last one for today and it is included because of the way the musicians extend every bar and every line.  For the first couple of bars it feels like it isn’t going to work at all, and then the percussion comes in and yes, and for a moment I wonder, but then quite remarkably it does work – and how!  It turns into a song with extended vocal lines but a really fund bouncy instrumentation.

Of course it only works if you don’t listen to the lyrics, if you do you’ll probably think, “what does this music have to do with

That man whom with his fingers cheats
And who lies with every breath
Who passionately hates his life
And likewise, fears his death

But then, if you can, just think of those lyrics when listening to the instrumental break.  It is an absolute scream, and if I were in a band now I think I’d be saying, “hey let’s do this song in this way”.   Except that I am not too sure the audience would quite get it.  But still, I think it would be a hell of a laugh for the musicians.

Oh and just listen to the way it ends.  What a hoot (when one remembers the lyrics).  All the fun of the fair indeed.  Who cares about the lyrics!

———————–

Untold Dylan was created in 2008 and is currently published twice a day –  sometimes more, sometimes less.  Details of some of our series are given at the top of the page and in the Recent Posts list, which appears both on the right side of the page and at the very foot of the page (helpful if you are reading on a phone).  Some of our past articles which form part of a series are also included on the home page.

Articles are written by a variety of volunteers and you can read more about them here    If you would like to write for Untold Dylan, do email with your idea or article to Tony@schools.co.uk.  Our readership is rather large (many thanks to Rolling Stone for help in that regard). Details of some of our past articles are also included on the home page.

We also have a Facebook site with over 14,000 members.

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Peggy Day (1969) part 2 : A benevolent appearance

Posted on February 7, 2022 by TonyAttwood

by Jochen Markhorst

II          A benevolent appearance

The Father of a Murderer is the last book the successful German author Alfred Andersch (1914-1980) completed, just before his death. It is a short, autobiographical story (96 pages) that masterfully recounts the last lesson of Andersch’s alter ego Franz Kien at the Wittelsbacher Gymnasium in Munich.

In May 1928, the start of a Greek class is startled by the entry of “the Rex”, rector Himmler, who comes to “inspect” the class. Himmler, indeed the father of Heinrich Himmler, is a massive, terrifying presence who soon takes over the class. His secret agenda becomes clear halfway through the lesson; not so much class inspection, as clean-up. And one of the victims is the poorly performing Franz. Andersch knows how compellingly to evoke the oppression that descends on the pupils – they know that Himmler will soon call someone to the blackboard to be gutted in front of the entire class. And Himmler knows that they know – and plays with the rising fear like a cat with its mouse.

When Franz is finally called up, Himmler tells him to write down the sentence “It is deserving to praise Franz Kien” in Greek on the blackboard. Franz, a lazy and uninterested pupil comes, of course, to nothing. Himmler must help him with every letter.

“You,” judges the Rex after ten torturous minutes, “you will not qualify for the Upper Secondary.”

Franz shrugs his shoulders.

“The good thing about that is that he will then stop examining me and call someone else to the blackboard. If I’m going to fail anyway, he doesn’t need to examine me anymore.

“It is not deserving to praise Franz Kien,” said the Rex.

Cheap, thought Franz, this had to come. Only because he can invert the sentence and throw back at me he picked it out in the first place.”

It did in fact more or less play out like this with Alfred Andersch. Andersch really was a pupil at that Wittelsbacher Gymnasium as a fourteen-year-old boy and was actually expelled from school by Himmler’s father, Joseph Gebhard Himmler. But Alfred/Franz is lazy, not stupid. He is a keen observer, sees through character flaws in both his teacher and Himmler, and thinks quickly. Like he does here: “Cheap. Only because he can invert the sentence and throwback at me he picked it out in the first place.”

Franz Kien would undoubtedly think exactly the same if he heard the second verse of “Peggy Day”:

Peggy night makes my future look so bright
Man, that girl is out of sight
Love to spend the day with Peggy night

… the reversal from love to spend the night with Peggy Day to love to spend the day with Peggy night is, after all, as corny as you can get. Well, cheap even. “Only because he can invert the name he picked it out in the first place.”

Although it could also be a by-catch; in choosing the name for his protagonist, Dylan seems to be driven by the ambition to be as kitschy as possible. And then he comes up with a rather unimaginative combination of Doris Day and Peggy Lee, something like that. Not unfathomable; Peggy Lee is a 40s/50s icon anyway, having just returned to the spotlight with a Grammy for “Is That All There Is?” (1969), and the star of Doris Day, that other 40s/50s icon, is suddenly shining again thanks to the successful television series The Doris Day Show.

As in the opening couplet, however, the easy-going lyricist still adds some irony. Just as Dylan inserted the anachronistic “by golly” before this, he now chooses the equally alienating “out of sight”. In 1969, this is a rather fresh, hip metaphor to express something like “awesome”, ill-suited to the conservative Peggy Lee/Doris Day cut of the surrounding lines. After all, up to and including the 1950s, “out of sight” literally meant “too far to be seen, not visible”. But presumably only since 1963, since James Brown’s “Out Of Sight” (You’re more than alright / You know you’re out of sight) has it been used to describe the physical attractiveness of a lady or awesomeness in general.

Stevie Wonder then takes it outside soul circles in 1965 with the mega hit “Uptight” (Baby, everything is all right, uptight, out of sight). Admittedly, at first hearing a little awkward and unintentionally ironic when sung by the blind Stevie Wonder (who also sings “I’m the apple of my girl’s eye” a little further on), but he did not write this part of the lyrics himself. Stevie had the riff, the music and the opening words “everything is all right, uptight”, Sylvia Moy completed the lyrics.

And the Easybeats eventually spread the new, hip metaphor all over the planet with their 1967 world hit, “Friday On My Mind”;

Gonna have fun in the city
Be with my girl, she's so pretty
She looks fine tonight
She is out of sight to me

Alienating in a very conservative country-shuffle like “Peggy Day” pretends to be, but on the other hand: Dylan also seems to be aiming for a cringe-factor, for the awkwardness that the adolescent experiences when his mother uses the wrong abbreviations in her apps and his father starts replying with memes. And Dylan succeeds, too; first the stale “by golly”, and now the hip, youthful “Man, that girl is out of sight”… a harmless dork, you’d think. But then again, so does the old Himmler appear;

“There was something sparkling, lively and now benevolent, apparently warmly affectionate in the brightly reddened face under smooth white hair, but Franz immediately had the impression that the Rex, although he could give himself a benevolent appearance, was not harmless; his friendliness was certainly not to be trusted, not even now, when he looked, jovially and portly, at the pupils sitting in three double rows in front of him.”

Franz has a keen eye. And we also know by now, since Shadow Kingdom in 2021, what horrors Dylan hid under “To Be Alone With You”, under another seemingly harmless ditty on Nashville Skyline. Who knows what will happen when Dylan reanimates “Peggy Day”.

“His tone was no longer affable. The father of the school, looking benignly after one of his classes – that was now definitely over; up there, behind the desk as if on a perch, now sat a hunter.”

——————-

To be continued. Next up: Peggy Day part 3

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:

 

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The Bromberg sessions part 2

Posted on February 6, 2022 by TonyAttwood

By Tony Attwood with data provided by Jochen Markhorst and Aaron Galbraith

Jochen reported finding three bootleg recordings of the Bromberg Sessions that we discussed a few days ago.   Kaatskill Serenade was covered in the last article plus “Polly Vaughan” and “Sloppy Drunk”.

We’ll now look at those two songs

Now come all ye hunters who follow the gun
Beware of your shooting at the setting of the sun
For Polly's own true love he shot in the dark
But oh and alas Polly Vaughn was his mark.

For she'd her apron wrapped about her and he took her for a swan
Oh and alas it was she Polly Vaughn

He ran up beside her and saw that it was she
Cried "Polly oh Polly have I killed thee"
He lifted up her head and saw that she was dead
And a fountain of tears for his true love he shed.

In the middle of the night Polly Vaughn did appear
Cried "Jimmy oh Jimmy you must have no fear;
Just tell them you were hunting when your trial day has come
And you won't be convicted for what you have done."

In the middle of the trial Polly Vaughn did appear
Crying "Uncle oh Uncle Jimmy Randall must go clear"
The lawyers and the judges stood around in a row
In the middle Polly Vaughn like some fountian of snow

For she'd her apron wrapped about her and they took her for a swan
Oh and alas it was she Polly Vaughn
Oh and alas it was she Polly Vaughn

The song appeared in Popular Ballads and Songs from tradition, manuscripts and scarce editions’, 1806 collected and published by Robert Jamieson who noted, “This is indeed a silly ditty, one of the very lowest description of vulgar English ballads which are sung about the streets in country towns and sold four or five for a halfpenny”.  It was not however included in what many find to be the definitive collection of over 300 ballads of the era by Francis Child in the “English and Scottish Popular Ballads” collection.

The recording above leads into Kaatskill Serenade noted above, and hearing the two together show us that Dylan was after a particular sound and style with this collection.

This sound doesn’t carry forward into the other recording we have from the sessions:

The lyrics appear here.

This is is another Bromberg song, although treated in a different style.  To my ear, where as the previous two recordings really do hit the nail, this approach is halfway there and needs cleaning up – there is just too much happening with the mix of brass, percussion and guitars.

We’re in discussion as to how best to present the remainder of the songs recorded in the sessions, given that we don’t actually have access to those recordings.   But I’m sure we’ll think of something!

———–

Untold Dylan was created in 2008 and is currently published twice a day –  sometimes more, sometimes less.  Details of some of our series are given at the top of the page and in the Recent Posts list, which appears both on the right side of the page and at the very foot of the page (helpful if you are reading on a phone).  Some of our past articles which form part of a series are also included on the home page.

Articles are written by a variety of volunteers and you can read more about them here    If you would like to write for Untold Dylan, do email with your idea or article to Tony@schools.co.uk.  Our readership is rather large (many thanks to Rolling Stone for help in that regard). Details of some of our past articles are also included on the home page.

We also have a Facebook site with over 14,000 members.

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