Tag Archives: Dark Eyes

Bob Dylan & Patti Smith: Dark Eyes, December 1995

BD & PS

Oh, the gentlemen are talking and the midnight moon is on the riverside
They’re drinking up and walking and it is time for me to slide
I live in another world where life and death are memorized
Where the earth is strung with lovers’ pearls and all I see are dark eyes

Here is a video of Bob Dylan & Patti Smith performing a great “Dark Eyes”.
It’s probably from one of Dylan’s two NYC concerts in December 1995, both at The Beacon Theatre (Dec 11 & 14).

A cock is crowing far away and another soldier’s deep in prayer
Some mother’s child has gone astray, she can’t find him anywhere
But I can hear another drum beating for the dead that rise
Whom nature’s beast fears as they come and all I see are dark eyes

They tell me to be discreet for all intended purposes,
They tell me revenge is sweet and from where they stand, I’m sure it is.
But I feel nothing for their game where beauty goes unrecognized,
All I feel is heat and flame and all I see are dark eyes.

Oh, the French girl, she’s in paradise and a drunken man is at the wheel
Hunger pays a heavy price to the falling gods of speed and steel
Oh, time is short and the days are sweet and passion rules the arrow that flies
A million faces at my feet but all I see are dark eyes

Electric Factory
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
15 December 1995

…. and then three nights in Philadelphia (December 15–17). Every night Patti Smith would come on in the middle for the tenth song of the set and they would share vocals on ‘Dark Eyes’, the acoustic song from the end of the Empire Burlesque album of ten years earlier, and which he had never sung live before. The routine might have been the same every night but there was nothing routine about it. …. ….but without question live performance brought it alive, and it was Patti Smith who made it happen. Here, in the tingling electricity between them as they traded verses and duetted on the choruses, the song was the conduit of a beauty and excitement it had never possessed. Many Dylan followers believed that he felt challenged by Patti Smith’s still possessing a fierce anti-showbiz, anti-bullshit credibility that had in his own case been compromised by then: that she therefore kept him on his toes as no performance with his own band alone would have done. As it was, he rose higher than his toes.
~Michael Gray (The Bob Dylan Encyclopedia)




Electric Factory
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
17 December 1995

BD & PS2

 


BD & PS3


-Egil

Bob Dylan & Patti Smith: 2 Great live versions of Dark Eyes

BD & PS

Oh, the gentlemen are talking and the midnight moon is on the riverside
They’re drinking up and walking and it is time for me to slide
I live in another world where life and death are memorized
Where the earth is strung with lovers’ pearls and all I see are dark eyes

A cock is crowing far away and another soldier’s deep in prayer
Some mother’s child has gone astray, she can’t find him anywhere
But I can hear another drum beating for the dead that rise
Whom nature’s beast fears as they come and all I see are dark eyes

Dark Eyes got it’s live debut in Sydney, Australia – 25 February 1986, but it failed & and is not performed again until Boston; Massachusetts, 10 December 1995 and then as a duet with Patti Smith. It was performed 7 times in December 1995, each time as a duet with Patti Smith.

Here are 6 of the 7 performances in December 1995:


The Orpheum Theatre
Boston, Massachusetts
10 December 1995

1995-12-10-Boston-Dark Eyes by Bob Dylan & Patti Smith on Grooveshark

Continue reading Bob Dylan & Patti Smith: 2 Great live versions of Dark Eyes

Bob Dylan & Patti Smith – Dark Eyes – Electric Factory Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 17 December 1995

BD & PS

From the last (and one of the best) concerts of the 95-tour we get this great version of “Dark Eyes”.

…. and then three nights in Philadelphia (December 15–17). Every night Patti Smith would come on in the middle for the tenth song of the set and they would
share vocals on ‘Dark Eyes’, the acoustic song from
the end of the Empire Burlesque album of ten years
earlier, and which he had never sung live before.
The routine might have been the same every
night but there was nothing routine about it. ….
….but without question live performance brought it
alive, and it was Patti Smith who made it happen.
Here, in the tingling electricity between them as
they traded verses and duetted on the choruses, the song was the conduit of a beauty and excitement it had never possessed.
Many Dylan followers believed that he felt challenged by Patti Smith’s still possessing a fierce anti-showbiz, anti-bullshit credibility that had in his own case been compromised by then: that she therefore kept him on his toes as no performance with his own band alone would have done. As it was, he rose higher than his toes.
~Michael Gray (Bob Dylan Ecyclopedia)

BD & PS2

Lyrics:

Oh, the gentlemen are talking and the midnight moon is on the riverside
They’re drinking up and walking and it is time for me to slide
I live in another world where life and death are memorized
Where the earth is strung with lovers’ pearls and all I see are dark eyes

A cock is crowing far away and another soldier’s deep in prayer
Some mother’s child has gone astray, she can’t find him anywhere
But I can hear another drum beating for the dead that rise
Whom nature’s beast fears as they come and all I see are dark eyes

They tell me to be discreet for all intended purposes,
They tell me revenge is sweet and from where they stand, I’m sure it is.
But I feel nothing for their game where beauty goes unrecognized,
All I feel is heat and flame and all I see are dark eyes.

Oh, the French girl, she’s in paradise and a drunken man is at the wheel
Hunger pays a heavy price to the falling gods of speed and steel
Oh, time is short and the days are sweet and passion rules the arrow that flies
A million faces at my feet but all I see are dark eyes



BD & PS3

-Egil