All posts by Egil

Bob Dylan, Bob Dylans's best songs

Bob Dylan’s best songs: It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue

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bob dylan

 

You must leave now, take what you need, you think will last
But whatever you wish to keep, you better grab it fast
Yonder stands your orphan with his gun
Crying like a fire in the sun
Look out the saints are comin’ through
And it’s all over now, Baby Blue

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CM: It’s not the same Blue as in It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue?
BD: No, no. That’s a different Blue. That’s a character right off the haywagon. That Baby
Blue is from right upstairs at the barbers shop, y’know, off the street… a different Baby
Blue, I haven’t run into her in a long time, long time.
CM: You’re being serious?
BD: Yeah, I’ve never looked at Joan Baez as being Baby Blue.
~Craig McGregor Interview (March 1978)

I had carried that song around in my head for a long time and I remember that when I was writing it, I’d remembered a Gene Vincent song. It had always been one of my favorites, Baby Blue… ‘ It was one of the songs I used to sing back in high school. Of course, I was singing about a different Baby Blue.”
~Bob Dylan (Biograph)

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Bob Dylan, Bob Dylan Concerts, Bob Dylan video

Bob Dylan: Rotterdam – September 10, 1987

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Bob Dylan & Roger McGuinn - Rotterdam 1987
Bob Dylan & Roger McGuinn – Rotterdam 1987

Three years on, Dylan returns to this relatively intimate venue, and, although the acoustics remain poor, he presents a high-energy show. After concluding the main set with a version of “Slow Train,” he returns with the Heartbreakers and Roger McGuinn (who has opened all the shows) for a fine version of “Chimes of Freedom,” Dylan singing the first and last verses, and Mr. McGuinn the second. The second encore is “Gotta Serve Somebody.”
~Clinton Heylin (Bob Dylan: A Life in Stolen Moments Day by Day 1941-1995)

Sportpaleis Ahoy
Rotterdam, The Netherlands
19 September 1987

  • Bob Dylan (vocal & guitar) with Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers.
  • Tom Petty (guitar)
  • Mike Campbell (guitar)
  • Benmont Tench (keyboards)
  • Howie Epstein (bass)
  • Stan Lynch (drums)
  • The Queens Of Rhythm: Carolyn Dennis, Queen Esther Marrow, Madelyn Quebec (backing vocals)

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Bob Dylan, Bob Dylan recording sessions

50 years ago: Bob Dylan – The first recording session for “Bringing It All Back Home”

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Bob Dylan - bringing it all back home

I never wanted to write topical songs,…. Have you heard my last two records, Bringing It All Back Home and Highway 61? It’s all there. That’s the real Dylan.
~Bob Dylan (Frances Taylor Interview, Aug. 1965)

50 years ago – 13 January 1965 – Bob Dylan entered Studio A, Columbia Recording Studios, NYC for the first of three seminal days in the studio… It was time to show the “real” Dylan on record.

Wikipedia:

Bringing It All Back Home is the fifth studio album by American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan, released in March 1965 by Columbia Records. The album is divided into an electric and an acoustic side. On side one of the original LP, Dylan is backed by an electric rock and roll band—a move that further alienated him from some of his former peers in the folk song community. Likewise, on the acoustic second side of the album, he distanced himself from the protest songs with which he had become closely identified (such as “Blowin’ in the Wind” and “A Hard Rain’s a-Gonna Fall”), as his lyrics continued their trend towards the abstract and personal.

The album reached No. 6 on Billboard’s Pop Albums chart, the first of Dylan’s LPs to break into the US top 10. It also topped the UK charts later that Spring. The lead-off track, “Subterranean Homesick Blues”, became Dylan’s first single to chart in the US, peaking at #39.

bd-65-studio
Photo by Columbia Records photgrapher Don Hunstein

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Country, Great albums, Great Concert, Johnny Cash, Music Calendar

Jan 13: Johnny Cash recorded “At Folsom Prison” in 1968

 

Johnny Cash At Folsom Prison

 “Hello, I’m Johnny Cash”

Johnny Cash recorded “At Folsom Prison” January 13 in 1968

“Folsom Prison looms large in Johnny Cash’s legacy, providing the setting for perhaps his definitive song and the location for his definitive album, At Folsom Prison. The ideal blend of mythmaking and gritty reality, At Folsom Prison is the moment when Cash turned into the towering Man in Black, a haunted troubadour singing songs of crime, conflicted conscience, and jail.”
~Stephen Thomas Erlewine (allmusic.com)

One of the best live albums in recording history was taped on this date in 1968, hell, it’s one of the best albums period. Today it is it’s 46 year anniversary.

Released May 1968
October 19, 1999 (re-release)
October 14, 2008 (Legacy Edition)
Recorded Live at Folsom State Prison, January 13, 1968
Genre Country
Length 55:56 (re-release)
Label Columbia
Producer Bob Johnston (original)
Bob Irwin (re-release)

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Elvis Presley, Memphis, Stax, Sun

Elvis Presley recording history in Memphis

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Elvis in the front yard of his home at 1034 Audubon Drive in May 1956
Elvis in the front yard of his home at 1034 Audubon Drive in Memphis – May 1956

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Elvis Presley in front of Graceland in 1957
Elvis Presley in front of Graceland, Memphis – 1957

I’ll stay in Memphis.
~Elvis Presley

I’m visiting Memphis in a couple of weeks, so I will have put out some “Memphis related” post the next weeks.

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Elvis was proud of his hometown and though most of his music was recorded in Nashville & Hollywood, some of his finest art was made in Memphis.

I’ve put together an overview of his Memphis recording session, embedded a couple of videos & made some best of lists (as usual).

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But let’s first get started with his great version of Chuck Berry’s “Memphis, Tennessee“…. recorded in Nashville.

Recorded May 1963 at RCA’s Studio B. Nashville.

Content:

  1. The Sun years (1953-55)
  2. At American Sound Studio (1969)
  3. At STAX Studios (1973)
  4. Live (1974)
  5. The Jungle Room Sessions (Graceland 1976)

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