Maria McKee sings Bob Dylan – Happy Birthday Maria McKee
Maria Luisa McKee (born August 17, 1964) is an American singer-songwriter. She is best known for her work with Lone Justice and her 1990 UK solo chart-topping hit, “Show Me Heaven”.
McKee was a founding member of the cowpunk/country rock band, Lone Justice, in 1982, with whom she released two albums. Several compilations of both previously released and unreleased material and a BBC Live In Concert album have been released since the group disbanded. Her band opened for such acts as U2.
Well, the emptiness is endless, cold as the clay
You can always come back, but you can’t come back all the way
Only one thing I did wrong Stayed in Mississippi a day too long
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I’ve been criticised for not putting my best songs on certain albums but it is because I consider that the song isn’t ready yet. It’s not been recorded right. With all of my records, there’s an abundance of material left off – stuff that, for a variety of reasons, doesn’t make the final cut. ..Except on this album, for which we re-cut the song ‘Mississippi.’ We had that on the “Time Out Of Mind” album. It wasn’t recorded very well but thank God, it never got out, so we recorded it again. But something like that would never have happen ten years ago. You’d have probably all heard the lousy version of it and I’d have never re-recorded it. I’m glad for once to have had the opportunity to do so.
~Bob Dylan (Press Conference (French coverage) De la Ville Inter-Continental Roma Hotel, Rome, Italy – 23 July 2001 )
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“Mississippi” is a beautiful, powerful song, something of an anchor for the album. I can easily believe that the lyrics and the melody are intended to convey majesty and heroism. Dylan’s performance of the song gets these feelings across with a lot of charm and humor and empathy.
~Paul Williams (Bob Dylan: Performing Artist Volume 3: Mind Out Of Time 1986 And Beyond)
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Having allowed Sheryl Crow to release her version of the song ahead of his, Dylan decided it was high time he reclaimed it. The new arrangement prompted him to claim to Fricke that ‘on the [“Love and Theft”] performance, the bass is playing a triplet beat, and that adds up to all the multirhythm you need, even in a slow tempo song’. What he no longer had was a voice he could command at will. The “Love and Theft” version, and the live counterparts he introduced in 2001, benefit from an arrangement which left any dirge-like element in the dust. But that vocal timbre had not so much diminished as disappeared beneath its crag-like remains. ‘Mississippi’ had stayed in his closet half a decade too long.
~Clinton Heylin (Still on the Road: The Songs of Bob Dylan Vol. 2, . 1974-2008)
August 14: Legendary producer Bob Johnston died 2015 – Rest in Peace
“Is it rolling, Bob?” – Bob Dylan at the beginning of To Be Alone With You (Nashville Skyline)
“Johnston had fire in his eyes. He had that thing that some people call ‘Momentum.’ You could see it in his face and he shared that fire, that spirit. Columbia’s leading folk and country producer, he was born one hundred years too late. He should have been wearing a wide cape, a plumed hat, and riding with his sword held high. Johnston disregarded any warning that might get in his way. … Johnston lived on low country barbecue, and he was all charm.”
– Bob Dylan, Chronicles: Volume One
“I had the best in the world in my hand – there was no place I couldn’t go with him, so that’s where I went. I think Blonde On Blonde is the best record Dylan ever cut… Blonde On Blonde was the first symphony cut in Nashville!” – Bob Johnston (Uncut magazine)
Donald William ‘Bob’ Johnston (born May 14, 1932, Hillsboro, Texas – died August 14, 2015) was an American record producer, best known for his work with Bob Dylan, Johnny Cash, Leonard Cohen, and Simon and Garfunkel.
This is a quirky album, from a Dylan not pointing a way for anyone, but from a great artist remaining at his work knowingly in the face of not being creatively on top form in the phenomenal way he had been in the period 1964–68.Warm and abiding, it sounds better and better as the years go by.
~Michael Gray (The Bob Dylan Encyclopedia)
Wikipedia: Dylan ultimately decided to re-record “If Not for You” and “Time Passes Slowly”, holding one final session on August 12. During that session, he also recorded “Day of the Locusts,” which by now had been finished.For the album’s final sequence, the three August 12 recordings were placed at the beginning of New Morning, while covers of “Ballad of Ira Hayes” and “Mr. Bojangles” were dropped.
Studio E Columbia Recording Studios New York City, New York 12 August 1970 8th and last New Morning recording session, produced by Bob Johnston.
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