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Bob Dylan: 5 great live versions of “Ain’t Talkin'”

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bob dylan ain't talking

As I walked out tonight in the mystic garden
The wounded flowers were dangling from the vines
I was passing by yon cool and crystal fountain
Someone hit me from behind

Ain’t talkin’, just walkin’
Through this weary world of woe
Heart burnin’, still yearnin’
No one on earth would ever know

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You’re talking to a person that feels like he’s walking around in the ruins of Pompeii … A song is a reflection of what I see all around me all the time.
~Bob Dylan(to Mikal Gilmore, 25 September 2001)

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This great song released on “Modern Times” August 29, 2006, has been played 118 times live by; peaking year was 2008 with 42 performances.

First played live 20 November 2006:

New York City Center
New York City, New York
20 November 2006

They say prayer has the power to help
So pray from the mother
In the human heart an evil spirit can dwell
I’m trying to love my neighbor and do good unto others
But oh, mother, things ain’t going well

Ain’t talkin’, just walkin’
I’ll burn that bridge before you can cross
Heart burnin’, still yearnin’
They’ll be no mercy for you once you’ve lost

 

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Bob Dylan, Bob Dylans's best songs

Bob Dylan’s best songs: You’re Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go

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Verlaine & Rimbaud
“Mine’ve been like Verlaine’s and Rimbaud”

Situations have ended sad
Relationships have all been bad
Mine’ve been like Verlaine’s and Rimbaud
But there’s no way I can compare
All those scenes to this affair
Yer gonna make me lonesome when you go
~Bob Dylan (You’re Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go)

Much of the song is thus delivered, so lightly as to suggest that it’s in brackets, with the same sparkling, generous humour. Astonishing that a man who, by the time he made this album, had been monstrously famous for over a decade and had been acclaimed as a genius before he was 25, could have the down-to-earth self-knowledge to
throw out, in this song, so ordinarily humorous and puckish a phrase as the one that ends this stanza: ‘You’re gonna make me wonder what I’m doin’ / Stayin’ far behind without you / You’re gonna make me wonder what I’m sayin’— / You’re gonna make me give myself a good talkin’ to . . .’
~Michael Gray (The Bob Dylan Encyclopedia)

And how smoothly the album slips from this orgy of marital upchuck into the lightest, most innocent, most enticing love song of the whole batch, a throwaway which on closer inspection seems quite as brilliant (in composition and performance) as anything else here: “You’re Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go.” So clever, so perfect, to have a song that puts any separation squarely in the future, instead of present, near past, or distant past.
~Paul Williams (Bob Dylan: Performing Artist, Vol 2: The Middle Years 1974-1986)

Grooveshark:
You’re Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go by Bob Dylan on Grooveshark

Spotify:

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Bob Dylan, Bob Dylan other

Bob Dylan: 6 different live versions of “Cat’s In The Well” (video & audio)

bob dylan under the red sky

The cat’s in the well, the wolf is looking down
The cat’s in the well, the wolf is looking down
He got his big bushy tail dragging all over the ground

The cat’s in the well, the gentle lady is asleep
Cat’s in the well, the gentle lady is asleep
She ain’t hearing a thing, the silence is a-stickin’ her deep

I got a request for doing a “x different live versions of Cat’s in the well” over @ out FB page.

It’s a song Dylan has played about 260 times live, peaking years were 1992, 1993, 2003, 2004 & 2007.

Perth Entertainment Center
Perth, West Australia, Australia
18 March 1992
Cat’s In The Well (Live, Perth 1992) by Bob Dylan on Grooveshark

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Bob Dylan: 5 Great Live versions of “Workingman’s Blues #2” (Video & audio)

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Bob Dylan

There’s an evenin’ haze settlin’ over the town
Starlight by the edge of the creek
The buyin’ power of the proletariat’s gone down
Money’s gettin’ shallow and weak
The place I love best is a sweet memory
It’s a new path that we trod
They say low wages are a reality
If we want to compete abroad

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Happy birthday “Modern Times”, here are 5 great live versions of “Workingman’s Blues #2”.

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National Indoor Arena
Birmingham, England
17 April 2007

My cruel weapons have been put on the shelf
Come sit down on my knee
You are dearer to me than myself
As you yourself can see
I’m listenin’ to the steel rails hum
Got both eyes tight shut
Just sitting here trying to keep the hunger from
Creeping it’s way into my gut

Meet me at the bottom, don’t lag behind
Bring me my boots and shoes
You can hang back or fight your best on the front line
Sing a little bit of these workingman’s blues

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Bob Dylan, Bob Dylan other, Bob Dylan video

Bob Dylan: 6 Great live versions of “Girl From The North Country” (video & audio)

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bob dylan

Well, if you’re travelin’ in the north country fair
Where the winds hit heavy on the borderline
Remember me to one who lives there
She once was a true love of mine

Well, if you go when the snowflakes storm
When the rivers freeze and summer ends
Please see if she’s wearing a coat so warm
To keep her from the howlin’ winds

Please see for me if her hair hangs long,
If it rolls and flows all down her breast.
Please see for me if her hair hangs long,
That’s the way I remember her best.

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“Girl From The North Country” rates 24 on a list of the songs he’s performed the most (hisbobness.info). Performed 546 times + a couple of 2014 performances.

Hearing two beautiful versions this weekend in Stavern & Kristiansand inspired this post.

Please feel free to use the comments section to suggest other great versions. I’m not uploading stuff, so I can’t promise I’ll find & include it.

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Brøndby-Hallen
Copenhagen, Denmark
12 July 1981

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