You
know what's coming up today, don't you? (Even if you're not familiar with this
blog's habits, you can read the title, duh.) To kick things off here's today's
portion of our Bob Dylan Top 125
Countdown.
At #109 we find a song that is much better known for
a version not by Dylan. Quinn the Eskimo (The Mighty Quinn) was first
recorded during The Basement Tapes sessions in 1967, when Dylan and & The
Band were holed up in the basement of a pink house in West Saugerties, New York.
The
subject of the song is the arrival of the mighty Quinn (an Eskimo), who changes
despair into joy and chaos into rest, and attracts attention from the animals.
Dylan is widely believed to have derived the title character from actor Anthony
Quinn's role as an Eskimo in the 1960 movie The Savage Innocents.
Dylan
recorded the song in 1967 during the Basement Tapes sessions, but did not
release a version for another three years. The first official release of the
song was in 1970 on Dylan's Self Portrait album, a live recording from 1969's
Isle of Wight Festival. The live version was also selected in 1971 for the
second compilation of Dylan's career, Bob Dylan's Greatest Hits Vol. II.
In
1985, the second of the two original 1967 takes appeared on the 5-LP Biograph
set. The first
of the two 1967 takes was not officially released until 2014, on The Bootleg
Series Vol. 11: The Basement Tapes Complete.
It
would be nice if I were able to demonstrate all these with the appropriate
versions. Unfortunately, the Dylan YouTube problem is as strong as ever and this
live version from 2003 was the only Dylan version that I have found:
You
can hear the proper version of Dailymotion. Here's the link:
Meanwhile,
the song was picked up and recorded by the good British band Manfred Mann, who
released it as a single in 1968. Dylan considers this as one of the best covers
of his songs ever released. The public thought so too. The song made #1 in the
UK, Germany, Ireland, Sweden and New Zealand, #2 in the Netherlands, Norway and
Switzerland, #3 in Canada, #4 in Austria, #8 in Australia, and #10 in the US.
A
few years later, in 1978, when Manfred Mann had evolved into Manfred Mann's
Earthband, they recorded another version:
At
#108 we find a recent song. When the Deal Goes Down is found in Dylan's thirty-second
studio album, which is called Modern Times (2006). Its melody is based on the
melody of Where the Blue of the Night (Meets the Gold of the Day), a
signature-song for Bing Crosby. In Bob's hands it becomes a beautiful,
introspective, and slightly sad ballad.
Finally
for today, the song at #107: No Time to Think is found on the album Street
Legal (1978). The song is about the emotions of rejection. All
the hurt that comes pouring out. But amazingly it all comes
pouring out through just three chords rotating over and over.
To
put so much into such an epic around just three chords is extraordinary.
It's a similar achievement to that of Desolation Row, which achieves the
same power again on just these same chords although in a different sequence.
The
song is not to be found on YouTube, but thankfully I've found it on Vimeo.
Here's the link:
Now, let's move on to this week's statistics. It was another
busy week, with its share of winners. Singapore did very well for a second week
and only just missed the Top 10. The Netherlands and Sweden are becoming major
players. An excellent showing for the United Arab Emirates too. Germany started poorly, but soon picked up steam and by the end of
the week it was in the top positions that it is accustomed to. The UK is still
going very strong and every week it is inching closer to France in the
all-time list. Speaking of, Cyprus is a
breath away from Ireland. If the trend continues, it will surely overtake it
during the week.
The
full Top 10 is as follows (there is a 2-way tie at #8):
1.
the United States
2.
Greece
3.
the United Kingdom
4.
Germany
5.
France
6.
the Netherlands
7.
Sweden
8.
Cyprus
8.
Italy
10.
the United Arab Emirates
Here
are the other countries that graced us with their presence this week
(alphabetically): Algeria, Argentina, Australia, Azerbaijan, Bangla Desh, Belgium,
Botswana, Brazil, Canada, Chile, China, the Czech Republic, Finland, Hong Kong,
India, Indonesia, Iran, Ireland, Japan, Latvia, Lebanon, Lithuania, Mexico, Pakistan,
Philippines, Portugal, Russia, Serbia, Singapore, South Africa, Spain,
Switzerland, Ukraine, Venezuela and Vietnam. Happy to have you all!
Here's
the all-time list:
1.
the United States = 46.8%
2.
Greece = 18.7%
3.
Russia = 8.9%
4.
Germany = 3.6%
5.
France = 2.6%
6.
the United Kingdom = 2.5%
7.
Canada = 1.03%
8.
Ireland = 0.96%
9.
Cyprus = 0.94%
10.
Italy = 0.64%
That's all for today, folks. Till the next one!
Since we did a Rolling Stones countdown and we're recently doing Dylan, I think that it's only fair that we do one for the Beatles too. I would like that to be more of a communal than personal list, if I can get some of you to get involved. Record Man & I already started doing this before this blog even existed. In order to do justice to the material, we divided the lists in four different time periods: 1962-64, 1965-66, 1967 and one that is yet to come, 1968-70. Here are my lists from before this blog (RM, if you still have yours, please post them here in the comments' section).
ReplyDelete1962-64:
1. She Loves You
2. I Want To Hold Your Hand
3. A Hard Day's Night
4. Can’t Buy Me Love
5. I Saw Her Standing There
6. Twist & Shout
7. I Feel Fine
8. Eight Days A Week
9. All My Lovin'
10. You Can't Do That
11. Any Time At All
12. I Should’ve Known Better
13. And I Love Her
14. Roll Over Beethoven
15. I’ll Follow The Sun
1965-66:
1. Eleanor Rigby
2. Help!
3. Ticket To Ride
4. Yesterday
5. Norwegian Wood
6. In My Life
7. Tomorrow Never Knows
8. We Can Work It Out
9. Here, There And Everywhere
10. She Said She Said
11. You've Got To Hide Your Love Away
12. Nowhere Man
13. Got To Get You Into My Life
14. Drive My Car
15. For No One
16. Day Tripper
17. Taxman
18. Run For Your Life
19. You're Going To Lose That Girl
20. I'm Only Sleeping
As for the 1967 lists, they were published on this blog, with comments for each song here's Record Man's list:
ReplyDelete15) Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds
14) She's Leaving Home
13) Fixing A Hole
12) Getting Better
11) Lovely Rita
10) Sgt. Pepper/With A Little Help From My Friends
Sgt. Pepper was a big deal in 1967. It over-powered everything else in the Summer of Love but IMO, it's the singles released outside of it that really shine hence the logjam of Pepper tunes in the bottom rungs. They are all stellar but there was more to consider.
9) Across The Universe . Whatever version you prefer. Me, I guess I'll stick with the original though I kinda miss the strings.
8) Hello Goodbye. I wasn't a big fan of this confection at the time and really resented it's chart dominance of Walrus but whatever. It's actually grown on me over the years but c'mon, seriously?
7) Baby You're A Rich Man. I love the swirling production. Lennon may have been high as a kite but it sure didn't damper his creativity.
6) Magical Mystery Tour. Another anthem that shoulda been a single. Great Horn charts!
5) All You Need Is Love. For the Beatles, 1967 was the year of the anthem and this exhortation to love really is all you need.
4) A Day In The Life. The centerpiece of Sgt. Pepper despite it's position at the end. This one blew everyone's mind.
3) Strawberry Fields. I really want to consider this and Penny Lane as one entity but that would be a disservice to both tunes. I know this is the Holy Grail for many Lennon fans and if it's any consolation, only the thinnest of lines separates the two.
2) Penny Lane: I loved this song as a teenager and it still gives me the feels 50 years on. Paul's English travelogue was wondrous to a boy living on a tropical island.
1) I Am The Walrus. Why this psychedelic fever dream appealed to an impressionable teen-aged mind I'll never be able to rightly explain. The funny thing is, it failed to encourage any drug use. Not then anyway.
Here's my list, in two parts, because as usual, I say too much:
ReplyDelete15) When I'm Sixty-Four: McCartney best of his trio of British Music Hall numbers (the other two being Your Mother Should Know and Maxwell's Silver Hammer). It's light and breezy and camp enough to be an enjoyable experience.
in a tie with:
15) She's Leaving Home: McCartney's stylistic follow-up to Eleanor Rigby lacks the former's magnificently clear structure and poetic lyrics. Still, it's a song that any other composer would have sacrificed an arm and a leg to have been able to write.
14) Getting Better: Paul was the driving force behind SPLHCB. John was in the process of putting his own life ahead of the Beatles, George was deeply into Indian philosophy and Ringo was dissatisfied. Paul's premise was of placing the album 20 years after the band was formed, which would make it around 1980. So, in Getting Better, Paul from the future was looking back at this difficult time for the band and reassuring his band-mates that it would, indeed get better.
13) Hello Goodbye: as a child I loved the song. Then as a teenager I semi-rejected it as too simple for its period. I re-appreciated it as an adult, especially for its vocal harmonies. The Beatles' voices blended together in a magical way and this was one of the best examples of it.
12) Baby You're A Rich Man: I stand by your description - my feelings exactly.
11) Being For The Benefit Of Mr. Kite: the prevalent feeling of SPLHCB album is that of a Sunday in a British holiday town, like Brighton or Bournemouth. It's especially true for this song: a walk in the park on a sunny Sunday morning, with the military band playing marching tunes and suddenly you notice this poster on a billboard, concerning a not too ambitious variety performance. However, "a splendid time is guaranteed for all".
10) Across The Universe: Lennon's spaced out philosophy actually made a lot of sense at the time. It still does, to those of us that are still incurably romantic... I do think that I prefer the version with the strings, though.
9) Magical Mystery Tour: I didn't care much for it, originally, but it eventually won me over completely. It has crazy infectious energy: it's really "coming to take you away".
8) Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds: Whether it was Julian's kindergarten drawing, or whether it was LSD, the song is inspired. Lyrics that define psychedelia, John's voice processed to sound almost other-worldly and that guitar riff...
7) Sgt. Pepper / With A Little Help From My Friends: Paul, working as an MC, introduces us to the magical world of Sgt. Pepper and his band with the title track, a hard rocker and a Rule Britannia nostalgia piece in equal parts. He then passes over the torch to Ringo for WALHFMF. That was done for a reason: Ringo was feeling particularly low in self-confidence during that time: he felt that the others held the creative reign and he was just a fourth wheel. He even considered leaving the group. Initially, he was reluctant to sing the song, feeling that he would not do it justice. The others eventually persuaded him and the result was excellent. One song flows seamlessly into the other and spells out the spirit of the Beatles. Joe Cocker's cover of WALHFMF took the song to another level, though.
... And this is part 2:
ReplyDelete6) Fixing A Hole: we discussed this at an earlier date, so I will be brief. I got to really appreciate this song over the last decade or so. I think it's of the kind of songs (in a category that includes the evergreen Stardust and Lou Reed's Magic And Loss) that you need to be of a certain age to fully appreciate: having fought battles, both won and lost and being in a position to look at life from a distance. There is something about this song that is existentially soothing.
5) Strawberry Fields Forever: #5 may look low, but since every song in my Top 6 is graded A+ for me, the difference between each position is very small. #5 and #4 in particular are practically in a tie. Lennon's look at his childhood is magical and yet completely grounded on real, fully identifiable feelings. There is poetry and there is wisdom and there is George Martin's production that does impossible things. (Also if you listen carefully, near the end of the song you'll hear "cranberry pie". Or is it "I buried Paul"?)
4) Penny Lane: if John was writing a song about his childhood, Paul would certainly write one too. This is how those two worked - and in my opinion it's that mutual admiration/rivalry that helped make the Beatles the greatest group ever. John's song was about memories of feelings and was sketched out as ideas floating around as dreams. Paul's song was about memories of incidents and was sketched out as images that would fill a young boy's gaze with wonder. John's musical treatment was anchored in the future while Paul's was anchored in the past. They were both as distinguished. Plus, I just adore the connecting phrase "and meanwhile back..."
3) I Am The Walrus: who could imagine that the phrase "yellow matter custard, oozing from a dead dog's eye" would sound so appealing. Yet it does and as you rightly say, the appeal of the song is quite inexplicable. Yet it's magnificent, it's a work of genius and from what I've read, it was so easy for John to write. (Like Yesterday was for Paul). These guys had a special connection to the creative juices of the universe.
2) All You Need Is Love: the yang to the Stones' yin: while the Stones were singing "rape, murder, it's just a shot away" the Beatles countered with "there's nothing you can do that can't be done. IT'S EASY." This song is a celebration of the concept of "the Beatles'". If I were to ever make a film about their career and lives, this would be the song I would be closing the film with.
1) A Day In The Life: well, it's my favorite Beatles' song of all-time, so naturally it's #1 in this list too. A song that transcends Pop music and is up there with the best that Bach, Beethoven and Mozart have to offer. This was also the last time and also the supreme example of a John-Paul collaboration. As for George Martin's production, I could write paragraphs about it... Fact: if you let this song take you along, you can actually feel yourself flying. And no. I don't use drugs.
Now, what I want from you, any of you, is to publish your own lists here. I don't mind if you publish as Anonymous. I'd rather that you use the same division as we did: 15 songs for 1962-64, 20 songs for 1965-66, 15 songs for 1967 and 20 songs for 1968-70. (I will prepare my list for 1968-70 as soon as possible). You may post your lists any day and in any page that is suitable for you. I.e. you can post them all here, or you can post them on the article that will appear on the day that your lists are ready. After that, I will tell you how we will continue. Come on AFHI, Phoenix, Scott, anybody else. The more many lists we have, the more authentic our final one will be. We owe it to the Beatles.
ReplyDelete