Sundog Posted December 5, 2003 Report Posted December 5, 2003 I've been listening to some of my old rock albums lately and have ran into a number of really fine Dylan covers. Things like If Not For You by George Harrison from his All Things Must Pass album. Another really great Dylan cover that I totally forgot about is World Party's version of All I Really Want To Do from the Private Revolution album. Just wondering what some of your favorites are? Quote
AfricaBrass Posted December 5, 2003 Report Posted December 5, 2003 This is pretty easy for me. My favorite Dylan covers were done by the Byrds. They had a whole bunch of 'em. I'm pretty sick of this version, but I used to really dig Hendrix' take on "Along Along the Watchtower". Sundog, if you like "If Not For You", you need to track down a bootleg of the 1970 Dylan/Harrison sessions. I believe they cowrote that track together. I know it's not a version by another artist, but I LOVE Dylan's version of "Tonight I'll Be Staying Here With You " from the LIVE 1975 (The Bootleg Series Volume 5) CD. The original track was on NASHVILLE SKYLINE, but it might as well have been a different song. Quote
Eric Posted December 5, 2003 Report Posted December 5, 2003 There is a band called Mary Lee's Corvette with a live CD that covers Blood on the Tracks start to finish. Apparently they loved the record and just decided to play it one night. Very worthy, IMHO. Eric Quote
Sundog Posted December 5, 2003 Author Report Posted December 5, 2003 Sundog, if you like "If Not For You", you need to track down a bootleg of the 1970 Dylan/Harrison sessions. I believe they cowrote that track together. Now that sounds very interesting! Quote
Jazz Posted December 5, 2003 Report Posted December 5, 2003 I second Jimi's All Along The Watchtower. I'm not sick of it though, I hardly listen to it. AB - Your bizarre new avatar almost gave me a frickin seizure! Quote
Jazzdog Posted December 5, 2003 Report Posted December 5, 2003 I opened up thinking..."My favorite Dylan cover HAS to be Nashville Skyline" the first thing that pops into my head is a Jerry Garcia (Grateful Dead) cover of "She Belongs To Me" It's about as great as Jerry ever got, his voice breaks and the rendition is FAR from perfect,. but it just pulls at the heart strings every time. His "Visions of Johanna" is great as well. I bought the album of Byrds' Dylan covers and sold it away! Keller Williams does a great version of Tangled. Jerry does it as well. Guess I am still quite a big Deadhead! Also the Red Hot Chilli Peppers covered Subteranean Homesick Blues on one of their first albums. It's not bad, but it still sounds too much like RHCP Quote
RDK Posted December 5, 2003 Report Posted December 5, 2003 Keith Jarrett did a wonderful version of "My Back Pages" many years ago... Quote
Jazzdog Posted December 5, 2003 Report Posted December 5, 2003 It's not a cover really, but what about Adrian Belew as the voice of Bob Dylan on "Flakes" by Frank Zappa? Quote
chris olivarez Posted December 5, 2003 Report Posted December 5, 2003 Mavis Staples does a killer version of "Gotta Serve Somebody". Speaking of killer AB that avatar is killing me. Quote
kenny weir Posted December 5, 2003 Report Posted December 5, 2003 Hey Clemintine - I called up this thread thinking only of three Dylan covers - and there's Gene Clark's Tears of Rage up there already! Cool album! Also: Love Minus Zero/No Limit - Rick Nelson Tangled Up In Blue - Hoodoo Rhythm Devils Quote
Jazz Posted December 5, 2003 Report Posted December 5, 2003 Speaking of killer AB that avatar is killing me. Dude, that's what I'm sayin. At least they look like a happy cat family, if a little psychotic... Quote
paul secor Posted December 5, 2003 Report Posted December 5, 2003 Jake and the Family Jewels: "Open the Door, Homer" Doug Sahm doing "Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues" live at the Hole in the Wall Club on a bootleg tape. Quote
Rooster_Ties Posted December 5, 2003 Report Posted December 5, 2003 AB - Your bizarre new avatar almost gave me a frickin seizure! I'll second that!!! How about Hendrix's cover of Dylan's "Can You Please Crawl Out Your Window?" (from "BBC Sessions") --- or probably better yet, how about "Like a Rolling Stone" (from "Jimi Plays Monterey")??? Quote
AfricaBrass Posted December 5, 2003 Report Posted December 5, 2003 I'm glad you guys like the avatar! It's that mullet family that we used to post all the time. I figured they'd make a perfect family for ol' James T. Jazz, I know I still need to make your avatar. You'll have it soon. Jazzdog, my favorite Dylan album cover is NASHVILLE SKYLINE too! Quote
Rooster_Ties Posted December 5, 2003 Report Posted December 5, 2003 (edited) How about Hendrix's cover of Dylan's "Can You Please Crawl Out Your Window?" (from "BBC Sessions") --- or probably better yet, how about "Like a Rolling Stone" (from "Jimi Plays Monterey")??? Quoting myself, I know... Did Hendrix ever cover any other Dylan tunes (besides these two, and of course "...Watchtower")??? I have a funny feeling I'm forgetting another one... Edited December 5, 2003 by Rooster_Ties Quote
edski Posted December 5, 2003 Report Posted December 5, 2003 I think Hendrix's "All Along the Watchtower" is definitive. Some other good ones: PJ Harvey did a great take on "Highway 61 Revisited" on her 1993 album "Rid of Me" (and played it live before that) by adding a "Highway!" chorus as only she could do. Sixteen Horsepower's "Nobody 'Cept You" is also great; thats on "Secret South" (2000). Television performed "Knockin' on Heaven's Door" live numerous times and Warren Zevon's version (on "The Wind") is very affecting ("Open up...open up..."). edski Quote
kulu se mama Posted December 5, 2003 Report Posted December 5, 2003 while hendrix's "all along the watchtower" is an all time classic, i have a special affinity for the xtc version. it is very quirky and jagged. it builds to such a point, that when it ends, i always have to hear it again. Quote
king ubu Posted December 5, 2003 Report Posted December 5, 2003 I still consider Dylan the best to do covers of Dylan songs. Saw him live early november, and he was just GREAT! You never know what to expect from him! Regarding what I thought was the topic here, it would have been Nashville, too. I like the World gone wrong cover, and some others, too, but Nashville gets the nod... ubu Quote
Rooster_Ties Posted December 5, 2003 Report Posted December 5, 2003 How about Hendrix's cover of Dylan's "Can You Please Crawl Out Your Window?" (from "BBC Sessions") --- or probably better yet, how about "Like a Rolling Stone" (from "Jimi Plays Monterey")??? Quoting myself, I know... Did Hendrix ever cover any other Dylan tunes (besides these two, and of course "...Watchtower")??? I have a funny feeling I'm forgetting another one... I knew there was one other one... Dylan's "Drifter's Escape" (from "South Saturn Delta", though I can't for the life of me remember where this was released before SSD). Anyway, that brings the tally of Dylan songs that Hendrix covered up to four!!! Quote
jpmosu Posted December 5, 2003 Report Posted December 5, 2003 I know it's not a version by another artist, but I LOVE Dylan's version of "Tonight I'll Be Staying Here With You " from the LIVE 1975 (The Bootleg Series Volume 5) CD. The original track was on NASHVILLE SKYLINE, but it might as well have been a different song. Damn straight--this version instantly puts me in a good mood, too. I love it. As far as covers go, I love Fairport Convention's "I'll Keep it with Mine." Quote
Joe Posted December 5, 2003 Report Posted December 5, 2003 Of the Fairport versions, I'm most fond of "Percy's Song". Quote
Alexander Posted December 5, 2003 Report Posted December 5, 2003 Elvis Presley did a very good version of "Tomorrow is a Long Time," as did Rod Stewart on "Every Picture Tells A Story." Speaking of Rod, he did a version of "The Wicked Messenger" on the first Faces album, I think (or the first Small Faces album with the Faces line-up, whichever you prefer). Quote
king ubu Posted December 5, 2003 Report Posted December 5, 2003 FIRST: NO NO NO NO NO NO covers "Knockin' On Heaven's Door." Pleeeeeez? NONE, NONE, EVER, none. It's sooooooooo over, dudes and the exceptions do NOT make up for the drivel we've had to suffer through for thirty years now. Please watch "Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid" again if yr needin' a fix. my words! ubu Quote
king ubu Posted December 5, 2003 Report Posted December 5, 2003 Also, I'm taking it ya'll don't know this side. It's one of the secret glories of early '70s rock. Here's Robert Christgau's review; you gotta read through his style but... Coulson, Dean, McGuiness, Flint "Lo and Behold" [sire, 1973] Comprising ten unfamiliar-to-unheard songs written (or anyway, copyrighted) by a well-known singer-songwriter between 1963 and 1971, this organizes scraps of persona the man himself couldn't handle and might as well be called Bob Dylan--"Yesterday" and Today. Dennis Coulson knows Dylan's lyrics for the lazy, flirtatious embraces of perception they are, and so never sops over into literalness--Baezesque prettifying or Bandesque uglifying. And where American folk-rockers can be counted on for the just-so flourish, the swelling rhythm, these guys (aided by producer Manfred Mann, world's most sensible Dylan nut) keep it ragged--the music rocks and rolls, but it also seems to stop short every now and then, and it's catchy, hooking with a tabla here, a build arrangement there, clownish horns that signify an entire side. Cynical ("Open the Door Homer") and idealistic ("The Death of Emmett Till"), self-pitying ("Sign on the Cross") and self-reliant ("Let Me Die in My Footsteps"), but always tough and intelligent. And let us not forget funny. A out, clem clem, now this one does sound interesting! AMG gives it four and a half stars (here), and has the following review: This is one of the finest records of its era (originally issued on DJM and Sire) and, amazingly, as a record of cover versions, had lots of rock press credibility as well. It should have fared about as well as the Hollies' venture into Dylan territory, except that Coulson, Dean, McGuinness, Flint were more suited to the Dylan material, and the Dylan songs they chose were a deliberate effort to delve specifically into material that Dylan had not released (as of that time) in any official versions — this was stuff that was known either only as compositions, or from various white-label bootlegs that were around then. The result was a record as good as anything the Band ever turned in, a gorgeous, haunting electric/acoustic mixture with impassioned vocals, impeccable musicianship, and what were then revelations about some of Dylan's best and least-known songs. (Remember, he was off the road then, and releasing maybe an album a year.) The numbers include "Eternal Circle" (added to this reissue in an alternate mix version as a bonus track), "Lay Down Your Weary Tune," "Open the Door Homer," "Don't You Tell Henry," "Get Your Rocks Off," "Tiny Montgomery" (a bonus track previously available only as a single B-side), "I Wanna Be Your Lover," "Let Me Die In My Footsteps," "Lo And Behold," and "Sign On the Cross." The sound is stunningly clean, and the new historical notes by Tom McGuinness are cool. — Bruce Eder It seems though the 1996 CD version (on Raven) is OOP... ubu Quote
WD45 Posted December 5, 2003 Report Posted December 5, 2003 On the new expanded edition of Live at Sin-e is a performance of "If you See Her, Say Hello" that nearly had me in tears. I went out and bought Blood on the Tracks the next day. Quote
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