Your Weekly Dylan Cover [#21]

Rod Stewart
"Tomorrow Is A Long Time"
Original Dylan version found on Bob Dylan's Greatest Hits, Vol. II (1971)

There may be some disagreement on this choice.

And that's OK, of course. But let me remind our gentle readers that when this popular feature started back in April, a caution accompanied the blog entry: "Regular readers of this blog know that Bob Dylan is affectionately referred to as the 'Patron Saint' of TNOP. This new weekly feature sifts through the thousands of cover versions of Dylan songs and provides you with our favorites, as well as a quick memory of our first exposure to the Dylan original."

The background of Dylan's "Tomorrow Is A Long Time" is worth a few words. It came to mind given the fact that tomorrow Columbia Records will finally officially release the original studio version, an out-take from The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan sessions (1963), on the latest "Bootleg" compilation, The Whitmark Demos. Most fans - like this author - are most familiar with the live version that first appeared on Greatest Hits, Vol. II, taken from the famous "Town Hall concert" in New York City, 1963. It is a truly affecting performance by Dylan; a heartbreaking, literate love song of longing set to an acoustic guitar chord structure similar to "Don't Think Twice, It's All Right."

The first cover of the song was a watershed for obvious reasons: Elvis Presley recorded it in 1966, a curious "bonus track" to the soundtrack of another one of his Hollywood films, this one called Spinout. (Perhaps Colonel Tom Parker actually felt sorry one day for Elvis and allowed him to record the tune; for instance, the title song to the movie had The King singing such dreck as: To spinout, yeah spinout/Better watch those curves, never let her steer/So spinout, yeah spinout/A road to love is full of danger signs.) Dylan, like many musical titans of his era, thought Elvis a seminal figure in American music. He has been quoted as saying, "When I first heard Elvis' voice I just knew that I wasn't going to work for anybody; and nobody was going to be my boss. Hearing him for the first time was like busting out of jail."

So there may be some truth to the yarn that Elvis' take on "Tomorrow Is A Long Time" may be Dylan's personal favorite cover of one of his songs. (Presley's slow, loping version is indeed pretty, and if you can find the Dylan follow up recording from his New Morning sessions, it is almost as though Dylan is aping it.)

But I find it no more compelling than the Sandy Denny cover in 1972. That one is similar in tempo and treats the listener to the pedal steel of "Sneaky" Pete Kleinow.

Which brings us, finally, to Rod Stewart. For those only familiar with cocktail music Rod or disco Rod, do yourself a big favor and go out and buy 1971's Every Picture Tells A Story. Now. It is arguably one of the ten best albums ever released in rock and roll history.

Side One of Every Picture ends with "Tomorrow Is A Long Time." Stewart and Faces' pal Ron Wood produce one of the more memorable arrangements of a Dylan song. The roots of "Tomorrow Is A Long Time" are obviously country - Hank Williams would no doubt have felt comfortable singing it - and one would think the gravelly voiced Londoner would have no business tackling the song. Wood makes the pedal steel purr and Dick Powell's fiddle glides throughout as Stewart makes Dylan's words flesh.

It's a definitive reading of one of Bob Dylan's most enduring songs.

Original Listening: Bob Dylan, "Tomorrow Is A Long Time" (Bob Dylan's Greatest Hits, Vol. II, 1971)

Bootleg Listening: Bob Dylan, "Tomorrow Is A Long Time" (New Morning sessions, 1970)

Demo Listening: Bob Dylan, "Tomorrow Is A Long Time" (The Bootleg Series Vol. 9: The Witmark Demos, 1962-1964, 2010)

Another Cover: Elvis Presley, "Tomorrow Is A Long Time" (Spinout Original Soundtrack bonus track, 1966)

Your Weekly Dylan Cover [#8]

"Mama, You Been On My Mind"
Jeff Buckley
Original Dylan version recorded during Bringing It All Back Home sessions (1965); studio recording first officially available on The Bootleg Series, Vols 1-3 (1991)

Jeffrey Scott Buckley was born in Anaheim, California in 1966, the only son of musicians Tim Buckley and Mary Guibert. Tim Buckley won critical notoriety for his folk albums in the 1960s, but died of a drug overdose in 1975. Young Jeff recounted that his sole encounter with his father was when he was eight years old.

Nevertheless, Jeff was surrounded by music as he grew up and was attracted to the guitar. After graduating high school, he formally trained for a year at the Musicians Institute in Hollywood. For the ensuing decade, Buckley made a living as a side musician in the Los Angeles area, and then in New York City.

In 1991, Buckley took part in a tribute to his father at St. Ann's Church in Brooklyn. Singing a quartet of songs, he saw this opportunity as a way to honor his absentee father's memory.

Buckley then started to make a name for himself in small clubs in New York, particularly the Sin-e, where he became the house act, mostly performing covers of a diverse array of artists, including Van Morrison, The Smiths, Leonard Cohen, Led Zeppelin, Bob Dylan and Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan. He also began writing original songs with Gary Lucas.

Creating a buzz in the musical community, record execs started to court Buckley. In 1992, the singer-songwriter signed a three album deal with Columbia Records. The first, Live at Sin-e, was released in 1993. But it was the next long-player in August 1994, Grace, that became a critical smash.

Jeff Buckley tragically drowned in the Wolf River near Memphis, Tennessee on 29 May 1997. He had been living in the city, working on a new album.

In 2004, in honor of the tenth anniversary of Grace, Columbia released the "Legacy Edition," a two CD set including a number of covers. It is from this compilation that Buckley's version of Bob Dylan's "Mama, You Been On My Mind" is culled.

Dylan recorded this song during the Bringing It All Back Home sessions back in 1965, but the understated studio recording was not officially released on record until 1991 on The Bootleg Series (Vol. 1-3). It is classic Dylan, with a simple melody and chord structure that lends itself to interpretation by other artists.

Buckley, in particular, makes it his own. At times simulating Dylan's chords with his spare electric guitar, his fantastic voice embodies the lyrics. It is amazing how mature Dylan's poetry was at this early stage of his career; via Buckley, the words have emotional heft whether one envisions the narrator pining for his lost lover after a separation of one year or twenty.

In an interview with Now magazine back in 1998, Buckley's mother Mary Guibert concluded her talk with Kim Hughes as follows:

"And you know," she offers, her composure finally crumbling, "Even Bob Dylan, in an interview with a French magazine, named Jeff as one of the great songwriters of this decade." Guibert, for the first time, begins to weep. "I don't think you can find any higher praise than from the lips of that gentleman."

Original Listening: Bob Dylan, "Mama, You Been On My Mind"

Live Listening: Bob Dylan & Joan Baez with The Rolling Thunder Revue, "Mama, You Been On My Mind" (Live 1975)

Cover Versions:

Rod Stewart, "Mama, You Been On My Mind" (highly recommended) (Never A Dull Moment, 1972)

Johnny Cash, "Mama, You Been On My Mind" (Orange Blossom Special, 2002 reissue)

The Beatles, "Mama, You Been On My Mind" (George Harrison on lead; studio session 1969)