Rainy Day Women #12 & 35…..
We recently did our version of this Bob Dylan classic from the mid-’60’s….. Â It’s fun to play and we added our own twist to it…… Â What really interests me most, though, is the title….. Â There’s no mention of women, rainy or not, in the song or any numbers….. Â By all rights the title of the song should be, “Everybody Must Get Stoned” – this line is at the end of every verse, all 5 of them…. Â S-o-o-o, why did Robert Zimmerman (Bob Dylan) name it what he did?….. Â I think you have to look at the radio industry during that period – a song with any hint of drugs in the title would have been immediately banned from air play by the censors and the program executives….. Â They probably wouldn’t even have listened to the song – the title would be explicit enough to get it banned….. Â I’m not sure this is the reason that Dylan named it as he did, and right now I’m too busy to do the research to see why he named it as he did…. Â I just thought I’d mention it….. Â Maybe someone in the community might want to pursue it further….. Â Remember – “Everybody Must Get Stoned”, but, if you do, do it in moderation (Ha!)…..
September 27th, 2013 at 11:25 pm
I’m only not commenting on this because I don’t like Dylan.
September 28th, 2013 at 9:35 am
Yeah, I have to agree with your non-comment, HS, Dylan was never one of my favorite artists, but, Rainy Day Women caught my attention because I’m into Blues….. He basically used the walking blues turn around (the tie-in part between the verses that takes you back so you can start the next verse – it’s a walking down progression – ala – Jimmy Reed, etc.)….. The whole song is this walking progression repeated over and over again in a standard three chord Blues….. Pretty sneaky, but, it works…. Our version is much more guitar based and I think, just maybe, even you would be impressed….. I’ve played it for a couple of friends, they also don’t care for Bob-o, who liked our version really well….
September 29th, 2013 at 9:24 pm
How can one not like Dylan? Just because the last time we saw him he did an entire 2.5 hour show in 1.25. But I digress. To answer the post
And here’s the official story of the title.
September 30th, 2013 at 7:08 am
Mr J., I agree with you that the song was probably not about drugs…. If you listen to the words, “Stoned” is used in the biblical sense, but, any radio station executive, DJ, or programer would immediately interpret it as Stoned = Drugs….. I had heard that the name came from takes 12 and 35 of the song….. I’m sure there are all kinds of stories out there about it….. And, it’s not that I don’t like Dylan, although I was really disappointed in his performance the last time I saw him (which I have on tape as evidence), there are some of his songs that are classics, but, to sit down and listen to a complete album of Dylan is a hard thing for me to do….. To me, there’s lots of filler in between the classics….. Thank God for Greatest Hits albums (Ha!)……
September 30th, 2013 at 9:04 am
I forgot we recorded at the Civic Center that night. For those who weren’t there. Dylan comes out and does a Mediocre show, the sound was substandard to say the least, and he did most of his hits (That he wrote and others recorded) but he must have been on some good “Speed” he sang and played like he couldn’t get out of there fast enough. Let me put it this way, From the time we parked and went in to when we got back to the car the motor had not even cooled off.
September 30th, 2013 at 9:32 am
I think that about sums it up, Mr. J…… I’m going to dig out those tapes and give them a listen….. It has been quite a while since I’ve listened to them…. I think it was the day after the concert (mid ’90’s I think) and I almost chunked them in the trash then….. Maybe they’ll sound better now that they’ve aged a while – Yeah, Sure…..