it's all over now, baby blue

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bob made this little fuck-you song song, right? and it was perfect and jaunty - and why not? it's a getthefuckouttahere song, and dylan will be blissfully free by the end of it. it's almost jokey with seasick sailors and slamming doors like a british sex farce but then wait a minute,
the Them listen to it and take it a little bit more seriously than its author, like the rest of the world. it's still all about a kiss off, but they cover it like sam cooke at an irish wake and it's mag-ni-fied, it's spectral and maybe just a little bit scary and more brreathless and van breaks up "take what you have gathered from coincidence" into "take... whatYOUhavegatheredFROM!... CO-in-CI-dence" like van is wont to do. it kills me. but's it's not even van that makes it, everyone knows it's that guitar thing all starry and blinking - from the first millisecond it's got this muted bell-chiming loveliness like a city rooftop at dusk, all fire escapes and billboards blinking into light. and it also wins because it's all like, "what dylan, mr. supegenius, you didn't think of adding a super-amazing blinking guitar part to your harmonica ditty? way to go, fucko."
but there ain't no victory nor light in the 13th floor elevators's version, it's murky, this one. roky's halting and choked, because he's not singing to some woman he wants out of his apartmente - he's singing to himself. roky is baby blue, and he's telling himself, 'it's all over'. no seriously, he knows that "strike another match and star anew" shit is allllll over. the elevators lay down a g.dead/byrds-jazzy spectral thing behind him with a real nice hesitant drumbeat. and fuck me if it doesn't kill.

― Fritz Wollner (Fritz), Sunday, 13 March 2005 05:56 (twenty years ago)

Dude, you forgot the Falco version!

― Tim Ellison (Tim Ellison), Sunday, 13 March 2005 06:04 (twenty years ago)

I thought Dylan's original had some gravitas, and that he might be sininging it at himself ("When I say you I mean I," despite[or in the mddle of?] that "I is another" jazz). yr. description's got me wanting to check Roky's version.

― don, Sunday, 13 March 2005 06:06 (twenty years ago)

the whole other angle to this song is that scene in "don't look back" where he uses it like a bludgeon on poor little donovan, and in that moment it's definitely a "you" you in the song, but yeah in general the you/I divide is pretty much indecipherable - which is maybe why it's such a good vehicle for others? anyway, i'll never know for sure until i track down the falco cover, that must be amazing.

― Fritz Wollner (Fritz), Sunday, 13 March 2005 06:12 (twenty years ago)

Don, it's on the greatest psych album ever made -- Easter Everywhere!!

Still love Van with Them the best tho.

― Stormy Davis (diamond), Sunday, 13 March 2005 06:13 (twenty years ago)

I don't know who Roky is singing to on that. I guess I just take their version mostly as pure surrealism, though I always associated the "you must leave now" etc. business with the nomadic theme of "Slip Inside This House" and the "tryin' to get back to you" theme of "Slide Machine" on that album

― Tim Ellison (Tim Ellison), Sunday, 13 March 2005 06:13 (twenty years ago)

it's all subjective, of course but to me roky's feeling it a little differently than van & bob did

― Fritz Wollner (Fritz), Sunday, 13 March 2005 06:15 (twenty years ago)

I think the Elevators were feeling everything a little differently.

― Tim Ellison (Tim Ellison), Sunday, 13 March 2005 06:17 (twenty years ago)

not to get all on yr jock Tim, but I really loved that article on the lp by Alan Licht that you published. Made me hear the record in an entirely different way...

― Stormy Davis (diamond), Sunday, 13 March 2005 06:20 (twenty years ago)

xpost

Indeed. But don't you think that song kind of stands out in the Elevators whole thing? it's alittle bit less about, i don't know, flashing lights and reverberations and a little more about pain. i don't know. maybe i'm misunderestimating the elevator, to paraphrase the prez.

― Fritz Wollner (Fritz), Sunday, 13 March 2005 06:21 (twenty years ago)

It's all couched in a framework about metaphysical transcendence, but I think there's a lot about striving and loss on that album: "Slip Inside This House," "Slide Machine," "Dust." (Even Stacy's "Nobody to Love," though you can't make out a lot of the lyrics.)

― Tim Ellison (Tim Ellison), Sunday, 13 March 2005 06:27 (twenty years ago)

"You're Gonna Miss Me" is total pain too tho, but I do take Fritz's point.

― Stormy Davis (diamond), Sunday, 13 March 2005 06:28 (twenty years ago)

i hear you, but "baby blue" always jumped out at me as a little less couched

― Fritz Wollner (Fritz), Sunday, 13 March 2005 06:29 (twenty years ago)

Right.

(and thanks Stormy)

― Tim Ellison (Tim Ellison), Sunday, 13 March 2005 06:42 (twenty years ago)

i think this is dylan's best early song. his singing is absolutely phenomenal. and probably how he managed to destroy his voice within the next 20 years.

― Amateur(ist) (Amateur(ist)), Sunday, 13 March 2005 07:25 (twenty years ago)

bryan ferry's version is interesting.

― Amateur(ist) (Amateur(ist)), Sunday, 13 March 2005 07:26 (twenty years ago)

the way the vocal begins is particularly compelling. with that weird one-note vamp that only descends with the very last three words. it evens comes in at a strange time. this is a really daring melody.

"look outthuuh saints are coming through"

― Amateur(ist) (Amateur(ist)), Sunday, 13 March 2005 07:40 (twenty years ago)

i wish fritz would write in a such a way so i could understand more than 33% of what he's saying.

― Amateur(ist) (Amateur(ist)), Sunday, 13 March 2005 07:42 (twenty years ago)

"An astounding record. You get to hear on this what a fantastic singer he was. His range, which now, as far as I can tell, has reduced to a perfect fifth, used to be enormous. He starts very high on the verse and then drops an octave in about a second and sounds like he's doing a duet with himself. A perfect record." --Donald Fagen

― Amateur(ist) (Amateur(ist)), Sunday, 13 March 2005 07:43 (twenty years ago)

I have a concert version of this on a bootleg from March 27, 1965 -- just 5 days after Bringing It All Back Home came out (whoops, I mean, just 5 days after it 'dropped'.) It's crazy to hear -- the audience actually CRACKS UP when he sings the "the empty-handed painter from your streets / is drawing crazy patterns on your sheets" !! Like, has that line ever struck anyone here as *funny*? Not anymoreso than any of Dylan's 'symbolist' stuff .. but then I'm like, well, waitaminute .. I guess that kind of wordplay was still kinda weird. Another Side was sorta there but then again sorta not. I don't know. It's crazy to hear though. Oh, another awesome thing -- the concert was taped by this girl, and you hear her little interjections throughout the thing; on "Baby Blue" she says "Is this song on the record?" and then a few bars later "Gee, I wonder if this song is on the record..." Awesome. (it's that "Gee" that totally kills me!) It gives me chills to think of people's minds getting split open by this stuff for the first time. God bless bootlegs.

And god bless Dylan, whatta guy.

― Stormy Davis (diamond), Sunday, 13 March 2005 07:49 (twenty years ago)

Dylan : "this song is Love Minus Zero, uh, slash ... [audience laughs] .. No Limit. end of quote. it's kind of like a painting, the title. painted in purple"

― Stormy Davis (diamond), Sunday, 13 March 2005 07:54 (twenty years ago)

could you copy that bootleg for someone? :-)

― Amateur(ist) (Amateur(ist)), Sunday, 13 March 2005 07:55 (twenty years ago)

absolutely!!

it's this thing:

http://www.bobsboots.com/CDs/cd-s49.html

― Stormy Davis (diamond), Sunday, 13 March 2005 07:57 (twenty years ago)

do you have "a tree with roots" by any chance?

― Amateur(ist) (Amateur(ist)), Sunday, 13 March 2005 08:00 (twenty years ago)

yep, I do! i have all three of the 'Genuine' Bootleg series too. i'm just a big collecting dork. all three of those 'Genuine' things really do have some amazing things on em though. I'd be more than happy to copy all this stuff for you, amateurist. Only thing is i'm notoriously slow (i still owe trades to milton and julio), but i'm trying to get better about this stuff, honest.

― Stormy Davis (diamond), Sunday, 13 March 2005 08:05 (twenty years ago)

i saw all of those at a store in madison, and was tempted to buy them, but didn't. this was before cd burners became widespread.

― Amateur(ist) (Amateur(ist)), Sunday, 13 March 2005 08:12 (twenty years ago)

woah, I listened through the "Love Minus Zero/No Limit" on this thing and the audience ALSO cracks up at the "read books, repeat quotations / draw conclusions on the wall" couplet! like, wtf?? god, I wonder what he was thinking. It's weird, it makes me think of how I used to feel as an undergraduate at the student cinema, when the students in the theater used to bust out in laughter at scenes that were totally earnest, like they just had no capability of focusing their branes on anything serious for a moment. god that used to drive me up the wall.

anyway, i kinda feel like a dick for just referencing the boot thing on this thread so uh, here's an actual link--

http://s26.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=3IYRIYPA08LZ42AJ7ASXRIM741

one word of warning -- the tape is sort of sped up so Dylan's voice sounds abnormally high; nothing really to be done about that. also i hope no Sony lawyers are reading.

― Stormy Davis (diamond), Sunday, 13 March 2005 08:16 (twenty years ago)

actually, maybe it's not so much sped up as it is slightly warped..

― Stormy Davis (diamond), Sunday, 13 March 2005 08:20 (twenty years ago)

"it makes me think of how I used to feel as an undergraduate at the student cinema, when the students in the theater used to bust out in laughter at scenes that were totally earnest"

Did you ever see that Johnny Depp movie Arizona Dream? Had the weirdest experience seeing that in the theater. For the first forty-five minutes or so, people were laughing at a bunch of stuff that wasn't funny, thinking the movie was a comedy! I wonder how they felt when they realized that it wasn't.

― Tim Ellison (Tim Ellison), Sunday, 13 March 2005 08:25 (twenty years ago)

what the fuck WAS that movie then? (aside from a total film maudit)

― Amateur(ist) (Amateur(ist)), Sunday, 13 March 2005 08:26 (twenty years ago)

i mean, that movie seems to be crying out for divergent and uncomfortable audience responses

(the only thing i really remember from it is vincent gallo doing his impression of the crop-duster scene from north by northwest. oh, and jerry lewis.)

― Amateur(ist) (Amateur(ist)), Sunday, 13 March 2005 08:27 (twenty years ago)

yeah man .. i dunno .. I guess it's all down to the whole "everyone deals with strong emotions in a different way" thing. at least, I *want* to believe that's the explanation (otherwise it just means these people are just total massive tools, and I'd hate to have to believe that)(want to give benefit of doubt, etc.) still, it's incredibly annoying.

― Stormy Davis (diamond), Sunday, 13 March 2005 08:28 (twenty years ago)

Well, there was the context at solo acoustic Dylan concerts where there would be audible laughter that Dylan could hear at lines in some of the songs that were actually intended to be funny. And, actually, I think there is an undercurrent of humor in Dylan's surrealism, but it's not really something at which you laugh out loud.

― Tim Ellison (Tim Ellison), Sunday, 13 March 2005 08:46 (twenty years ago)

any love for the chocolate watch band version?

― charltonlido (gareth), Sunday, 13 March 2005 08:50 (twenty years ago)

was that really 67% indecipherable? damn.

― Fritz Wollner (Fritz), Sunday, 13 March 2005 09:09 (twenty years ago)

i mean i know i used the word "spectral" twice, which is pretty unforgivable but i was aiming for transparency

― Fritz Wollner (Fritz), Sunday, 13 March 2005 09:11 (twenty years ago)

no, that was perfectly readable, Fritz. dunno what Amateurist's quite talking about.

― jermaine (jnoble), Sunday, 13 March 2005 09:40 (twenty years ago)

Hole covered this too right? And Beck sampled it?

― kate/thank you friendly cloud (papa november), Sunday, 13 March 2005 09:43 (twenty years ago)

How did people bootleg concerts in 1965 anyway? Did this girl smuggle in a reel-to-reel tape recorder under her hat?

― Alba (Alba), Sunday, 13 March 2005 12:52 (twenty years ago)

"Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?" by Joyce Carol Oates was inspired by Dylan's "It's All Over Now, Baby Blue". Here is a link to the short story if you are curious, I think it is worth checking out if you are a fan of the song.

http://www.usfca.edu/fac-staff/southerr/wgoing2.html

― Earl Nash (earlnash), Sunday, 13 March 2005 13:41 (twenty years ago)

There's also a nice Damon & Naomi cover of this song, on a single with a couple of Ghost guys.

― dlp9001, Sunday, 13 March 2005 15:49 (twenty years ago)

"any love for the chocolate watch band version?"

hell yeah. i was gonna bring it up, but i already did somewhere else a month ago. the influence that them's version had on garagerockamerica was VAST VAST VAST.

― scott seward (scott seward), Sunday, 13 March 2005 16:06 (twenty years ago)

fritz, that was a really nice piece... i'm going to have to find my copy of easter everywhere and listen to it all again.

― dave k, Sunday, 13 March 2005 17:36 (twenty years ago)

I guess empty-handed painters drawing crazy stuff on your sheets,und alzo in in wherever and bus stations reading books repeating quotations drawing con-cloo-shuns on tha wall, is funny enough, abzurrd and Abzurdist enough to laff at, esp. easy to relate to ("scenes that we've all seen before," in the immortal words of Willie Nelson), if you are in the Sixties and/or Collegetown, for instance. Greil Marcus also mentioned something like "it's easy to forget how funny audiences found a lot of these songs," especially in his oggd old Berkekely, I'm sure xpost the Genuine bootlegs? If you mean Sony's Bootleg Series, a lotta these do show off Dyl's great lost early vocal gifts (and yeah, could very well be his method of sound-production that messed up his voice, especially since he started smoking again, and stayed on the Endless Tour). Aside from Halloween Mask, Live 1966, and the Rolling Thunder thing from 1975 (and its LP semi-ancestor, Hard Rain), the second box set and the 1961-to-1991-or-thereabouts double-disc live set on Sony/Japan all have a lot of great early tracks (good studio vocals sometimes as well, though the live audience really seems to inspire him, performance-wise)(and re-"writing"-wise, considering some of the better radical revisionism he comes up with onstage)(no prob with your writing Fritz, thanks!)

― don, Sunday, 13 March 2005 19:16 (twenty years ago)

i was being hyperbolic (due to tiredness?)--i just didn't get a few of the things fritz wrote, maybe just 10%? sorry fritz.

― Amateur(ist) (Amateur(ist)), Sunday, 13 March 2005 21:08 (twenty years ago)

The Chocolate Watchband version might sound cool but still seems like an obligatory Dylan cover. I don't really buy Dave Aguilar with those lyrics. The most ridiculous Dylan cover I've ever heard is the Leaves' version of "Love Minus Zero/No Limit."

― Tim Ellison (Tim Ellison), Sunday, 13 March 2005 23:17 (twenty years ago)

but the watchband version isn't an obligatory dylan cover. it's an obligatory cover of them's obligatory dylan cover.

― scott seward (scott seward), Sunday, 13 March 2005 23:51 (twenty years ago)

no Don I wasn't talking about the official bootleg series on Sony (although I do have those and agree with ya that there is a lot of great stuff to be found), but a series of three 3 CD sets that this bootleg label called Scorpio released (titled Genuine Bootleg Series presumably in mockery of the "official" Sony series):

http://www.bobsboots.com/CDs/cd-g08.html
http://www.bobsboots.com/CDs/cd-g09.html
http://www.bobsboots.com/CDs/cd-g10.html

They are really well done, nice packaging, lots of cool performances. The first one starts off with his version of Lord Buckley's "Black Cross"! They also did the complete basement tapes thing that Amateurist mentioned--

http://www.bobsboots.com/CDs/cd-t13-R1.html

― Stormy Davis (diamond), Monday, 14 March 2005 01:01 (twenty years ago)

Thanks, Stormy!

― don, Monday, 14 March 2005 02:01 (twenty years ago)

seven years pass...

I just had the bizarre realization that the version of this song that I know best is actually the 1977 Graham Bonnet cover, lol

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8rHuSobhKBs

I hadn't heard his version in donkeys years, but somewhere in the back of my mind I guess I thought it was an Eagles or Rod Stewart cover, or maybe Smokey or one of those bands. I had NO idea it was Bonnet. So that was kinda fun to figure out :)

― set the controls for the heart of the sun (VegemiteGrrl), Thursday, 10 January 2013 21:17 (twelve years ago)

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