Music for Roctober - #8 - Bob Dylan
The lessons of Bob Dylan's "Like a Rolling Stone" are many: Never give up, edit, edit, edit, be at the right place at the right time, experiment, write even when you don't feel like writing and the "experts" don't know a thing. Let me explain. The year is 1965 and a frustrated song writer is thinking of packing it in. Instead he writes a long and rambling piece of prose. Out of the that piece of prose he extracts a song. That song doesn't sound quite right so he messes around with different versions of it and produces something with which he is happy.
In the studio a friend of one of the artists fills in where necessary, ending up in the recording booth. When one of the players takes a break that young musician suggests an improvised organ piece for the recording. It works. This is rock and roll history and out of it came one of the greatest pieces of rock music ever. Oh yeah, once the piece was recorded, Columbia Records didn't want to release it.
"Like a Rolling Stone" was a #2 Billboard Charts hit and a #4 U.K. Chart hit. Let's step down the hall and listen to all of those lessons:
In the studio a friend of one of the artists fills in where necessary, ending up in the recording booth. When one of the players takes a break that young musician suggests an improvised organ piece for the recording. It works. This is rock and roll history and out of it came one of the greatest pieces of rock music ever. Oh yeah, once the piece was recorded, Columbia Records didn't want to release it.
"Like a Rolling Stone" was a #2 Billboard Charts hit and a #4 U.K. Chart hit. Let's step down the hall and listen to all of those lessons:
I graduated from high school in 1970. Ya got got yer Beatles, yer Stones, yer Motown Sound, et cetera, but this more than any song says "The Sixties" to the memory of my head and my heart. That means it was all over AM radio back then. It's the one. Makes a helluva ringtone, too, starting with the singular drum shot at its beginning. (Although I change mine up. Right now, I'm really digging Treat Me Right by Cesar Rosas starting with its first drum beat.) I know, I know, too much info.
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I think it is very cool that Al Kooper sat down at that organ and made that sound. Great story.
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