Dylan: our favourite early covers - and yours
January 15, 2025
Colin Randall writes: Salut! Live’s editors - Andrew Curry, Bill Taylor and I - are all Dylan fans to one degree or another. So are and have been lots of other artists and countless among them have dipped gratefully for inspiration into the voluminous Dylan songbook. Here, limiting our choices to material from the era covered by A Complete Unknown, each of our writers choose four favourite covers
For many Bob Dylan fans, there is no such thing as a Dylan cover that is better than original. For them, he can do wrong and no one else can get close. I've seen the Rolling Stones' version of Like a Rolling Stone described as little more than pub rock, Joan Baez's many excellent covers dismissed as sanitised shadows of the originals.
The rest of us divide into different categories. We may prefer Dylan doing Dylan but see merit in other interpretations of his work.
We may prefer some of those covers. We may even think, as some do, that he's a great writer but cannot sing for toffee so anyone else will do.
My own outlook is mixed. I can name plenty of Dylan songs that I feel others do better - Baez's Sad-Eyed Lady of the Lowlands, for example - but have been known to change my mind and revert to the original (as is the case with Percy's Song).
So let us throw open the discussion. By all means tell us why no one, for you, outperforms Dylan on any of his songs. But if you do have your own favourite covers you are warmly invited to share their choices in the Comments, with the Salut! Live's growing readership. We shall extend the invitation to subscribers of relevant Facebook groups, including own own (see footnote).
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Here are our selections:
Bill Taylor (who saw the film in Toronto on Christmas Eve):
If You Gotta Go, Go Now — Manfred Mann
Reams have been written about the rights and wrongs of Frank Loesser’s winter standard Baby It’s Cold Outside. But If You Gotta Go, Go Now is a simple “no pressure, stay or don’t stay” proposition, written with verve and wit. Manfred Mann leader singer Paul Jones has the perfect touch of mischief in his voice to keep things light and unthreatening.
The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll — Cage the Elephant
A garage band formed in Kentucky and then based in England may seem an unlikely choice. But the way lead singer Matt Schultz’s sibilant whisper almost caresses Dylan’s stark lyrics, with guitars and drums growling and murmuring in the background, gives the song an inexorable momentum and immense, unsettling power.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RvCiRUq3X3M
Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right – Leftover Cuties
Simple and straightforward, as befits the song, with Shirli McAllen letting the lyrics pour out slowly and deliberately, with a lovely, understated instrumental backing. The brass interlude is a surprise but a very good one. McAllen’s voice is soft and warm, but there’s an edge there, too. For me, this is as close to perfect as it gets.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=72pZh_URKqg
Chimes of Freedom – Bruce Springsteen, Sting, Tracy Chapman, Peter Gabriel and Youssou N’Dour
Human Rights Now! was a 20-concert world tour in 1988 for Amnesty International. I was at the Toronto show. The concerts ended with all the performers coming out to deliver Dylan’s anthem for the downtrodden. It was a rare and electrifying chance to see such a collection of talent on stage together. Even now it sends chills.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TbEr240Tfsk
Andrew Curry:
Highway 61 Revisited/ Highway 61 — Martin Simpson
I first saw Martin Simpson play live in 2000, after he had returned to the UK from the States. He’d recently released Bootleg USA, which includes this towering version of Highway 61 Revisited, reconnected to its roots in the country blues.
https://youtu.be/O2O8angbwg0?si=bq2TNos7bVXe8iin Official
Queen Jane Approximately — Emma Swift
One of my favourite records of Dylan covers is Blonde on the Tracks, by Emma Swift, who is based in Nashville. She recorded it to overcome a pandemic period of creative block. The video is charming.
https://youtu.be/2R94s8vxi9A?si=AR5IqIsS2bEBN6BE
I’ll Keep It With Mine — Marianne Faithfull
Marianne Faithfull has always been a fine interpreter of other people’s songs. This version of I’ll Keep It With Mine, recorded with the inventive producer/ arranger Hal Willner, makes the Dylan song stranger and darker.
Colin Randall:
Percy’s Song — Fairport Convention
One of my favourite Dylan songs, exposing the US judicial system’s intellectually and morally grotesque habit of imposing prison sentences way beyond life expectancy. I’ve been known to favour Dylan’s original but Sandy Denny’s glorious vocals make it a close run thing.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wWQ5R3eobg
Boots of Spanish Leather — Ronnie Drew with Eleanor Shanley
The late singer from The Dubliners applies his gravel tones to the guilt-ridden, how-can-I-make-it-up-to-you? male pleadings, interplaying to perfection with Shanley's tart ripostes.
All Along the Watchtower — Jimi Hendrix
Even some otherwise absolutist Dylan-and-only-Dylan fans make an exception for Hendrix's electrifying transformation of the song.
https://youtu.be/TLV4_xaYynY?si=E-Uh4zZgnU3kK7HB
To Ramona — Alan Price
I've seen rival claims on behalf of the Flying Burrito Brothers but feel Price's version—to which Bill Taylor alerted me when I was looking for substitutes to avoid repetition with two of his choices—is immeasurably superior. Bill also spotted that To Ramona was the flip side to Dylan's If You Gotta Go, Go Now
https://youtu.be/MHgeI9XpIPY?si=e3D7PcNHfjbXxy4v
We’ve made a Spotify playlist of most of these songs—sadly, Cage the Elephant’s version of Hattie Carroll is missing.
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/7oHcnaw7kwIMA9pR1cnZEh?si=2CQ34XPMQjyEMvJitD6VFw&pi=e-wDty1vVvThOc
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I’m gonna cheat and add a fifth one to my list, which I’d somehow overlooked – Johnny Rivers’ cover of "Positively 4th Street."
Dylan, in "Chronicles: Volume One," calls it his favourite “of all the versions of my recorded songs… I liked his version better than mine. I listened to it over and over again. It was obvious that we were from the same side of town, had been read the same citations, came from the same musical family and were cut from the same cloth.”
Can’t say fairer than that.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NGAWwK9unlQ
Posted by: Bill Taylor | January 15, 2025 at 02:33 PM
I remember Dylan saying that. I had originally included Si Tu Dois Partir - not Fairport but Ruth Norman since I already had Percy’s Song - then realised I already had four
Posted by: Colin Randall | January 15, 2025 at 04:33 PM
Where's Jim McGuinn's work here ? No one ever interpreted Bobby better. The Byrds' "Chimes of Freedom", "My Back Pages", "The Times They Are a'Changin " are the finest covers I've ever heard. And McGuinn's solo "Up To Me" is a classic.
Posted by: Dr. Randall Speer | January 16, 2025 at 04:30 PM