To really showcase how much Alex means to me, today I am highlighting a Bob Dylan song that is not sung by Bob Dylan. As a die-hard Dylan fan, that’s a difficult thing for me to do. But nobody said love is easy.
This song has actually been covered by a laundry list of performers… everybody from Kelly Clarkson to Neil Diamond, Bryan Ferry to Joan Osborne. The best-known versions belong to Billy Joel and Garth Brooks, both of whom landed on the singles chart with the song.
My choice, Adele, has also had success with the track overseas and is releasing it in the U.S. as the next single from her well-received album 19.
Dylan himself released the song on his 1997 album Time Out of Mind. Though I like the song itself, I’ve always felt it is out of place on that album, which is so focused on sorrow and mortality. Such a straight-forward love song is rare by Dylan, let alone on an album like that one.
Adele does the song great justice, and hearing this makes me want to revisit her album, which I cast aside after it failed to engage me over a listen or two. She has a great soulful voice, and makes it hard to argue that the song would be better served by Dylan’s whiny croak.
And the whole world is on your case
I could offer you a warm embrace
To make you feel my love
When the evening shadows and the stars appear
And there is no one there to dry your tears
I could hold you for a million years
To make you feel my love
I know you haven’t made your mind up yet
But I would never do you wrong
I’ve known it from the moment that we met
No doubt in my mind where you belong
I’d go hungry, I’d go black and blue
I’d go crawling down the avenue
No, there’s nothing that I wouldn’t do
To make you feel my love
The storms are raging on the rolling sea
And on the highway of regret
The winds of change are blowing wild and free
You ain’t seen nothing like me yet
I could make you happy
Make your dreams come true
Nothing that I wouldn’t do
Go to the ends of the Earth for you
To make you feel my love
Meet Me In Montauk 
Billy Joel released a single of this?
I actually only know the Dylan version, which I like, though this is certainly an admirable cover.
Here’s Joel’s version:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=svOcLsFEBJ0
Adele listed a group of artists she admired in an article that appeared in NY Times (I think; I doubt it was in the Burlington Free Press 🙂
She listed Vampire Weekend as one of her favorite groups of the year and said how their album reminded her of dancing around her house with her mom and her dog to Paul Simon’s Graceland album when she was a kid. That article made me want to get her album. This song makes me want to get it even more.
By the way, I don’t know this song at all – not by Dylan or Joel or Brooks. So Adele will now own it for my money 🙂
Here’s the article. It was The New York Times, and it was a cat, not a dog, with whom she danced. She also cites Santogold and an artist named Laura Marling, who I must check out at once based on her raves.
Interesting stuff. I’ve really liked everything I’ve read about Adele… she seems to have personality to spare. And I can vouch for her Vampire Weekend and Santogold picks, so I’ll have to check out the others.
That’s why I mentioned both Vampire Weekend and Santogold – both have had featured roles on your blog this past year. Perhaps Chris Brown and Laura Manning will grace us in 2009.