Sign on the Window isn't the Bob Dylan podcast you need, but it's definitely the one that you want! Each week we select a Dylan song at random, live with the song for a week (or two) and then get together to discuss. This week we start our 4th (!) season with the appropriate "New Morning."
We talk context (3:00), the song itself and its horn overdubs, earnestness and chord structure (5:00). We talk our fantastic playlist (29:00) and recommendations for you (35:30)
Next time: "What is this shit?"
Context (3:00)
"New Morning" was recorded twice in 1970 at Studio E, Columbia Recording Studios in New York City. Three takes on June 4 (take 3 on New Morning) and one take on July 13.
Bob's played the song 79 times total.
Song Itself (5:00)
In Chronicles, which deals with the creation of New Morning, Dylan writes*:*
I had just heard the song 'New Morning,' on the playback and thought it had come out pretty good. New Morning might make a good title, I thought and then said it to Johnston.
'Man, you were reading my mind. That’ll put ’em in the palm of your hand — they’ll have to take one of them mind-training courses that you do while you sleep to get the meaning of that.'
Exactly. And I would have to take one of them mind-reading courses to know what Johnston meant by saying what he just said.
Kelly and Daniel talk about the multiple versions we now have. They discuss how insane it was not to open New Morning with "New Morning," almost as a declarative statement.
They talk about the musical triumph to the earnestness of his lyrics. Is Dylan selling us anything other than a bucolic pastoral scene? Is this corny or exquisite? If wildlife and nature aren't your bag, the subtle complexity of the music keeps one listening.
Tony Attwood (at Untold Dylan) goes into the chord progressions, which may mean more to Kelly than Daniel:
First off, the chords. The song is in A and so a rotating A / D chord change as the band starts up is all we might expect. Very relaxed, very straightforward.
But then, as the organ begins to have a bit more prominence we are off. In the second line C sharp minor appears, and is followed by A7, F sharp minor, D, B minor, C sharp minor, D, E…
OK I appreciate if you are not schooled in the finer points of chord sequences that is gibberish, but believe me this is unusual. Not odd. Not wrong, just unusual, especially for Dylan.
But whether you get the chords or not, just listen to the track and how the organ comes in, during “Rabbit running down…” to give a totally different feeling from from the opening.
And then by the time we get to the chorus, we’re rocking away – quite different from where we started – and where we go back to with verse two.
If nothing else, listen just to the organ in the chorus – that playing is talking about fun and laughter and enjoyment.
But then the middle 8 – again with a very unusual sequence (G, F sharp minor, G,E).
And the organ is holding a chord as if this is in the village chapel on a Sunday.
Yet like all "uplifting" songs about "new" beginnings, this song has plenty to latch onto as one begins a new job, a new project, or just welcomes the morning sun.
Does this song still work in 2020?
A lot of people try to imbue songs like this with everything from Romanticism to Transcendentalism, but, really, "New Morning" is a better example of "One More Night." Nothing really happens, but that's the point.
Dylan said at the end of his chapter on New Morning:
To be sure, the album itself had no specific resonance to the shackles and bolts that were strapping the country down, nothing to threaten the status quo. All this was in what the critics would later refer to as my 'middle period' and in many camps this record was referred to as a comeback album — and it was. It would be the first of many.
All told: a great start to Season 4.
THE EPISODE’S PLAYLIST (29:00)
RECOMMENDATIONS (35:30)
Kelly and Daniel both look backward for recommendations. Kelly explores her Top 10 over the last 5 years of this 21st century. Daniel went beyond the confines of this podcast to look at his Top 10 of the 2010s.
ENDINGS (41:00)
After a final purge, there's 399 songs left. Kelly guesses #297. Would've been "Workingman's Blue #2." It's actually #1, Self Portrait.
REFERENCES IN EPISODE
Follow us wherever you listen to podcasts. See our real-time playlist See That My Playlist is Kept Clean on Spotify. Follow us intermittently on Twitter and Instagram.
Tell your friends about the show, rate and review wherever they let you, and consider supporting us by subscribing or at Patreon.
101 – "New Morning"