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're back in 1978 with "Baby Stop Crying," off Street Legal.
Kelly has been broken (3:00)
"Baby Stop Frying" original song (7:00)
Context (12:30)
Song itself: storyline, lyrics, "Dog Bumped," choruses (16:45)
A roleplay between Jonathan Cott and Bob Dylan (29:30)
Playlist (40:30)
Recommendations (47:00)
Endings (57:00)
Next episode: Fractions!
Kelly has been broken: "Baby Stop Frying" (3:00)
Back in some other world, longtime listeners will recall the short-lived and apathetically discarded series Sign on the Window Presents, Mixed Up Confusion Presents: Game of Thrones, Season 7. Longtime listeners will recall Daniel changed some lyrics of Dylan songs for the season. Kelly was tasked with taking Daniel's "Baby Stop Frying" and put music to it. If the Show Which Must Not Be Named didn't break her, this song did.
Context (12:30)
The song was recorded at Rundown Studios in Santa Monica on April 28, 1978. Accompanying Dylan is Billy Cross, David Mansfield, Steve Soles on guitar, Alan Pasqua on organ, Jerry Scheff on bass, Ian Wallace on drums, Bobbye Hall on percussion, with Steve Douglas on tenor sax as well as Helena Springs, Jo Ann Harris, and Carolyn Dennis singing backing vocals.
This song charted as high as #13 in the UK and was a top 10 across Europe. (It didn't chart in the US.)
Dylan has performed this song 39 times (as of recording), only in 1978 (June 1 to November 14).
Song Itself (16:45)
Kelly and Daniel try to make sense of this song. Both provide slightly different narratives. Daniel notes you can see each verse in two distinct ways that completely change the tenor of the song. While Daniel loves Dylan's intonations and his ability to bring a mediocre song some life, Kelly is dead inside.
Daniel tried to look on the bright side. He role-played Jonathan Cott's interview with Dylan for Rolling Stone in 1978 (29:30). Daniel noted the fire chorus (a chorus! in a Bob Dylan song!) but Kelly just stared into the void. Daniel notes the saxophone, which is a negative for her, but Douglas's solo is the shortest ever. Kelly says any merits have cancelled themselves out. Daniel tries the Robert Johnson connection ("Stop Breakin' Down Blues") but it wasn't enough, nor was Sonny Boy Williamson ("Stop Crying").
Does this song work in 2020?
Kelly says she's been scarred and hopes to never hear this song again. Daniel is more charitable, even if the song has a ton of pop fluff and a chorus that really does drag on and on and on. Michael Gray gives it the spin you need to allow this song into (or back into) your heart.
‘Baby Stop Crying’ represents the themes of betrayal and salvation. 'You been down to the bottom with a bad man, babe' is the dark, accusing opening line. The song goes on to try to reach the woman, despite the felt betrayal, urging her to join him down the new road to salvation, with the singer still loathe to walk that road alone: 'Go down to the river babe / Honey I will meet you there.' This plea that she understand the need for a new baptism and the need to renounce, that she accept his need for spiritual journeying, that she come along too, is developed in the album’s major songs in writing as absorbing, complex and vivid as anything Dylan has given us.
For a take like that, "Baby Stop Crying" benefits from being on the same record as "Changing of the Guards," "Señor" and "Where Are You Tonight?" Does it rise to those heights? No, but we can pretend.
From the always excellent Haiku Dylan summarizes this song best:
Some asshole hurt you,
I'll avenge you and love you,
But please be quiet.
THE EPISODE’S BOOKLET & PLAYLIST (40:30)
RECOMMENDATIONS (45:00)
Kelly recommends the new King Krule (which she just bought tickets for later in the year — little did she know at the time) and new singles from Frank Ocean.
Daniel listened to the new Beach Bunny Honeymoon and Tame Impala The Slow Rush. He watched the last seasons of Bojack Horseman, The Good Place, You're the Worst and Silicon Valley. Goodbye to the 2010s indeed...
ENDINGS (57:00)
396 songs remain. Kelly guessed #49. Could've been the entire album Tempest. Nope. It's #299. "Love Minus Zero/No Limit" from 1965's Bringing It All Back Home.
REFERENCES IN EPISODE
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