spanish country leather boots? or northern leather spanish girls, from boots?

okay. i have NOT done my job.

BUT: tonight, i am home, mixing songs to listen to, & i get this idea -- this "yen" [lookit up]-- to play bob dylan songs next to led zeppelin songs. now, i'm no huge led zep fan, though i'm "cool" enough to call them "led zep," but i am [obviously] a bob fan [so cool as to just call him "bob" but then again, YOU know who i'm talking about], & i realized that the led zep version of "in my time of dyin'" owes just a little bit to mr dylan. . . at least i think so. dunno for sure, BUT i hear "in my time of dyin'" on disc one of "physical graffiti" -- a song i know, & have heard, the led zep version -- & i realize that bob did it on his first album. [side note: bob ALSO did "house of the rising sun" on the same record, & he did an arrangement (or version) that he basically stole from dave van ronk, (who you should all check out)a friend of his, but bob didn't tell dave about the fact that bob used dave's version until they were in the car one day, & bob realized dave might HEAR bob's version -- oops, not friends for a while] so: bob did "in my time of dyin'" & so *I* am thinking about bob & led zeppelin. . . & then i'm thinking about bob, & songs that he "borrowed". . . & i start thinking about songs by bob that might just fit in with songs by led zep. . . & i start thinking.

like i am supposed to do, with this "blog". . . anyway. i start looking to see if there are OTHER songs that the ol' zep has covered that bob also covered -- i think maybe there's a zep cover of a bob song, but i can't/don't try to find one. . . i just decide to "make a playlist". . . i use media monkey to do all this music management, so i'm in my element. . . & i realize that i can run the two versions of 'in my time of dyin,' bob (of course) last, & then? what?. . . so i figure "nobody's fault but mine," one of my fave zep pieces -- i love the idea -- & i think maybe "stuck inside of moblile with the memphis blues again" would well follow "nobody's fault but mine" . . . the wheat? i put "over the hills & far away" on there. . . followed by one of my faves of bob's. . . one of my ALL TIME faves. . . "boots of spanish leather."

now: i LOVE "boots of spanish leather." just like i LOVE "girl from the north country" . . . ya'll see where this is going? have you EVER listened to the two songs back to back? i HIGHLY recommend it. . . highly. seriously: listen to the "girl from the north country" that's on "the freewheelin' bob dylan" & then listen to "boots of spanish leather" & tell me that you dont think they are almost exactly the same song. . . well sure, there are DIFFERENCES. . .but not so much. . .

& so? what i don't get. . . is why can i not find reference to these songs being related? my fave book [far as songs go] is oliver tragers "keys to the rain" -- he's freakin amazing -- doesn't even mention it. . . in the two entries on those songs, NEITHER ONE mentions the OTHER one. . . not at all.

but it's soooooooo obvious. . . so obvious. just listen to them. that's all you have to do. & you know what? at 5 am, with a toothache, it's hard for me to keep track of which song is which. . . "for she once was/ a true love of mine" isnt that far away from "oh, how can, how can you ask me again/ it only brings me sorrow./ The same thing I would want today,/ I would want again tomorrow"

& that's all you need to think about today.

to steal a line: my bob dylan life, in stolen moments

so: the idea here runs like this:

i'm gonna blog once a week or so about my favorite subject in the world: the songs of bob dylan. i figured out that if i blog one song a week, every week, through bob's whole catalog, then we've got a baker's dozen of years before we run out. . . so we should be able to round this whole thing out by 2022 [which has a sorta nice ring to it -- i should look up when that'll be on the hebrew calendar, as mr zimmerman was raised jewish, but i just don't care enough about that, so we're stickin' with this other arbitrary calendar. . .besides, bob's got a christmas album out now!].

i'm not discounting any number of other possibilities: posting more than once a week [ha ha]; posting less than once a week [more than likely]; posting about bob-related stuff but not specifically about songs; posting about the same song more than once; posting about some songs less than once; even posting about stuff that is related to bob so tangentially & obliquely that you may question my sanity [which i assume yer going to be doin fairly soon anyway, if anybody's reading this in the first place].

i just want a place to start trying to formalize, in words, how i feel about dylan's songs & what they mean to ME. . . but i am hoping to encourage plenty of responses, so that through a healthy dialogue we might be able to come to a better understanding of what the appeal of this guy's music is, exactly. not "exactly" really, but you know what i mean. or maybe not: if yer confused, keep checking back, you'll either get the hang of it or eventually stop showing up at all. i encourage everyone to leave comments whenever possible, especially if you see a way in which i could better format or layout or approach the whole thing. should i quote the lyrics in their entirety before every post? link to the lyrics & quote them piecemeal as i discuss them? quote them in their entirety at the end of every post? one of the things that i plan to do is address places where the lyrics are performed differently than the way they were written, or places where we have new or different versions of songs which deviate from the standard. best example of this: the lyrics to "idiot wind" as it is sung on the bootleg series vol 2 versus the lyrics as they are sung on the official release of "blood on the tracks" & are printed in the official book of dylan's lyrics.

the primary text i am using is the older book of lyrics, from 1985: the text i am using is officially called "Bob Dylan: Lyrics - 1962-1985" and is subtitles "Includes all of 'Wrtitings and Drawings' Plus 120 new writings". Published by Alfred A. Knopf and is copyrighted 1973, 1985. I own a copy of the Second Edition, Published October 28, 1985; Reprinted Six Times; Eighth Printing, March 1995. For any songs that i discuss that were written after 1985, i'll be using the First Edition, First Printing of "Lyrics 1962-2001."

my copy of the earlier book is HEAVILY annotated -- i have noted in the margins where the songs' lyrics differ as printed from what is sung on the official album, not to mention a number of songs that have different versions, such as the "Idiot Wind" mentioned above.

and this all speaks to what i want to do: talk about the songs of bob dylan, with a focus on the lyrics. so, that's where we're headed. any suggestions? let's hear em. thanks in advance for reading, & if you ever see anything you disagree with, or find something factually faulty, for bob's sake, LET ME KNOW!!

& don't forget: everybody must give something back for something he gets. . . ["4th Time Around," Blonde on Blonde, 1966]