Latest / Six Degrees of Dylan - Audio Episodes / Strange Things Happening Every Day

Transcript

Strange Things Happening Every Day · Six Degrees of Dylan - Audio Episodes

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: I'm Colin McGady and I have a theory.
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_00: Bob Dylan's Like A Rolling Stone changed what a popular song could be and every rock
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: and pop song since can be connected back to it.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_00: This is a journey through musical evolution,
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_00: following the influences,
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_00: shared ideas and unexpected encounters that connect one record to another.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: Six songs, five connections, one destination.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to Six Degrees of Dylan.
• 0:26
  [music]
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_00: Before we begin, a quick listening note.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_00: For licensing reasons, the songs themselves aren't included in this episode.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: You'll find today's Spotify playlist linked in the post notes.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: I'll let you know when to pause and listen,
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_00: and point you towards particular moments in each song.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_00: Take your time, then come back when you're ready to follow the next connection.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_00: Enjoy!
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_00: Today, we begin with Sister Rosetta Tharp and Strange Things Happening Everyday.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_00: The title of this edition is Before the Watershed, a River.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_00: Dylan is often described as a turning point,
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_00: but the music flowing towards that moment already had plenty to say.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_00: Across these six records,
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_00: I want to follow the way a singer's delivery can change what a song means to us.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_00: Tharp recorded our opening song in 1944.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_00: On track one,
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_00: listen to her first vocal entrance,
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_00: the spring in the phrasing and the way she keeps the words moving with the rhythm.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_00: Pause here and play track one in the playlist.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_00: Come back when you're ready.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_00: What I hear there is conviction carried by rhythm.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_00: She gives the line a bounce and then drives it forward.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_00: The confidence in the singing makes the performance feel open and inviting.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_00: Tharp was an inspiration to Little Richard.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_00: That's our first connection.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_00: With Tutti Frutti, we can hear what vocal attack could become in his hands.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_00: On track two, start at the very beginning.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_00: Listen to how his opening burst of syllables works almost like a drum fill.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_00: Before the story has even started, the voice has set the whole record in motion.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_00: Pause here for track two, Tutti Frutti, then come back and we'll follow its next connection.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_00: That opening grabs your attention through the sheer force of its sound.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_00: Richard makes the voice itself part of the percussion.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_00: Otis Redding acknowledged Richard as an inspiration for going into music.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_00: Our next record,
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_00: Shout Banalama,
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_00: catches Redding early in his career, when that influence is especially easy to hear.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_00: On track three,
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_00: listen to his first sung verse, after the opening calls, where he mentions Alabama.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_00: Notice the speed of the delivery, then the heavier, rougher edge of the voice.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_00: There's a familiar urgency, with a different person beginning to emerge inside it.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: Pause here and listen to track three, Shout Bama Lama.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_00: Come back when you're ready.
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_00: The phrases chase one another, but the grain of Redding's voice gives them weight.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_00: You can hear why the comparison with Richard matters,
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_00: and also where it begins to lead somewhere else.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_00: Our next connection follows Redding as a songwriter.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_00: He wrote and first recorded Respect, In 1967, Aretha Franklin made her own recording.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_00: On track four, listen for the first passage where she spells out the title.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_00: Notice how the letters land against the beat.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_00: That rhythmic precision makes the demand feel deliberate.
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_00: The arrangement lets her take charge of the conversation.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: Aretha Franklin, Respect.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_00: Pause here for track four, Respect, then return to the episode when you're ready.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_00: Spelling the word makes you attend to it.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_00: The force comes from the way she places each sound as much as from the word itself.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_00: That's one way an interpretation can change a song's meaning.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_00: On the same album as Respect, Aretha also recorded Sam Cooke's A Change Is Gonna Come.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_00: That shared song gives us our next connection.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_00: We're stepping back to Cooke's own recording from 1964.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_00: On track five, listen to his first vocal entrance after the orchestral introduction.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_00: Hear how he stretches the opening phrase across the accompaniment.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_00: The scale of the orchestra is large, but the voice feels close to us.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_00: Take your time with track five.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_00: A change is gonna come.
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_00: Pause here and come back when you're ready.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_00: That unhurried entrance makes you listen to the person telling the story.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_00: A song that became a civil rights anthem begins with the intimacy of a remembered life.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_00: Cook also brings us to Dylan.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: Hearing Blowing in the Wind helped inspire him to write A Change Is Gonna Come.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_00: That connection belongs to Dylan's earlier songwriting.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_00: Our Destination, Like a Rolling Stone, followed in 1965.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_00: The comparison between these two recordings in our playlist is my own.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: Cook sings from an experience of racial exclusion and holds on to the possibility of change.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_00: Dylan addresses someone whose security and privilege have fallen away.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_00: Those experiences have very different stakes.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_00: What interests me is the pressure each singer puts into the delivery.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_00: For our sixth track, listen to the first question in the first chorus.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_00: Notice how Dylan stretches it out while the band keeps moving.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_00: A short question becomes an insistent confrontation.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_00: Bob Dylan, like a rolling stone.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_00: Pause here for our final track, then come back for a few closing thoughts.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_00: The question hangs there, and the band keeps pushing it towards you.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_00: After this journey, I hear that delivery in a wider company.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_00: We've heard Tharp's rhythmic confidence,
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_00: Richard's explosive attack,
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_00: and Reading beginning to turn an influence into a voice of his own.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_00: Aretha has shown how a performance can reshape a song,
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_00: and Cook how a public hope can reach us through an intensely personal address.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_00: Each record gives us another way into the next.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_00: That's the pleasure of following these connections.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_00: Before the watershed, a river.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_00: The full six-song playlist is linked in the episode notes,
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_00: along with the written edition and its sources.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_00: I'm Colin McGaddy.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks for listening to Six Degrees of Dylan.
• 6:26
  [music]