DYLANCHORDS.COM UNOFFICIAL MIRROR

Sep 4: The blog has been down for a while, but now I've moved it. That probably means there will be more activity there too. Please update your links.

March 12 2007: It’s been a while, but here are two new songs and a solo: Back Door Blues from the “Banjo Tape” (February 8, 1963), which is a wonderful example of Dylan’s guitar style, and Waltzing With Sin from the Basement Tapes (1967). I've also added the guitar solo in Tell Me Momma from the “Royal Albert Hall” concert in 1966.

Other than that, there are a number of small corrections and upgrades. Many of them concern the bug in the conversion process a couple of years back, which made some of the chord indications end up close together at the beginning of the line. This was the case with She’s Your Lover Now, some of the songs on Empire Burlesque, and a number of others. If you come across songs that are still wrongly aligned, please let me know.

Oct 13: Last Words on Modern Times. Before you start flaming me, read the whole thing, and/or remember that my point is not that Dylan is a thief, but that (a) it's ok – it's actually unavoidable – to steal; (b) Dylan has done it in an artistically mosty successful (and for the most part: highly successful) way; (c) I don't blame him for doing it, but for taking undue credits; and (d) since this issue touches upon so many areas which are not limited to the legal issues and the aesthetical judgement, it's up to each listener to judge for himself.

Oct 4: “Gentle Nettie Moore” [pdf file] is a ballad from the 1860, here in a transcription with chord symbols instead of the original’s piano score. The refrain is quite similar to that of "Nettie Moore", but the differences are also marked. Judge for yourselves.

Sep 21: I’ve gathered together the musical sources to Modern Times that have been found so far and my reactions to them in some Introductory remarks. Please let me know if you happen to sit on a 30s recording which sounds exactly like Nettie Moore or Ain’t talkin’…

Sep 19: The music to When the Deal Goes Down bears a more than striking resemblance to Bing Crosby’s “Where the Blue of the Night (Meets the Gold of the Day)”.
Levee Gonna Break is taken wholesale (apart from a few new lines of lyrics here and there) from Kansas Joe & Memphis Minnie’s “When the Levee Breaks” from 1929 (also covered by Led Zeppelin).
Thanks to Rob Kennedy, Stephen Mapes, and Christopher Henricsson.

Sep 13: Ooops – got it all wrong here. Rollin’ and Tumblin’ wasn’t taken from Robert Johnson after all. Ruud writes: “The real source is Hambone Willie Newbern, who recorded the song around 1929. It became a popular song and was also recorded by Babyface Leroy (guitar player and drummer with Muddy) together with Muddy Waters and Little Walter for the Parkway label in january 1950. The same year they made the recording for Chess, and that version is played almost note by note by Bob and the boys.”
The same correction has been made by Patrick Ferris (Mr Brokenbricks) and Arthur Egle. Thanks!

The connection between the Modern Times lyrics and Henry Timrod was discovered by Scott Warmuth after some ingenious detective work. Great catch!

Sep 12: They just keep rolling in. Markus of notdarkyet fame has found the refrain of Ain’t talkin’ in a Stanley Brothers song, “Highway of Regret” (shame on you Stanley, stealing from Bob like that!). And the Yakuza of Modern Times is called Henry Timrod, the “Poet Laureate of the Confederacy” (Wikipedia article | Dylanpool thread). Thanks to Mac for notifying me (and for lots of other stuff too).
By the way, I forgot to mention which day it was yesterday, but you probably noticed anyway.

Sep 11: Oh yes, and as several readers have pointed out, Rollin’ and Tumblin’ is a virtual blueprint of Muddy Water's song of the same name. Muddy, in his turn, has borrowed it from Robert Johnson’s “If I Had Posession Over Judgement Day”.

Sep 7: Here we go again: The music to Beyond the Horizon is based on/copied from/stolen from Jim Kennedy’s “Red Sails in the Sunset” covered by Nat King Cole, Fats Domino, Louis Armstrong, and many others. It’s still a nice tune, but it’s not by Dylan. Thanks to Rob Kennedy for notifying me.

Aug 26: Didn’t I say it? And it was so. I was going to wait until the official release date, but since a) I am going away for a week, and b) most people seem to have it already, I figured: why wait any longer? Modern Times it is.

Aug 22: Eagerly waiting for Modern Times, are we? Wondering if there will be updates here? Who knows.
I say it, so it must be so.

Aug 21: It took me a while, but inspired by the studio session outtakes, here it is: Tell Ol’ Bill

Aug 13: While we‘re waiting for Modern Times – I happened to write up a little whodunnit about the guitar part on “Don’t Think Twice”. It’s called It wasn’t Bruce, so there’s a clue for you …

It is also included in the newest version of Things Twice – the Book, in case you want the whole thing.

June 15: Things Twice—the Book is out. Inspired by Seal, I've collected my writings in a pdf book. Most of it was here already, but some is new, most notably a brand new follow-up to the analyses of the “Lonnie Johnson” series that have been published in the blog. The blog series is also completely revised and rewritten.

The book is available for download (2.2 Mb). The complete music examples in the book, in pdf and midi format, can be grabbed from here

The next step will be Things Twice—The Movie . . .

June 2: Don’t Think Twice has been updated with a full tab.

Mar 16: I am fortunate enough to be able to offer you a mirror of Lennonchords, complete with the full set of chords which have been removed from the original site. Thanks to the person who sent me the ZIP, which is also available for download.

Dec 18: What you are looking at is an unofficial mirror of Eyolf Østrem's dylanchords.com, much of which is temporarily unavailable due to the American Music Publishers' Association (MPA)'s "rattling of sabres against tab sites". Thankfully I have been able to track down a recent copy of the site, which I have uploaded as a service to fellow guitar-playing Dylan fans who may be experiencing withdrawal symptoms.

This mirror is also available as a ZIP file which you are encouraged to download in case this mirror is forced offline.

-- Chris Barnes (maintainer of this unofficial mirror)

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