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Girl from the North Country
(3)I stole this from Susie because I had to. I always thought this version of “Girl from the North Country,” which is essentially the one on Nashville Skyline, was a hilarious example of two pop music icons singing near each other.
In 1969, Dylan caught a certain amount of flack for making “Nashville Skyline” with Nashville musicians, including Norman Blake and Earl Scruggs, and I don’t think the critics liked it much.
However, as Clinton Heylin would write about Nashville Skyline, “if Dylan was concerned about retaining a hold on the rock constituency, making albums with Johnny Cash in Nashville was tantamount to abdication in many eyes.”[2]
Helped by a promotional appearance on The Johnny Cash Show on June 7, Nashville Skyline went on to become one of Dylan’s best-selling albums. Three singles were pulled from the album, all of which received significant airplay on AM radio.
This video is, I take it, from that appearance on The Johnny Cash Show. It is out of sync and annoying but it’s fun to watch these two together.
“Nashville Skyline” is a slight album but I always thought it was fun. It has one good song, “Tonight I’ll be Staying Here with You.” (A better version of that on “Live 1975.”) And of course this so-called duet.
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3 Responses to “Girl from the North Country”
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In much the same way that we have several songs about a young woman who’s drowned by her sister in a fight over a man, or the various fates of Arthur MacBride and his cousin, it seems to me that “Girl from the North Country” and “Scarborough Fair” descend from the same source. They do sound very similar, especially around “remember me to one who lives there, for she once was a true love of mine.” It’s just that this song is full of nostalgia and wist, and “Scarborough Fair” is full of “I won’t take her back until she does seven impossible things before breakfast.”
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Also:
If you see her, say hello
She might be in Tangiers
She left here last early spring
She’s living there I hearSay for me that I’m all right
Though things get kind of slow
She might think that I’ve forgotten her
Don’t tell her it isn’t so -
Well you know what they say, Tommy. Good poets borrow, great poets steal.
“If you see her say hello” has always been one of my favorite Dylan ballads. As Blood on the Tracks is one of my favorite albums. It’s why I don’t like to buy music by the tune. I like the concept of an album.
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