in Hibbing...Today in rock history, Bob Dylan made his solo performance debut when he opened for John Lee Hooker in 1961. It was held at Gerde’s Folk City in New York, where Dylan also met Joan Baez for the first time. He strummed songs that would appear almost a year later on his debut album, including “House of the Rising Sun” and “Song to Woody.” Dylan would record the album later in the year, after appearing on songs by Carolyn Hester and Harry Belafonté. Here he is performing "House," which is a tune more usually associated with the Animals, but Bob gives it a good reading nevertheless...
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But Dylan was first out of the gate, ahead of The Animals. But Dave Van Ronk was even first-er out of the gate ahead of Dylan. In No Direction Home, Van Ronk tells how he was the first to arrange & play House in the way Dylan later did, & that Dylan was a Van Ronk fan in the Village. So one day Dylan stopped by to see Van Ronk & asked him if he would mind if he recorded Van Ronk’s version of House of the Rising Sun. Van Ronk said that actually, he would prefer if Dylan didn’t record his version because he was planning to record it himself. To which Dylan replied: “Oops.” (The record had already been pressed.)
So Van Ronk said it used to bug him when people would associate his arrangement of House with Dylan rather than with him, but all was forgiven -- especially after the Animals had a hit with their cover (of Dylan’s cover of Van Ronk’s cover) and the song became associated with the Animals rather than with Dylan. Van Ronk told Dylan: “So now you know how I felt!” & they had a laugh over it.
And thanks for posting a Dylan song, Charlie Mac! May there be many more!
Thanks for the info, Mr. Whoamus - now that you mention it, I do remember this from the "No Direction Home" broadcast. And speaking of that, do you still have the DVD of this show? Would like to take another look at it...
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