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Bob Dylan - "Cry A While"
[Love & Theft, 2001]
"Cry A While" from Love & Theft (2001) is another Blues song that shows Dylan grabbing deep into the motif bag of that genre, although I must admit it's not one of my favorites: the story behind the song is much more interesting than the song itself. In some way already the arrangement with the rhythm change after the 4th bar is a tribute to two different strands of the Blues. The first four bars are played with straight eighth notes in Delta Blues style á la Charley Patton and Tommy Johnson while the rest of the verse uses the swinging rhythm with dotted eighths.
The prominent ascending bass line in the first four bars is a classic Delta Blues riff first recorded by Tommy Johnson who used it for his "Big Road Blues" (1928, mp3 at the Internet Archive).
Cryin', ain't goin' down this big road by myself
Now don't you hear me talkin', pretty mama?
Lord, ain't goin' down this big road by myself
If I don't carry you, gon' carry somebody else
Cryin', sun gonna shine in my back door someday
Now, don't you hear me talkin', pretty mama?
Lord, sun gon' shine in my back door someday
And the wind gon' change, gon' blow my blues away
Baby, what makes you do me like you do do do, like you do do do?
Don't you hear me now?
What makes you do me like you do do do?
Now you think you gon' do me like you done poor Cherry Red
Taken the poor boy's money now, sure, Lord, won't take mine
Now don't you hear me talkin' pretty mama?
Taken the poor boy's money; sure, Lord, won't take mine
Taken the poor boy's money now; sure, Lord, won't take mine
Cryin', ain't goin' down this big road by myself
Now, don't you hear me talkin', pretty mama?
Lord, ain't goin' down this big road by myself
If I don't carry you, gon' carry somebody else
Cryin', sun gon' shine, Lord, my back door someday
Now don't you hear me talkin', pretty mama?
Lord, sun gon' shine in my back door someday
And the wind gon' change, blow my blues away
Although Dylan surely knows this recording, the Mississippi Sheiks' "Stop And Listen Blues" (1930, mp3), a song using the same bass riff and a similar melody, appears to me more likely as the musical inspiration for "Cry A While":
Yes, today have been, baby, long old lonesome day.
Now don't you hear me talking pretty mama?
Yeah, today have been a long old lonesome day.
Crying, seem like tomorrow be the same old way.
Crying, smokestack black, baby; the bells it shine like gold.
Now don't you hear me talking pretty mama?
Oh, smokestack black; bells it shining like gold.
Crying, I found my baby laying on the cooling board.
Don't the hearse look lonesome, mama, rolling 'fore your door?
Now don't you hear me talking pretty mama?
Don't the hearse look lonesome rolling 'fore your door?
Crying, she's gone, she's gone, won't be back no more.
Oh, stop and listen, hear the bells in tone.
Now don't you hear me talking pretty mama?
Oh, stop and listen, hear the bells in tone.
I had a sweet little fairo, but she's dead and gone.
Crying, followed my baby down to the burying ground.
Now don't you hear me talking pretty mama?
I followed my baby to the burying ground.
It was hacks and horses standing all around.
This song was very popular at the time, more so than Tommy Johnson's recording. Reportedly they paid him some money for borrowing the music of "Big Road Blues". The Mississippi Sheiks have recorded three versions and some adaptions from 1930 to 1934, also Tampa Red did a cover version in 1932. In fact Dylan quotes the line "I went to the churchhouse" from "Stop And Listen Blues No. 2" (1930):
[...]
I went to the churchhouse, cried at the door.
Now don't you a-hear me talkin', pretty mama.
I went to the churchhouse, cried at the door.
I will never see my sweet baby anymore.
The Mississippi Sheiks' "Stop And Listen Blues" is about someone bemoaning the death of his lover. It's related to and maybe even derived from the "Death Letter Blues", first recorded by Ida Cox in 1924. Both variants also belong to the prehistory of Dylan's "Call Letter Blues" (1974, see my article about this song).
But here Dylan departs from the original lyrics' topic. "Cry A While" is conceived as a revenge song. The title line is clearly derived from "I Cried For You", a song written by Gus Arnheim, Abe Lyman and Arthur Freed in 1923:
[Verse 1]
I remember other days, how I used to weep
Over things you said to me, I couldn't even sleep.
You forgot your promises, ev'ry single vow.
All you did was laugh at me, but things are different now.
[Refrain:]
I cried for you
Now it's your turn to cry over me
Every road has a turning
That's one thing you're learning.
I cried for you
What a fool I used to be
But I'll find two eyes just a little bit bluer,
I'll find a heart just a little bit truer.
I cried for you
Now it's your turn to cry over me
[Verse 2]
How can I forget the hours that I worried through
Wondering the live-long day just what next thing to do.
In those days you never thought anything of me.
But the slave that was all yours and now at last is free.
About "I Cried For You":
"This song about unrequited love and subsequent revenge was written by eminent band leader Abe Lyman; his pianist, Gus Arnheim (who later went on to lead a band of his own); and a lyricist, Arthur Free, who later became a movie producer. It was initially popularized by its co-writer, Abe Lyman, and by Cliff Edwards, known as Ukulele Ike. Half forgotten, the song had a remarkable comeback in the late thirties, with best-selling records by Bunny Berigan and his Orchestra in 1938, by Glen Gray and The Casa Loma Orchestra (sung by Kenny Sargent) and Bing Crosby in 1939, and by Harry James and his Orchestra (sung by Helen Forrest) in 1942". [Marvin Paymer, Sentimental Journey. Intimate Portraits of America’s Great Popular Songs, Darien, CT 1999, p. 42]
Other recordings were by Billie Holiday (1936, mp3 at the Internet Archive), Judy Garland (1939) and Frank Sinatra (1957). Since the thirties the singers usually left out the verses. But "all you did was laugh at me" is echoed in "Cry A While" in the line "all you gave me was a smile", so Dylan surely knows early performances from the twenties.
To combine elements of a song from mainstream popular music with the Blues form isn't that unusual. In this respect "Cry A While" is also a kind of tribute to the Mississippi Sheiks who used to borrow extensively from other people's songs from all genres. Their big hit "Sitting On Top Of The World" was conceived in a similar way: they took a melody from a Blues song by Leroy Carr ("You Got To Reap What You Sow") and the refrain line from a contemporary Pop hit ("I'm Sitting On Top Of the World" by Lewis/Young/Henderson, recorded by Al Jolson et al.).
But this song with its sources also allows us to have a look at some interesting aspects of songwriting history. "I Cried For You" is one of the early torch songs of the twenties. This new type of songs of unrequited love "exploring many sides of the loss and longing for love" (Arnold Shaw) was at least partly influenced by Blues, which became popular at the same time. By referring to "I Cried For You" in a Blues context Dylan simply acknowledges this relationship.
Also songs of revenge with a more aggressive stance towards the former lover were not that common in mainstream popular music until the forties and fifties. But they were popular in the early twenties, as "I Cried For You" and for example the related song "Who's Sorry Now" (Kalmar/Ruby/Snyder, 1923) prove:
Who's sorry now
Who's sorry now
Whose heart is achin' for breakin' each vow
Who's sad and blue, who's cryin' too
Just like I cried over you
Right to the end
Just like a friend
I tried to warn you somehow
You had your way
Now you must pay
I'm glad that you're sorry now
Right to the end
Just like a friend
I tried to warn you somehow
You had your way
Now you must pay
I'm glad that you're sorry now
I'm glad that you're sorry now.
These kind of lyrics were inspired by two classic songs from the decade before: "Some Of These Days" (Shelton Brooks, 1911, popularized by Sophie Tucker, mp3 at the Internet Archive) and "After You've Gone" (Creamer/Layton, 1918), "hybrids of 'coon' song and sentimental ballad" (Philip Furia) that were popular with both black and white performers and audiences. This songs remained in the repertoire of mainstream performers, offering examples of a more aggressive answer to loosing the lover. And they were also precursors of Dylan's own brand of anti-love and put-down songs.
But they had also a great influence on the rhetoric and motif bag of the Blues. Revenge on an untrue lover is a main topic of that genre and there is a clear trace of the wandering of the revenge motif from these songs via the Vaudeville Blues of the early twenties to the male singers since the mid-twenties. Exactly this historical context is reflected in "Cry A While". The lines:
To break a trusting heart like mine
[...]
Fighting back tears that I can't control
[...]
I always said you'd be sorry.
clearly refer to "After You've Gone":
Don't break your baby's heart
[...]
Oh honey baby, can't you see my tears?
[...]
But let me warn you [...]
You'll regret some day.
Or, as Charley Patton in "Some These Days I'll Be Gone" (1929), his somehow mutilated version of "Some Of These Days", sang:
Some of these days, you're gonna be sorry
I know you're gonna miss me sweet dream, for I'll be goin' away.
But Dylan – maybe referring to "Who's Sorry Now" with the line "now you must pay" – changes the time frame from "some day" to maybe "today" and also adds a related revenge motif, the fantasy of aggression against the poor girl with his clearly ironic borrowing of the title line of Sonny Boy Williamson's "Your Funeral, My Trial" (1958):
Please come home to your daddy, and explain yourself to me
Because I and you are man and wife, tryin' to start a family
I'm beggin' you baby, cut out that off the wall jive
If you can't treat me no better, it gotta be your funeral and my trial
When I and you first got together, 't was on one Friday night
We spent two lovely hours together, and the world knows allright
I'm just beggin' you baby, please cut out that off the wall jive
You know you gotta treat me better, if you don't it gotta be your funeral and my trial
The good Lord made the world and everything was in it
The way my baby love is some solid sentiment
She can love to heal the sick and she can love to raise the dead
You think I'm jokin' but you better believe what I say
I'm beggin' you baby, cut out that off the wall jive
Yeh you gotta treat me better, or it gotta be your funeral and my trial
Fantasies of killing the untrue or mistreating lover were very popular in Blues. Songs of that type were sung both by women and by men and quickly became a cliché. Interestingly Dylan here closes a full circle by arriving at death again. The "Stop And Listen Blues" was about bemoaning a dead lover. Now the narrator threatens the mistreating lover with death.
Generally fictitious aggressivity is used to mask helplessness and Dylan is obviously using that line in this sense. Mocking the narrator's weakness he ends up with a bombastic threat, ironically deconstructing the revenge song by unraveling the psychological background.
The rest of the song is filled up with a catalog of related Blues motives, but most of the time not as direct quotes but as paraphrases and allusions. "I did it for you" (i.e. going to "Mr. Goldsmith" with whom he "didn't wanna have to be dealin' with") reworks the lament of the man who claims to have done everything for the mistreating woman, as for example in Tampa Red's "Juicy Lemon Blues" (1929), a song thematically related to "Cry A While":
I done everything a poor sweet man could do.
I done everything, poor sweet man could do.
Mama, you've done me dirty, it's comin' back to you.
Alcohol – here it is the "barrel of whisky" – was a standard means to anesthetize the Blues, as (one of many parallels) in another song by Tampa Red, "Drinkin' My Blues Away" (1935):
I don't drink because I'm dry, mama, I drink because I'm blue.
No matter how I try, babe, I can't get along with you.
And I just keep on drinkin', drinkin' every night and day.
Well I just keep on drinkin', tryin' to drive my blues away.
Traveling and going away - here in verse 3 with the "Pennsylvania line" and the "Denver Road" as well as with the "extra mile" he walks every day - is also a major strategy of escaping the trouble, used often enough in Blues songs, but also in many earlier Dylan songs. Sex is another standard motif, here it's the "sweet fat that sticks to your ribs", a reference to all the "big fat mamas" of the Blues (already used by Dylan in "Tough Mama").
But sex is also in the background of boasting, another classic Blues topic and a basic feature of "Cry A While". The difference from Blues is that Dylan is using this sexually suggestive boasting from the perspective of an old man, a major theme in his songs since 1997 as for example in "Make You Feel My Love" or "Moonlight" and now also in "Spirit On The Water" and other songs on "Modern Times". Here we get "I don't carry dead weight – I'm no flash in the pan", "I'll set you straight", "I'm letting the cat out of the cage", "I feel like fighting rooster..." (this one obviously borrowed from Victoria Spivey's "Dope Head Blues", 1927). Also "I'm tryin' to be meek and mild" could be an ironic twist of the phrase "I’m young and wild" in another thematically related song, "Train Time Blues" by Tampa Red (1929). I'll quote the complete lyrics, because a similar set of motives is used here and because Tampa was a great compiler of lines and motives himself.
I went to the station, I looked up on the board.
I went to the station, I looked up on the board.
And couldn't see no train and couldn't hear no whistle blow.
Well, I'm gonna leave this mornin' if I have to ride the blind.
Well I'm leaving this morning, even if I have to ride the blind.
'Cause I've been mistreated and I don't mind dyin'.
You shouldn't mistreat me, mama, 'cause I'm young and wild.
You shouldn't mistreat me, mama, 'cause I'm young and wild.
You should remember, mama, that you was born to die.
I wouldn't have been here, mama, if it hadn't have been for you.
I wouldn't have been here, mama, if it hadn't have been for you.
I'm raggedy and I'm dirty and I'm broke and I'm hungry, too.
So bye bye, mama, you're gonna miss me some sweet day.
Bye bye, Baby, you're gonna miss me some sweet day.
And you're gonna be sorry you done Tampa Red this way.
Generally "Cry A While" works on two levels. First it is a compilation, an inventory of Blues motives and lines. Here Dylan's way of constructing songs is clearly derived from how writers from that genre have built their songs. It's as if he intended to integrate as much related motives as possible. Additionally it's a journey through music history, giving a glimpse of how these kind of songs developed and how black and white performers and writers exchanged and borrowed ideas and topics. Dylan surely has enough knowledge of the history of the revenge song to be able to construct - by purpose or not, I have no idea of course - this kind of "lesson". All these songs mentioned resonate somewhere in the background of "Cry A While" and add meaning and context.
Literature:
- David Evans, Big Road Blues. Tradition And Creativity In The Folk Blues, New York 1987 (1982), p. 268ff (about "Big Road Blues" and related songs)
- Lyrics of "Big Road Blues" & "Stop And Listen Blues" quoted from Evans, p.270 & 285
- Other Blues lyrics are quoted from Robert MacLeods Document Transcriptions Vol. 2 + 6 (Pat Publications, Edinburgh 1995 + 1999)
- Lyrics of "I Cried For You" and "Who’s Sorry Now" quoted from Robert Kimball & Robert Gottlieb, Reading Lyrics, New York 2000.
- Philip Furia, Poets Of Tin Pan Alley, A History of America’s Great Lyricists, New York 1990, p. 33ff (about "Some Of These Days" & early torch songs incl. Arnold Shaw quote)
(first published 30.10.2006 on my website morerootsofbob.com)
© Jürgen Kloss
30.10.2006/11.10.2010
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