Bob Dylan was back on Black Cake this week
Bob Dylan’s ‘Girl from the North Country‘ was that song playing towards the end of this week’s episode of Black Cake as Covey is walking the streets looking for her baby who was been taken away from her and adopted — Black Cake, Season 1, Episode 7, “Birth Mother“.
The song itself was a lovely representation of what were likely to be Covey’s feelings as she scours the city looking for a baby with a birth mark on its head.
Frantically hoping she can find her, not knowing what she will do if she does and, while likely hoping, even if her baby had been adopted, she was now being taken care of by people who truly loved her.
Remember me to one who lives there
She once was a true love of mineWell, if you go when the snowflakes storm
When the rivers freeze and summer ends
Please see if she’s wearing a coat so warm
To keep her from the howlin’ winds
(full lyrics of ‘Girl from the North Country‘ at Bob Dylan’s official website) (Listen to the song at the bottom of this article)
The song is also the second Dylan song to be played on the Black Cake soundtrack, with the iconic musician’s ‘All The Tired Horses‘ being played on Episode 3.
Who wrote Dylan’s ‘Girl from the North Country‘ and when was it released?
As you might expect about one of America’s greatest living songwriters, ‘Girl from the North Country‘ was written by Bob Dylan and released on his second studio album The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan, which came out in May, 1963.
The song, of course, was somewhat based on the classic English folk song ‘Scarborough Fair’, with Dylan not only using the Scarborough Fair melody to create his own now classic track but also some of its lyrics — “Remember me to one who lives there/She once was a true love of mine”.
Interestingly, while it has always been known Dylan wrote the song about a woman he was in love with, it has never been revealed who that woman was, although there has been plenty of speculation.
It has been thought for a long time that the woman in the song was Bob Dylan’s high school girlfriend, Echo Helstrom, who was someone the musician once dedicated a song when she was in the audience at a concert, saying she was “the first girl I ever loved”.
Dylan himself has never admitted who he wrote ‘Girl from the North Country‘ about, although he did once say when asked about Echo, “Well, she’s a north country girl through and through”.
Then again, in my mind, a mystery like that should stay just that — in the mind of one of America’s greatest musicians and, possibly, in the heart of the girl he wrote about.
What is Bob Dylan doing these days?
Dylan himself, of course, is now 82-years-old and still going strong — writing songs, recording and performing.
The American singer songwriter’s latest full-length release is his 40th studio album Shadow Kingdom (yep, 40th), which came out in June this year.
Like so many of Dylan’s releases, it was not only universally critically acclaimed, the album also charted in a huge number of countries (20).
Its most success was seen in Austria where I currently live (#4 on the Austrian Albums chart), #3 on the Japanese Rock Albums chart, and #3 in Scotland and Switzerland.
In the United States, Shadow Kingdom hit #71 on the Billboard 200 chart.
Listen to Bob Dylan’s ‘Girl from the North Country‘ as played on this week’s Black Cake episode in the video, and via Dylan’s The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan album on Spotify.
Dylan and Israel
And by the way, with the whole messed up situation in the Middle East, and with left-wing lunatics out on the streets supporting Hamas, speaking of Bob Dylan, I have been thinking about his pro-Israel song ‘Neighborhood Bully’ a lot lately, and its lyrics (full lyrics on Dylan’s website here):
The neighborhood bully just lives to survive
He’s criticized and condemned for being alive
He’s not supposed to fight back, he’s supposed to have thick skin
He’s supposed to lay down and die when his door is kicked in
He’s the neighborhood bully
Because the whole damn song is Bob Dylan being prophetic, while talking about much of the world expecting Israel to always take what’s thrown at them without fighting back against a terrorist organization hiding behind women and children.
Fuck that, eh?