Grateful Dead Hour no. 1143
Week of August 16, 2010
Grateful Dead 10/21/83 Centrum, Worcester MA
SPACE->
TRUCKIN'->
WHARF RAT->
I NEED A MIRACLE->
TOUCH OF GREY
~
JOHNNY B. GOODE
Bob Dylan, Down in the Groove
UGLIEST GIRL IN THE WORLD
"Ugliest Girl in the World" is one of two Robert Hunter lyrics that Bob Dylan grabbed from a notebook at Club Front during his mid-'80s collaboration with the Grateful Dead. From an interview I did with Hunter in February 1988:
RH: I brought the book - I think it had 15-17 songs - in to the Dead before we made In The Dark, of which several were selected for In The Dark: "Push Comes To Shove," "Black Muddy River" ... perhaps only those two were selected. I took about three of them for the Liberty album and Dylan took two of them for his album. Set 'em, and sent me a tape. That's what I call easy to work with.
DG: So you submitted these to Dylan, and he chose them? And there was no other communication, really?
RH: No, he just flipped through the songbook that was sitting there at Front Street, liked these tunes, put 'em in his pocket, went off, set 'em to music, recorded 'em, and. . .First time I met him he said (Dylan voice): "Eh, I just recorded two of your tunes!" And I said, "Neat!" (laughs)
DG: He didn't even ask first?
RH: Bob Dylan doesn't have to ask a lyricist if he can do his tunes! Come on, man! I gotta just say this for the record. You got your Grammies, you got Bammies, you got your Rock 'n'Roll Hall of Fame - as far as I'm concerned, Bob Dylan has done two of my songs, and those other things sound far away, distant, and not very interesting.
DG: And you like what he did with the tunes?
RH: Very, very much.
Enjoy!
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Thank you for listening!
- David Gans
Producer/host
Enchanted my mind