Bob Dylan on Sam Cooke

I seldom find myself thinking in terms of “truth” when it comes to Sam Cooke. Even in his many early gospel recordings one has to believe the message to find any truth in them! I accept his music at face value and generally don’t look for truth.

When he sings of the men on the “Chain Gang” I’m not looking for truth in lyrics as much I am looking for a well crafted song designed to be a hit!  “Cupid” is essentially a plea- “to shoot the one he desires with their arrow so she comes to him”.

In “Having A Party” and “Twistin’ The Night Away”  there’s talk of “Coke’s in the icebox and popcorn on the table” or a happening place in New York where they dance the twist! I’m not looking for truth. I’m’ looking for a good time-if only in my mind  as I picture the images.

With Bob Dylan though I do look for truth. Without truth, early -and then later Dylan would NOT EXIST! However early Dylan was folk music and folk demands truth -or triviality! Of course the events of “1913 Massacre” took place but it was Woody’s song and he did it better . Any “truth”  had to be attributed to Woody and not Bob. Woody does take some liberties in this. “I Ain’t Got No Home (in this world anymore)” is a great Carter Family song from the 1920’s that Woody stole-and quite effectively as many did NOT have homes during the depression and dust bowl times of his life!  But as for Dylan–nice but unbelievable.

Dylan’s “truth” comes from events of his lifetime. “The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll” and “Ballad of Hollis Brown” are great examples of songs that, without truth, fail!

And yet folk music lends to lore. Lore that is not always based on fact  but often legend. Myth and tales told around a fire or a circle. Woody, Sam and Bob all understood this and put this into thier repotrioir! A song about “Peggy-O”, “Buffalo Gals”, “East Virginia” or “They Call the Wind Maria”  needs no truth. They and many like them only needed the listener to temporary believe in the tale being sung. Not in truth itself.

All three were protest singers and in that regard truth was essential! Sam, however died before he could make much of an impact in the world of protest but his “A Change is Gonna Come” is a accurate today, MLK Day 2020, as it was when he first sang it. A change needs to come! A revolution needs to take place!

Dylan perfected WHAT a protest song was. Then he stepped away from them and let other voices be heard. And there were many!  However if one listens to them seldom do they deviate much from the tenets that Bob set down! What sets them apart is substance,   style and topic.

As for Woody his entire life was a protest song in action. He exposed the hypocrisies of the US. the world, it’s leaders and in the US he spoke of injustices and became the lyrical voice for the common man just as much as Steinbeck was the literary voice of the same people. Woody took a flawed democracy and a failed republic and turned both on their backside and exposed the ugly truth of them!

Truth!

The entire point of this comes full circle. And that asks the question: Do we need to believe in the voice–or do we need to believe in the MESSAGE of the voice? If we believe in truth what is the truth each of us chooses TO believe in???

“The day we see the truth and cease to speak is the day we begin to die’ –Martin Luther King, Jr.