Revolution in the Air (Songs of Bob Dylan Vol 1) by Clinton Heylin

Author:Clinton Heylin
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Constable Robinson
Published: 2009-05-31T23:00:00+00:00

{153} CAN YOU PLEASE CRAWL OUT YOUR WINDOW?

Published lyrics: Writings and Drawings; Lyrics 1985; Lyrics 2004.

Known studio recordings: Studio A, NY, July 30, 1965 – 21 takes [45]; October 5, 1965 – 2 takes; ?November 30, 1965 – 10 takes [45 – tk.10] [probably recorded on October 5 in reality].

Dylan’s claim that he abandoned writing sequel songs after the now-lost ‘Mr. Tambourine Man Part 2’ does not bear a great deal of scrutiny. He wrote a couple of sequel songs to ‘Like a Rolling Stone’ in the months following, issuing them as a series of singles that produced progressively more disappointing chart positions. The first of these was almost certainly ‘Can You Please Crawl Out Your Window?’ – a song he did not release until December 1965, but first recorded at the second-album sessions in late July. Its twenty-one starts and five finishes occupied a large chunk of studio time on July 30, and even then he wasn’t entirely happy.

The reason this song occupied Dylan and the musicians so long is unclear, though Bloomfield had his own chaos theory about the sessions as a whole that seems particularly pertinent here: ‘No one had any idea what the music was supposed to sound like. . . . The sound was a matter of pure chance. . . . The producer did not tell people what to play or have a sound in mind. . . . It was a result of chucklefucking, of people stepping on each other’s dicks until it came out right.’ Bassist Harvey Brooks confirms that new producer Bob Johnston – who replaced Wilson after he and Dylan had a fundamental falling out, as artists and producers sometimes do – was largely a bystander to proceedings: ‘Johnston was there just to keep it going. He was supposed to say if somebody was in tune or out of tune, but that was a useless concept.’

In the case of ‘Can You Please Crawl Out Your Window?’ Dylan seemed to want the thing out of tune. After twenty-one takes, the one that was put on the Highway 61 test-pressing features an off-key rhythm guitar (Dylan’s, I suspect) throughout. That a more musical take was available was confirmed when Columbia managed to accidentally release another July 30 take of the song on the A side of early copies of ‘Positively Fourth Street.’

For once, one has some sympathy for the label. With a song title like this, who knew what it actually sounded like? ‘Can You Please . . .’ certainly wouldn’t have been much of a clue, as that particular phrase doesn’t appear anywhere in the song. Dylan generally sings, ‘Ah, c’mon, crawl out your window.’ In Columbia’s cardex system it was initially filed under the title on the studio sheet – ‘Look at Barry Run’ – while ‘Positively Fourth Street’ had itself been filed under ‘Black Dalli Rue.’ Gee, I wonder why they mixed ’em up?

The song demonstrates very little compassion for this particular Miss Lonely, even when she seems to be on the receiving end of a rather violent man (‘your face is so bruised’).

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