Don't Think Twice, Dylan 's Alright

The biggest testament to Bob Dylan's songwriting ability might just be that he was able to crank out hits, despite having a voice that would be envied only by a seal with a two-pack-a-day smoking habit.

I had recently noticed four different covers of "All Along The Watchtower" on my ipod. None of those were the Dylan original. I actually thought that the Jimi Hendrix cover might have been the original, and when I went to Wikipedia to find out, I ended up jumping from article to article about this one song. The nerds among you will already know that part of the Battlestar Galactica mythology held that this tune was in the human subconscious from the time our planet was populated by a human/robot mongrel. I don't know that I can get into all of that business, but given the number of times this tune has been covered, maybe there's something to it. Secondhandsongs.com lists 44 versions of this tune since its 1967 Dylan release.

And I'm not sure secondhadsongs.com has a complete listing. For example, they don't list any cover versions of "Don't Think Twice, It's Alright," even though the Mike Ness version has been on my most often played lists for several years, and Wikipedia lists many, many covers of that one. I actually didn't know this was a Dylan song until the original played over the closing credits of the Season 1 finale of Mad Men. (I just finished watching season one, three years after the fact.)

Here's a version of that one by Metric that I've watched a few times on YouTube.

The logistics are going to make it impossible for me to catch Metric at the Voodoo Fest this year, but I was really excited to catch them. I also recently caught a live Muse concert on one of those HD music channels, and it was really good. It's just the craziest time of year. There's absolutely nothing going on here during the heat of summer, but then fall arrives, and every day of every weekend is jam packed.

Unrelated, except that it pays tribute and that I'm going to embed a YouTube video, we need to mark the passing of Barbara Billingsly. Leave It To Beaver was a great comedy, and it still holds up today. I'm not giving you the business.

But my favorite scene from BB is definitely this one.

"Oh Stewardess, I speak jive." If that didn't make you laugh, there's something wrong with your day.

If you're still with me, crank up the volume, and leave on this one.