Summer Days (Bob Dylan song)
| "Summer Days" | |
|---|---|
| Song by Bob Dylan | |
| from the album Love and Theft | |
| Released | September 11, 2001 |
| Recorded | May 2001 |
| Studio | Clinton Recording, New York City |
| Genre | blues, rock |
| Length | 4:52 |
| Label | Columbia |
| Songwriter(s) | Bob Dylan |
| Producer(s) | Jack Frost |
| Love and Theft track listing | |
12 tracks
| |
"Summer Days" is an uptempo twelve-bar blues song written and performed by American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan that appears as the third song on his 2001 album Love and Theft.[1] Like most of Dylan's 21st century output, he produced the song himself under the pseudonym Jack Frost. It was anthologized on the compilation album The Best of Bob Dylan in 2005.[2]
Composition and recording
In their book Bob Dylan All the Songs: The Story Behind Every Track, authors Philippe Margotin and Jean-Michel Guesdon describe the song as the "first time Dylan wrote...in an authentic rockabilly style, reminiscent of guitarist Brian Setzer". They note that he seems to be laughing at himself in the lyrics, "especially when he sings, 'The girls all say, 'You're a worn-out star'" and that his "excellent vocal" is "tinged with humor and lightness - light years away from the dense atmosphere of Time Out of Mind". They also praise the guitar playing as being "absolutely stunning, particularly "Charlie Sexton's excellent solos" and cite his riff in the introduction as being "close to Big Joe Turner's "Roll 'em, Pete".[3]
Critical reception
Spectrum Culture included "Summer Days" on a list of "Bob Dylan's 20 Best Songs of the '00s". In an article accompanying the list, critic Kevin Korber writes that it's "both unfortunate and kind of inevitable that Dylan doesn’t get much credit for having a sense of humor. His work is so steeped in the mythos of him being the Greatest American Songwriter that it’s easy to forget that he’s a human being" and calls the song "one of the most genuinely fun...on an album that has more than its fair share". Korber also notes that the "lyrics have a cyclical nature, ending where they began as Dylan seems to imply that life will keep going beyond him (or this Court Jester version of him), and the band’s looping patterns echo that sentiment".[4]
In his book Bob Dylan, Performing Artist: 1986-1990 and Beyond, Paul Williams writes that he is "thoroughly delighted by all of "'Summer Days' even though I have a low tolerance for Dylan uptempo kitchen-sink jump-shuffle numbers like most live versions of 'Everything Is Broken' and 'Highway 61'. But 'Summer Days' seems to me to break the mold, musically and lyrically and attitudinally fresh in ways that never stop tickling me".[5]
Cultural references
The lines "She says, ‘You can’t repeat the past’, I say, ‘You can’t?’ / ‘What do you mean, You can’t, of course, you can!” is a close paraphrase of a passage from F. Scott Fitzgerald's 1925 novel The Great Gatsby.[6]
Live versions
According to his official website, Dylan played the song 885 times on the Never Ending Tour Between 2001 and 2018.[7] This makes it the most frequently played live song from Love and Theft and Dylan's 13th most frequently played live song ever.[8]
References
- ^ "Love and Theft". Rolling Stone. September 4, 2001.
- ^ "Dylan | The Official Bob Dylan Site". www.bobdylan.com. Retrieved 2021-05-20.
- ^ Margotin, Philippe; Jean-Michel Guesdon (2015). Bob Dylan : all the songs : the story behind every track (First ed.). New York. ISBN 1-57912-985-4. OCLC 869908038.
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link) - ^ "Bob Dylan's 20 Best Songs of the '00s". Spectrum Culture. 2020-12-04. Retrieved 2021-05-20.
- ^ Williams, Paul (2004). Bob Dylan, Performing Artist: 1986-1990 and Beyond. London: Omnibus Press. p. 328. ISBN 1-84449-281-8.
- ^ "Significant Quote". The Great Gatsby:Chapter 6. Retrieved 2021-05-20.
- ^ "Po' Boy | The Official Bob Dylan Site". www.bobdylan.com. Retrieved 2021-05-20.
- ^ "Bob Dylan Tour Statistics | setlist.fm". www.setlist.fm. Retrieved 2021-05-20.
