Dylan Covers: Rainy Day Women #12 & 35

Cross Canadian Ragweed: Rainy Day Women #12 & 35

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Admittedly, this song is nowhere near one of Dylan’s best. But it is undeniably one of the most fun. The lead-off track from the seminal Blonde On Blonde is a raucous barroom ballad full of jangly instruments, huge sing along lines, and off-stage banter. What makes Rainy Day Women so intriguing, however, is the mystique behind it. The song’s meaning has been examined and scrutinized for years. On the surface, the casual listener will undoubtedly hear the persuasion to partake in illegal activity. Upon further review, one may realize that Dylan means “stoned” in the proverbial sense. But to take the song into any further consideration will only confuse the listener more. Dylan, in one of many slaps-in-the-face to interviewers, once described the song like this:

“Rainy Day Women #12 & 35 happens to deal with a minority of, you know, cripples and Orientals and, uh, you know, and the world in which they live,.... It’s another sort of a North Mexican kind of a thing, uh, very protesty. Very, very protesty. And, uh, one of the protestiest of all things I ever protested against in my protest years.”

Cross Canadian Ragweed covered the song on their 2001 release Live and Loud at the Wormy Dog. The Wormy Dog Saloon in Stillwater was the home venue for the Oklahoma band (among many others) in their early years. Because of the song’s live setting in a small bar, this cut contains many similarities to Dylan’s version – and it is just as fun.

As far as the meaning behind the song – I believe Dylan achieved his goal – to create a tune that people would be talking about for years, with no answer as to the writer’s intentions. Why is this the only song on the album to feature a full horn section? Why did he choose to lead off album with it? And what’s with the numbers 12 and 35? I have no answers for you, but just for fun, multiply them together…..

The Music Biz: Nashville Sucks

I could go on for days about the songs I went through High School with that throw words at the music industry – specifically Nashville and their blood-thirsty executives. Most of these songs are filled with personal spite after many Texas music-makers made hopeful trips to the country music capitol only to return downtrodden and empty-handed. In fact, the biggest unifying factor in the group of artists that make the Texas/Red Dirt Scene is their mutual disdain for the entire commercial country machine.

In one particular case, Mike McClure – then leader of the relatively successful band The Great Divide – returned from Nashville with a bag of matchbooks embossed with the band’s logo, but no record deal and no plans for future talks. Cody Canada of Cross Canadian Ragweed re-tells the story and caps it off with the idea of setting the town ablaze with Molotov Cocktails ignited by those very matches.

Cross Canadian Ragweed: Anywhere But Here
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On the heels of Pat Green’s fanbase – one that carried over from the Outlaw scene created by Willie, Waylon, Jerry Jeff, David Allan Coe, etc., these bands found a rabid group of listeners in Texas and Oklahoma who were eager to call the music their own. Fans have been known to chant “Nashville Sucks!” as a left-handed request for Cory Morrow’s Nashville Blues.

Cory Morrow: Nashville Blues
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I was very much into this scene a few years ago - while I still enjoy some of the artists, much of that music was shelved to make room for the never-ending flow of great music that can be found (whether from Nashville or not) around the blogosphere. Once I realized that you didn’t have to be from Texas to make real music, my eyes were opened wide. Being a fan of that scene, however, I learned the value and importance of original songwriting, connecting with fans, and the live show experience. The growing success of nearly every ‘Texas Music’ band is proof that dedication pays – especially after failure.

While many of the bands in the scene now have much bigger deals than the ones they were living off a few years ago, they still retain animosity toward having any aspect of their careers controlled by someone who probably hasn’t even picked up a guitar. I caught Ragweed at the CD Release Party for their most recent disc Mission California. As part of their contract with Universal South, if they played a show on the day of the actual release, they were required to play the album front to back, in order, and with no encore. Cody Canada made a point to apologize to the fans for this before the show started, and immediately broke into ‘track 1’ of the record:

Cross Canadian Ragweed: Record Exec
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Here are a few more songs from the genre expressing the same sentiments.

Travis Linville: Ain’t Bein Treated Right
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Houston Marchman: Viet Nashville
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Jack Ingram: Happy Happy Country Country
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