Today we have songs from four men each named after one of the Seven Dwarfs. Apologies to Grumpy, Sneezy and Dopey for not giving you each a song of your own, but I have spoken to Zoot and they assure me you are the three fellows they are singing about. That sounds a bit unlikely in Grumpy's case to be honest, but let's not get into that.
"Martha Hardin" - Sleepy John Estes
"Black Smoke" - Bashful Brother Oswald
"Door Mat Blues" - Doc Sausage & His Mad Lads
"Going Down To See Bessie" - Happy & Artie Traum
"Three Jolly Little Dwarfs" - Zoot
Doc Sausage & His Mad Lads is a great band name. I've been playing an awful lot of The Band recently, in an effort to whittle down a possible ICA. I had no idea that anyone had covered Bessie Smith. Happy & Artie messed around with the lyrics a little I think.
ReplyDeleteHappy & Artie actually released it first. Their version came out in 1970 and the Band/Dylan version wasn't on the original Basement Tapes bootleg knocking about at the time. Happy was an occasional Dylan contributor around then and was part of the line-up that re-recorded some Basement Tapes tracks for "Bob Dylan's Greatest Hits Vol II", so presumably him and Artie picked it up straight from the factory.
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