Jack White Meets Bob Dylan In The Evening

Meg White is temporarily out of commission, so Jack White has found a new performance partner: Bob Dylan. White shocked the crowd at Nashville's Ryman Auditorium last night when he joined Dylan for the first ever live performance of the Blood on the Tracks gem "Meet Me In The Morning." White's band The Raconteurs opened for Dylan last year but the two never shared the stage. (Their only other prior duet was at a Dylan concert in Detroit four years ago when they did the White Stripes song "Ball and Biscuit.") Elvis Costello, who is set to join the Dylan tour this Saturday night, also surprised the crowd with a brief solo acoustic set after opening act Amos Lee.

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Song Stories

“1999”

Prince | 1982

“I don’t consider myself a great poet,” Prince told Rolling Stone. “I just know I’m here to say what’s on my mind.” In the case of the apocalyptic party anthem “1999,” he was worried about then-president Ronald Reagan’s foreign policies. The song’s melody is based on a riff borrowed from the Mamas and Papas’ “Monday, Monday,” and Prince originally envisioned the first verse with three-part harmony but later split the vocals between himself and members of the Revolution. Because Warner Bros., with whom Prince was locked in a contractual battle, owned the original’s masters, Prince rerecorded the song and appropriately released that version in 1999.

More Song Stories entries »

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