Friday May 28, 2021 “All Along the Watchtower” Jimi Hendrix

This version of "All Along the Watchtower" has been called the definitive cover of Bob Dylan songs by several critics.

Many other artists have covered it, including Eric Clapton, Neil Young, U2, Dave Matthews Band and The Grateful Dead. Dylan was so impressed with Jimi's version that Dylan for years played it the way that Jimi had recorded it. Interestingly this was Hendrix’s only US top forty hit where his influence far outpaced his popularity.

Dave Mason, who plays acoustic and twelve-string guitar on Hendrix’s “All Along the Watchtower” also recorded the song on his own solo album and has said it’s a deceptively simple song, "It's just the same three chords, and they never change." (Am G F for the simplest version).

Responding to a frequent Dylan vocal criticism, made even here on Song of the Day, Hendrix said: "All those people who don't like Bob Dylan's songs should read his lyrics. They are filled with the joys and sadness of life.”

Stay safe and well...and Jimi Hendrix, yeah, gone too soon.

There must be some kind of way out of here

Said the joker to the thief

There's too much confusion

I can't get no relief

Business men they drink my wine

Plowmen dig my earth

No one will level on the line

Nobody of it is worth

 No reason to get excited

The thief he kindly spoke

There are many here among us

Who feel that life is but a joke

But you and I we've been through that

And this is not our fate

So let us not talk falsely now

The hour's getting late

 All along the watchtower

Princes kept the view

While all the women came and went

Barefoot servants too

Outside in the cold distance

A wild cat did growl

Two riders were approaching

And the wind began to howl