The 8-year-old is at the kitchen table, practicing drawing lessons from one of the roughly seventeen thousand how-to books Top Management has acquired over the years. She begins humming a song she and I had sung—or, more accurately, "sung"—together a few nights earlier: Bob Dylan's "Stuck Inside of Mobile (with the Memphis Blues Again)," a song that, for reasons even I don't entirely understand, is one of the songs I play most frequently on the guitar and which she and her 13-year-old sister therefore have a certain fondness for.
I decide to play the original and call it up on the iTunes. The Golden Weasel listens for a few verses and then says, "he doesn't sing it like we do," which is very true. She then wonders, "why does he talk it instead of singing it?"
I explain about style and technique and touch upon the differences between sprechstimme and sprechgesang and the history of each.
The next song comes on, another we'd sung—"sung"—together the other night. She listens to the first few verses and then, judging by the affectionate smile on her face, thinking she's bestowing upon her parents her highest compliment, she says, "this is yours and mommy's song."
The song?
"It Ain't Me, Babe."
Go 'way from my window
Leave at your own chosen speed
I'm not the one you want, babe
I'm not the one you need
You say you're lookin' for someone
Who's never weak but always strong
To protect you an' defend you
Whether you are right or wrong
Someone to open each and every door
But it ain't me, babe
No, no, no, it ain't me babe It ain't me you're lookin' for, babe.
Go lightly from the ledge, babe
Go lightly on the ground
I'm not the one you want, babe
I will only let your down
You say you're lookin' for someone
Who will promise never to part
Someone to close his eyes for you
Someone to close his heart
Someone who will die for you an' more
But it ain't me, babe
No, no, no, it ain't me babe
It ain't me you're lookin' for, babe.
Seems her talents for drawing doesn't extend to lyrical analysis. Or maybe she just doesn't know the word ain't.
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