TITLE: Tears Of Rage
DATE: February 2017
LOCATION: Chalet Studios
MUSICIANS:
Drums … Al Cross
Bass … Dennis Pendrith
Hammond B3 … David Chester
Guitar … Graham Young
Piano … Bob Burrows
Vocals … Bob Burrows
SONGWRITER: Bob Dylan, Richard Manuel
RECORDING PERSONNEL:
Recording Engineer: David Chester, Scott Campbell
Mixing Engineer: Josh Bowman
Producer: Bob Burrows
GRAPHIC ARTIST: Mike Raines
NOTES:
Bob Dylan wrote the lyrics for this song and then handed them to Richard Manuel (piano player and vocalist with The Band) and asked him … do you have any ideas for this? … and so Richard wrote the music to accompany those lyrics.
Richard admitted later that he had no idea what the song was about, but as he said, when you are working with a master like Bob Dylan you don’t ask him that!
In an interview thereafter Dylan said that he wrote the song from the perspective of his parents and their generation’s view and impressions about his generation.
Regardless, the song was released as the first track on The Band’s Music From Big Pink, which took some doing because the record company did not want that at all.
Apparently it is against “the rules’ to start an album with a slow song!
I particularly love the song because it reminds me so much of watching Richard sing all those great gritty blues songs with Levon And The Hawks at The Concord.
Always love the way he growled out those songs while playing that piano.
Richard’s tragic and premature loss seared a hole in all our hearts … forever.