Dylan Cover #679 The Radiators "This Wheels On Fire" Live

In this ongoing Monday Series we will be exploring various artists versions of Bob Dylan song's. Today's tune is a live cover by The Radiators playing "This Wheel's On Fire"

All April (and the first week of May) RtBE focuses our Monday Dylan Cover Series on artists who are playing this years New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival. Today is The Radiators who is playing the festival Sunday May 4th.

Thoughts On Original:
This Dylan and Rick Danko collaboration came out from the famed Basement Tapes, but first saw the light of day on Music from Big Pink. The slow rolling dirge is interesting and haunting and lends itself to covers (such as Julie Driscoll with Brian Auger and the Trinity's version). A very interesting tune that Danko says came about this way: 

"We would come together every day and work and Dylan would come over. He gave me the typewritten lyrics to 'This Wheel's On Fire'. At that time I was teaching myself to play the piano.... Some music I had written on the piano the day before just seemed to fit with Dylan's lyrics. I worked on the phrasing and the melody. Then Dylan and I wrote the chorus together."

The Band kept playing the tune throughout their career and Dylan inserted it into his Never Ending Tour and played it through the 90's and 00's. 

Cover:

Thoughts on Cover Artist:
The Radiators are New Orleans staples. RtBE loves "Like Dreamers Do" (Thanks Tom) and own some live vinyl from the band, but have yet to truly fall in love with them, but that could always change... 

Thoughts on Cover:

The band kicks the tune up and makes it a bluesy shuffle, prettying it up a bit and shaving off some of the woolly edges, but it still works. A fine cover.