Wednesday, March 5, 2008

The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll

Every now and again I will come across a song that just stops me in my tracks and I am compelled to listen to over and over again. It usually happens with songs that are beautiful in sound and utterly sad. The best example of this I can't share with you (because it is a Brian Hall song and I may be the only person who owns a copy of it other than him) but is a song about the robbery of a convenient store on Christmas Day and the death of a toddler, it is perhaps the saddest song I have ever heard and yet I love it (I know that sounds weird).

This past weekend we bought the soundtrack for I'm Not There and today on the way to the doctor's office I heard another beautiful, yet sad, song. I urge you to listen to it if you have never heard it and if you have take a listen again for my sake. It is called The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll and Dylan wrote it when he was 22. It is based on the true account of a high society man named William Zantzinger who in 1963 killed a black servent for apparently no reason other than he was drunk at a ball in Baltimore.

I will leave you with this.

-June

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I was just looking around for twin blogs (we just had boy/girl twins) and saw Guided by Voices (my favorite band) and The Royal Tenenbaums (one of my favorite movies) in your interests and I had to comment. Congratulations on the babies!