Thursday, October 8, 2009

Marianne Faithfull / Waylon Jennings - "Dreaming My Dreams With You"

SONG Dreaming My Dreams With You

WRITTEN BY Allen Reynolds

PERFORMED BY Marianne Faithfull; Waylon Jennings; Cowboy Junkies; ... amongst many others.

APPEARS ON "Faithless" (1978); "Dreaming My Dreams With You" (2001); "Trinity Sessions" (1988); ... amongst many others.




"Dreaming My Dreams With You" is a gorgeous song written by singer-songwriter Allen Reynolds who, although having written some fine songs, is probably more famous for his production work with artists of very varied quality! Reynolds is perhaps best known for producing nigh on every Garth Brooks LP. However, he's also produced albums for artists of far better quality such as, amongst others, Kathy Mattea, Hal Ketchum, Crystal Gayle and Emmylou Harris.

An array of artists have covered this classic. Most of them very badly! I was looking for our favourite version - the beautiful fragile Cowboy Junkies version from the mighty "Trinity Sessions" LP - but couldn't find a vid. So instead here's Waylon's decent interpretation of the song (from the 2001 album of the same name) and, perhaps even better, the lovely version by Marianne Faithfull (about whom the song could easily have been written!) from her excellent 1978 comeback album "Faithless".

"Dreaming My Dreams With You" is a complex, beautiful, bijou song of heart-wrenching regret and loneliness, but also too a song affirming the power of love, even in wretched circumstance.

It's a tale of anguished separation from a special loved one lost through the protagonist's unstated weakness. It's a recurring weakness from which he hopes "that I've learned this time."

The haunting refrain of "I'll always miss dreaming my dreams with you" highlights the essence of his longing for those long lost moments of true love. He dreams that the pain will eventually end and that "Someday I'll get over you."

Despite this agony, he still strongly believes in, and affirms, the concept of love ("I won't let it change me. Not if I can. I'd rather believe in love.") However, it may be an idyllic, perhaps over-idealised, concept of love to which he aspires ("I hope that I find what I'm reaching for. The way that it is in my mind.") And that may be his real tragedy.


(Original version at Stupid&Contagious)




LYRICS
I hope that I won't be that wrong anymore
I hope that I've learned this time
I hope that I find what I'm reaching for
The way that it is in my mind

Someday I'll get over you
I'll live to see it all through
But I'll always miss
Dreaming my dreams with you

I won't let it change me
Not if I can
I'd rather believe in love
And give it away
As much as I can
To those that I'm fondest of

Someday I'll get over you
I'll live to see it all through
But I'll always miss
Dreaming my dreams with you

Someday I'll get over you
I'll live to see it all through
But I'll always miss
Dreaming my dreams with you



by Allen Reynolds






Waylon Jennings - "Dreaming My Dreams With You"







Marianne Faithfull - "Dreaming My Dreams With You"











3 comments:

  1. Saw Emmy Lou Harris and Rodney Crowell do this tune on DavidLetterman and it made me tearup as it always does. Their Steel Guitar player was perfection itself, he was as groovy as the words.

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  2. I don't think the text alludes an unnamed weakness of the singer but to the hope that next time he/she will make a better judgement of the person to love and that the heartache won't last that long anymore. But maybe I-M wrong here...

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  3. There is a video version of the Cowboy Junkies doing this song. It's on the DVD of "Trinity Revisited. Margo Timmons shares the vocals with Vic Chestnut. A really good version of a great song.

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