Mornin' Dew - a tale of re-writing

September 24^th – Just a little bit of playing the music detective today; the name’s Re-Morse. Like a much poorer version of an Oxford defective that keeps harking on about old cases.

You’re all aware of my deep liking for Jeff Beck’s album Truth by now, I trust? It’s one of the seminal albums of the late 60’s and you can take that as truth (did you see what I did there) from a convicted rock-lover and blues-o-file. If you’ve not heard a copy then I’m here to tell you your education is sadly lacking; sadly.

For starters and as I’ve mentioned before, it was the last decent recording Rod Stewart did; it’s the one where he proved his blues chops and could (should) have gone on to greater things. He didn’t, I’ve covered it, move on.

The two sides of ten tracks just bristle with the collective of a band on a mission, they take no prisoners and each track is a gem from the fireworks of  Aint Superstitious and You Shook Me through to, IMHO, the stand-out track, Mornin’ Dew. It carries the blues territory and history on its back which Mr. Stewart unloads with a vocal performance of stellar quality and gravitas; it’s just spellbinding in its audacity and it has Jeff Beck and Nicky Hopkins as added zest.

Mornin’ Dew was a Bonnie Dobson original. Mr. Dobson, a Canadian folk musician with limited success, had been recording since the early 60’s and her penning of Mornin Dew, originally a sombre ballad, was heard by the guy who became associated with the song after he updated it, giving it a harder rock edge, and releasing it worldwide to great success; Tim Rose.

Mr. Rose was a jobbing musician who had also had limited success with his songwriting and performing until Mornin’ Dew came along. Mr. Rose first heard the song being performed by Fred Neil, a little known US folksinger in his own right but you’ll probably know him better for his penning of the film music track Everybody’s Talkin’ from the film Midnight Cowboy and possibly through his pioneering work with dolphins. Neil had heard the original by Ms. Dobson and used it in his repertoire and that’s where Mr. Rose heard it, reworked it then…claimed half the writing royalties for it.

As you can imagine that went down like a cup of cold sick with Ms. Dobson who, to this day, resents and denies Mr. Rose’s claim and involvement. Trouble is the loophole in the law allowed him to do that and he profited greatly by it, in fact made a habit of it. He also reworked the song, Hey Joe, the song that made Jimi Hendrix. This was what could be classed as a blues standard and so songwriting credit is virtually impossible to verify. A US band called The Leaves recorded it in ‘56’ but it wasn’t copyrighted until 1962 by two folk singers who both claimed credit for it…but they reckoned without Mr. Rose who re-worked it and also claimed writing credit for it.

It would seem that Tim Rose was very much a struggling songwriter for not only were his two best known, biggest earning songs seemingly written by others he also had the majority of his live successes working or guesting in other people’s bands. His struggles with alcohol must have surely compounded his health problems and he died in London on this day in 2002 aged just 62 after complications during surgery.

The meandering/man in places he shouldn’t be theme continued when he was buried in Brompton cemetery, even though he was born in the US and raised in Washington. He left behind no family and died intestate; he even featured on an episode of Heir Hunters’. I wonder if Bonnie Dobson put in a claim.