Coming down through fields of green

Remembering the late Gordon Lightfoot, one of Bob Dylan's favorite songwriters

When Bob Dylan inducted Gordon Lightfoot into the Canadian Music Hall of fame at the 1986 Juno Awards, he said Lightfoot had turned down the award in the past because he wanted Dylan to do the induction. Now, here he is on the stage. At this point in Dylan’s career, you expect something elliptical but brilliant, probably mumbled. You would be half right. “So, uh, anyway, somebody of rare talent and all that, and here’s a video clip of his recent and not-so-recent-achievements.”

That’s it. A tepid endorsement at best, impersonal and slapdash — but uncharacteristic. Quotes espousing his love for Lightfoot’s work abound, including the one that made me take the Canadian singer-songwriter more seriously: “I can’t think of any Gordon Lightfoot song I don’t like. Every time I hear a song of his, it’s like I wish it would last forever.” 

I backed my way into Dylan through other artists, a sort of hierarchy of needs that I’ll explore at some future point. But after reaching that peak, I came down the other side and into the arms — or rather, that whiskey warm baritone — of Lightfoot.

At a time when I was buying albums like Synchronicity and An Innocent Man and Seven and the Ragged Tiger, I picked up two Gordon Lightfoot singles that were part of Reprise Records’ “Back to Back” series: “Sundown” b/w “Carefree Highway,” and “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald” b/w “Race Among the Ruins.” I’d heard “Sundown” on the country radio station my mom listened to when I was a preschooler, and loved it still a decade later, starting to comprehend why someone would be creeping up Gord’s back stairs.

Those singles, a little worse for wear.

I don’t recall what made me purchase those records at that time other than the fact that I loved those songs and wanted to be able to hear them whenever I wanted. I certainly wasn’t going to hear them on the radio. “Race Among the Ruins” didn’t take at the time, but I had those two A sides and the freshly discovered majesty of “Carefree Highway” as a bonus, so I didn’t seek out more. Chalk that up in part to the times. No YouTube, no Spotify, and no budget to buy an album that wasn’t a sure thing.

It wasn’t until much later, probably when a college friend loaned me a cassette of Gord’s Gold, that I realized just how much more there was, that he wasn’t just a two- or three-hit wonder from the mid-70’s There was the early ‘60s folk scene, signing with Albert Grossman, the spate of hits in the ‘70s, and the seemingly endless string of songs that did so much with so little. A hard strum, a bit of backing, and those melodies. I’m still no expert, content to this day to work my way slowly through a catalog that continues to reveal its wonders.

One I return to again and again is a performance of one of the big early hits, a beautiful version of “Summer Side of Life” that starts a BBC concert from 1972. Lightfoot’s manically strummed 12-string acoustic drives the song, while a bassist and lead guitarist lend just a bit of color. The star is Lightfoot’s voice, so smooth that it took me several listens before the subtle tale of young men heading off to fight in Vietnam revealed itself.

I haven’t listened to much Lightfoot in the last year or two. He suffered health problems that you will read plenty about elsewhere, and toured well beyond the ability of his shattered voice to do his songs justice. Those songs without that voice put me off a bit. But he seemed to bring happiness to people right up to the end, so who am I to judge?

Death remains the best career move, and so I’m sure I will have ample opportunity to revisit Lightfoot’s work in the coming weeks. I’ll be looking for those who suggest songs beyond the obvious, the hidden gems that, as Dylan said, you wish would last forever.

Suggested listens? Comment below.