If Not For You

Cameron Crowe, in the essay included in Biograph, calls this song, “infectious”. He writes:

This infectious love song from New Morning was a hit recordng for both Olivia Newton-John and George Harrison. Dylan’s own definitive version was never released as a single. “I wrote the song thinking about my wife…it seemed simple enough, sort of tex-mex. I would never explore all the possibilities of instumentation in the sudio, add parts and so forth, chagne the beart around, so it came off kind of folky.”

Although Dylan is known as a sophisticated lyricist, he is also a master of the simple love song. Writing a simple love song is not so simple. I’ll Keep It With Mine, Love Sick, Make You Feel My Love, are a few examples where Dylan successfully threads the needle between a sickly sentimental and a fine love song.

Rolling Stone magazine ranks it as #55 on Dylan’s all-time great song list.

He didn’t play it live until 1992, although Dylan had included it in rehearsals and sound checks. Dylan and Harrison tried it out before the Concert for Bangladesh but decided against it. Judging from the quality of the rehearsal, probably a good idea (see below).

Bob Versions

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ePUgKh8k8V0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W5J23P_8EYI

Duet with Harrison at a rehearsal for the Concert for Bangladesh. Included as an extra in a later version of the DVD.

Covers

From Harrison’s album All Things Must Pass.


Lyrics

If not for you
Babe, I couldn’t find the door
Couldn’t even see the floor
I’d be sad and blue
If not for you

If not for you
Babe, I’d lay awake all night
Wait for the mornin’ light
To shine in through
But it would not be new
If not for you

If not for you
My sky would fall
Rain would gather too
Without your love I’d be nowhere at all
I’d be lost if not for you
And you know it’s true

If not for you
My sky would fall
Rain would gather too
Without your love I’d be nowhere at all
Oh! what would I do
If not for you

If not for you
Winter would have no spring
Couldn’t hear the robin sing
I just wouldn’t have a clue
Anyway it wouldn’t ring true
If not for you

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