Tight Connection to My Heart (Has Anybody Seen My Love)

"Tight Connection to My Heart (Has Anybody Seen My Love)" is a song by Bob Dylan that was released on his 1985 album Empire Burlesque. As a single, it was a Top 40 Hit in New Zealand and Belgium. An earlier version of the song, entitled "Someone's Got a Hold of My Heart", was recorded for Dylan's 1983 LP, Infidels, but was not included on that album; it later appeared on The Bootleg Series Volumes 1–3 (Rare & Unreleased) 1961–1991.

"Tight Connection to My Heart (Has Anybody Seen My Love)"
Single by Bob Dylan
from the album Empire Burlesque
B-side"We Better Talk This Over"
Released1985
GenreRock, new wave
Length5:22
LabelColumbia
Songwriter(s)Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan singles chronology
"Jokerman"
(1983)		 "Tight Connection to My Heart (Has Anybody Seen My Love)"
(1985)		 "When the Night Comes Falling from the Sky"
(1985)

Development and recording

"Someone's Got a Hold of My Heart"

An early version of "Tight Connection to My Heart (Has Anybody Seen My Love)" was recorded during sessions for Infidels, Dylan's 1983 album, as "Someone's Got a Hold of My Heart".[1] A total of thirteen takes of the song were recorded at the Power Station Studio in New York City, in three of the recording sessions, on April 16, April 25, and April 26.[2] On the recording sheet, the song was listed as "Hold of My Heart".[2] One of the April 25 takes was released on The Bootleg Series Volumes 1–3 (Rare & Unreleased) 1961–1991.[1]

Personnel

The following musicians played on the recording released on The Bootleg Series Volumes 1–3 (Rare & Unreleased) 1961–1991:[3]

"Tight Connection to My Heart (Has Anybody Seen My Love)"

Music

Dylan used the basic track from one of the "Someone's Got a Hold of My Heart" takes from 1983, and added vocal overdubs in January 1985, including vocals by female backup singers.[4]

Lyrics
Humphrey Bogart and Mary Astor in the 1941 film The Maltese Falcon. Dylan borrowed lines from this and other Bogart films for "Tight Connection to My Heart".

Dylan biographer Michael Gray notes that, as elsewhere on the Empire Burlesque album, "Tight Connection to My Heart" includes references to a number of lines of dialogue from Humphrey Bogart films.[5] In Sirocco, Bogart says, "‘I’ve got to move fast: I can’t with you around my neck", which becomes "Well I had to move fast / And I couldn’t with you around my neck" in the song. Also in Sirocco, Bogart says, "I don’t know whether I’m too good for you or you’re too good for me", changed to "But I can’t figure out if I’m too good for you / Or if you’re too good for me" in "Tight Connection to My Heart".[5] In The Maltese Falcon, when Bogart's character [Sam Spade] is told, "We wanna talk to you, Spade", he replies, "Well, go ahead and talk"; Dylan turns this into "You want to talk to me, / Go ahead and talk".[5] Gray writes that Dylan's line "I’ll go along with the charade / Until I can think my way out" is said in the movie Tokyo Joe[5] (this line has elsewhere been attributed to another Bogart film, Sahara).[6] A variation on this same line was also used in the Star Trek episode "The Squire of Gothos" in 1967.[5] In The Oklahoma Kid, Bogart says to James Cagney, "I wanna talk to you, kid," and Cagney replies "Go ahead and talk." Cagney is later arrested for a crime he didn't commit, and kills two men for attempting to get away when he is arresting them for the crime. The song includes the lines, "You wanna talk to me / Go ahead and talk /... I must be guilty of something" and "Later he'll be shot for resisting arrest."

Gray additionally hears references to some non-Bogart films in the song. In Now and Forever, from 1934, Gary Cooper says about some police officers that "Close up they don’t look as large as they do from a distance"; in the song this becomes "What looks large from a distance / Close up ain’t never that big."[5] Other references are to "Memphis in June", the Hoagy Carmichael song used in Johnny Angel, and to the film title Town Without Pity.[5]

About the film references, biographer Clinton Heylin complains of Dylan's "reliance on the dialogue of Hollywood scriptwriters for any lyrical gaps, as he replaced blazingly original lines from 'Someone's Got a Hold of My Heart' with excerpts from Humphrey Bogart movie scripts".[7] Jonathan Lethem, contributor to The Cambridge Companion to Bob Dylan, is likewise disappointed that the rewrite "replaces the original's vulnerable tone with a Bogartishly hardboiled one".[8] Gray writes that "these film script snatches... are so unmemorable and unarresting as content yet are mostly so attractive, tersely energetic and imitable as conversational rhythms, and offer cadences of heightened moment: they are great movie lines, in fact, and understandably appealing to [Dylan]."[5] He adds that in some of the instances, "Dylan’s sub-editing, his tightening-up, gives [the lines] their radiance. You might feel that they’re easy building blocks for writer’s-block sufferers, or for singer-songwriters with nothing special to say. Or you might feel that Dylan has made himself inward with, and then re-expressed creatively, yet another branch of American popular culture: one that may have been handed down from above, from the on-highs of Hollywood, but one that has inhabited the shared minds of millions of ordinary people."[5]

Personnel

The following musicians played on the recording released on Empire Burlesque:[9]

  • Bob Dylan – Keyboards, vocals
  • Mick Taylor – Guitar
  • Ted Perlman – Guitar
  • Robbie Shakespeare – Bass
  • Sly Dunbar – Drums
  • Carol Dennis – Backing vocals
  • Queen Esther Marrow – Backing vocals
  • Peggi Blu – Backing vocals

Release and appraisal

"Tight Connection to My Heart (Has Anybody Seen My Love)" was released as the opening track on Empire Burlesque on May 30, 1985.[9] As a single, it was released with "We Better Talk This Over" as the B-side;[10] this song first appeared on 1978's Street-Legal.[11] The single reached the Top 10 in New Zealand[10] and the Top 40 in Belgium;[12] it also reached No. 71 in Canada.[13] In the 2000s, the song was put on the Dylan compilation The Ultimate Collection,[14] as well as on certain editions of The Essential Bob Dylan, including the "Limited Tour Edition"[15][16] and the "Australian Bonus Tracks Edition".[17]

AllMusic critic Stephen Thomas Erlewine describes "Tight Connection to My Heart" as a "subtle gem",[18] while for Thomas Ward, also of AllMusic, the song is "tremendous fun".[19] The writers of The New Rolling Stone Album Guide, include the composition in "the all-time canon of great Dylan songs on lousy Dylan albums".[20] Similarly, critic Anthony Varesi, for whom "the bulk of [Empire Burlesque] is unattractive", characterizes "Tight Connection to My Heart" as "fantastic".[21] The editors of Mojo magazine likewise praise the song, calling it "deeply '80s but entertainingly breezy" while lamenting that Empire Burlesque "fails to scrape even modest heights thereafter".[22]

Live performances and covers
British singer-songwriter John Martyn, shown here in 2006, is among the artists who have covered "Tight Connection to My Heart (Has Anybody Seen My Love)".

Dylan performed "Tight Connection to My Heart" 14 times in the early 1990s. He first performed it on January 12, 1990, in New Haven, Connecticut, and then 11 more times in 1990.[23] On November 16 and 17, 1993, he played the song twice in New York City.[23]

John Martyn released a cover on the first pressing of his 1986 album Piece by Piece .[24]

The song makes an appearance in the Dylan-sanctioned Dustbowl play Girl from the North Country by Conor McPherson, hauntingly sung by Sheila Atim and arranged by Simon Hale in performances at London's Old Vic theatre in August 2017.[25]

Charts
Chart (1985) Peak
position
Belgian Charts 38[12]
Canadian RPM Singles Chart 71[13]
New Zealand Singles Charts 8[10]
US Billboard Bubbling Under Hot 100 Singles 103[26]
US Billboard Top Rock Tracks 19[27]

Notes
  1. Bauldie 1991
  2. Bjorner 2003
  3. The Bootleg Series Volumes 1–3: Liner Notes
  4. Heylin 2010, p. 266
  5. Gray 2008, pp. 226–227
  6. Spurge 2012
  7. Heylin 2010, p. 265
  8. Lethem 2009, p. 163
  9. Empire Burlesque: Liner Notes
  10. Bob Dylan – Tight Connection to My Heart (Has Anybody Seen My Love) (Charts.org.nz)
  11. Erlewine: Street-Legal Review
  12. Bob Dylan – Tight Connection to My Heart (Has Anybody Seen My Love) (Ultratop)
  13. Top Singles - Volume 42, No. 21, August 03 1985
  14. Bob Dylan – The Ultimate Collection (Album)
  15. Erlewine: The Essential Bob Dylan "Limited Tour Edition" Overview
  16. Bob Dylan – The Essential (Album)
  17. Erlewine: The Essential Bob Dylan "Australian Bonus Tracks Edition" Overview
  18. Erlewine: Empire Burlesque Review
  19. Ward
  20. Brackett 2004, p. 265
  21. Varesi 2002, p. 171
  22. Blake 2008, p. 275
  23. Tight Connection to My Heart (Has Anybody Seen My Love): Discover
  24. Caldwell
  25. "Sheila Atim Performs 'Tight Connection To My Heart' From Girl From the North Country", The Old Vic, August 2, 2017.
  26. Bubbling Under, p. 66
  27. Empire Burlesque: Billboard Singles

References
  • Bauldie, John (1991). The Bootleg Series Volumes 1–3 (Rare & Unreleased) 1961–1991 (CD booklet). Bob Dylan. New York: Columbia Records.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Björner, Olof (2003-08-18). "Still on the Road: 1983 Sessions". Bjorner.com. Retrieved 2012-09-24.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Blake, Mark (ed.) (2008). Dylan: Visions, Portraits, Backpages. Mojo. ISBN 978-0756637255.CS1 maint: extra text: authors list (link) CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • "Bob Dylan – The Essential (Album)" (in Dutch). GfK Dutch Charts. Retrieved 2012-09-06.
  • "Bob Dylan – Tight Connection to My Heart (Has Anybody Seen My Love)". Ultratop. Retrieved 2012-09-24.
  • "Bob Dylan – Tight Connection to My Heart (Has Anybody Seen My Love)". charts.nz. Retrieved 2012-10-07.
  • "Bob Dylan – The Ultimate Collection (Album)". charts.nz. Retrieved 2012-10-07.
  • "The Bootleg Series Volumes 1–3: Liner Notes". Bobdylan.com. Archived from the original on 1998-01-29. Retrieved 2012-11-03.
  • Brackett, Nathan, with Christian Hoard (2004). The New Rolling Stone Album Guide (4th ed.). Fireside Books. ISBN 0-7432-0169-8.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • "Bubbling Under". Billboard. 1985-07-27. Retrieved 2012-09-24.
  • Caldwell, Rob. "Piece by Piece Review". Allmusic. Retrieved 2012-09-29.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • "Empire Burlesque: Billboard Singles". Allmusic. Retrieved 2012-09-24.
  • "Empire Burlesque: Liner Notes". Bobdylan.com. Archived from the original on 1998-01-29. Retrieved 2012-11-03.
  • Erlewine, Stephen Thomas. "Empire Burlesque Review". Allmusic. Retrieved 2012-09-24.
  • Erlewine, Stephen Thomas. "The Essential Bob Dylan "Australian Bonus Tracks Edition" Overview". Allmusic. Retrieved 2012-09-24.
  • Erlewine, Stephen Thomas. "The Essential Bob Dylan "Limited Tour Edition" Overview". Allmusic. Retrieved 2012-09-24.
  • Erlewine, Stephen Thomas. "Street-Legal Review". Allmusic. Retrieved 2012-10-21.
  • Gray, Michael (2008). The Bob Dylan Encyclopedia (Revised and Updated ed.). Continuum. ISBN 978-0826429742.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Gray, Michael (2000). Song & Dance Man III: The Art of Bob Dylan. Continuum. ISBN 0-304-70762-7.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Heylin, Clinton (1995). Bob Dylan: The Recording Sessions, 1960–1994. St. Martin's Griffin. ISBN 0-312-15067-9.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Heylin, Clinton (2010). Still on the Road: The Songs of Bob Dylan, 1974–2006. Chicago Review Press. ISBN 9781569767597.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Lethem, Jonathan (2009). The Cambridge Companion to Bob Dylan. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0521714945.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Riley, Tim (1992). Hard Rain. Alfred A. Knopf. ISBN 0-394-57889-9.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Splurge, Bill (2012-07-23). "Ranking Bob Dylan's 33 Studio Albums: No. 29 - 'Empire Burlesque'". Guitar Aficionado. Retrieved 2012-10-17.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • "Tight Connection to My Heart (Has Anybody Seen My Love): Discover". Bobdylan.com. Retrieved 2012-10-20.
  • "Top Singles - Volume 42, No. 21, August 03 1985". RPM. 1985-08-03. Retrieved 2012-09-24.
  • Varesi, Anthony (2002). The Bob Dylan Albums: A Critical Study. Guernica Editions. Retrieved 2012-10-11.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Ward, Thomas. "Tight Connect to My Heart (Has Anybody Seen My Love) Review". Allmusic. Retrieved 2012-10-11.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
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