Cool Water
Encyclopedia
"Cool Water" is a song written in 1936
by Bob Nolan
. It is about a man and his mule, Dan, and a mirage in the desert.
and The Sons of the Pioneers in 1948
. The recording was released by RCA Victor Records as catalog number
20-2923. The record was on the Billboard magazine chart for 13 weeks beginning on August 6, 1948, peaking at #9.
boxed set, released on Mercury Records in 1998. It also appears in the film Rango
, set in an Old West town populated by animals that is suffering from drought. Every Wednesday, the townspeople perform a ritual they believe will return water to their town, during which the song plays over a PA system.
Frankie Laine
and The Mellomen
took it to #2 on the British charts in 1955.
Marty Robbins
recorded the song on his 1959 album Gunfighter Ballads and Trail Songs
.
Burl Ives
recorded this song on his 1961 album Songs of the West
.
Odetta
recorded the song in 1963 on her One Grain of Sand
album.
The Shadows
recorded this in 1965 for a television show; later released on the Italian compilation album Dakota.
Fleetwood Mac
also covered this song in 1982; it was the B-side to the single "Gypsy"
.
Other covers of the song were done by Riders in the Sky, Jack Scott, Ramblin' Jack Elliott
and Slim Whitman
, among others.
The Muppets
(Lubbock Lou and His Jughuggers) also covered the song on the set for "Singin' in the Rain" in Episode 501 after Gene Kelly refuses to go on.
The Gaither Vocal Band covered this song as well. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MT7_MUiiuRU&NR=1
Joni Mitchell
recorded "Cool Water" (with revised lyrics), released on Chalk Mark in a Rainstorm
, March 23, 1988.
Nellie Lutcher
also covered this song.
Bob Dylan
and The Band
recorded "Cool Water" during the Basement Tapes sessions, but the cover is only available in bootleg
form.
Leo Kottke
performed a version on the album Burnt Lips
.
The Replacements recorded this song around 1986; it is on a re-released version of Pleased to Meet Me
.
Johnny Cash
covered this on his second posthumous record American VI: Ain't No Grave
Courtney Jaye
and Peter Hayes
- Cool Water's cover (2008)
Ramblin Jack Elliot recorded "cool water" on his album Country Style/Live
1936 in music
-Events:*January 4 – Billboard magazine publishes its first music hit parade*March 28 – Inaugurational concert of the São Paulo City Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Ernst Mehlich...
by Bob Nolan
Bob Nolan
Bob Nolan was a Canadian-born American singer, songwriter, and actor. He was a founding member of the Sons of the Pioneers, and composer of numerous Country music and Western music songs, including the standards "Cool Water" and "Tumbling Tumbleweeds." He is generally regarded as one of the...
. It is about a man and his mule, Dan, and a mirage in the desert.
Original version
The best-selling recorded version was done by Vaughn MonroeVaughn Monroe
Vaughn Wilton Monroe was an American baritone singer, trumpeter and big band leader and actor, most popular in the 1940s and 1950s. He has two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for recording and radio.-Biography:...
and The Sons of the Pioneers in 1948
1948 in music
-Events:*May 20 - The Second International Congress of Composers and Music Critics 1948 opens in Prague.*June 5 - Opening of the first Aldeburgh Festival, founded by Benjamin Britten, Eric Crozier and Peter Pears....
. The recording was released by RCA Victor Records as catalog number
Catalog numbering systems for single records
This article presents the numbering systems used by various record companies for single records.- Capitol :...
20-2923. The record was on the Billboard magazine chart for 13 weeks beginning on August 6, 1948, peaking at #9.
Other artists
Hank Williams recorded the song in 1948 or 1949 for the Johnny Fair Syrup Company radio show on KWKH in Shreveport, Louisiana. The recording is available on The Complete Hank WilliamsThe Complete Hank Williams
The Complete Hank Williams is an award-winning 1998 box set collecting almost all of the recorded works of country music legend Hank Williams, from his first recorded track in 1937 to the last session prior to his untimely death in 1952 at the age of 29...
boxed set, released on Mercury Records in 1998. It also appears in the film Rango
Rango (2011 film)
Rango is a 2011 American computer-animated Western Comedy film directed by Gore Verbinski and produced by Graham King. In the film, a chameleon named Rango accidentally ends up in the town of Dirt, an outpost that is in desperate need of a new sheriff...
, set in an Old West town populated by animals that is suffering from drought. Every Wednesday, the townspeople perform a ritual they believe will return water to their town, during which the song plays over a PA system.
Frankie Laine
Frankie Laine
Frankie Laine, born Francesco Paolo LoVecchio , was a successful American singer, songwriter, and actor whose career spanned 75 years, from his first concerts in 1930 with a marathon dance company to his final performance of "That's My Desire" in 2005...
and The Mellomen
The Mellomen
The Mellomen were a popular singing quartet active from the late 1940s through the mid-1970s. The group was founded by Thurl Ravenscroft and Max Smith in 1948. The Mellomen recorded under a variety of names, including Big John & The Buzzards, The Crackerjacks, The Lee Brothers, and The Ravenscroft...
took it to #2 on the British charts in 1955.
Marty Robbins
Marty Robbins
Martin David Robinson , known professionally as Marty Robbins, was an American singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist...
recorded the song on his 1959 album Gunfighter Ballads and Trail Songs
Gunfighter Ballads and Trail Songs
Gunfighter Ballads and Trail Songs is an album released by Marty Robbins on the Columbia Records label in September 1959, peaking at #6 on the U.S. pop albums chart. It was recorded on April 7, 1959...
.
Burl Ives
Burl Ives
Burl Icle Ivanhoe Ives was an American actor, writer and folk music singer. As an actor, Ives's work included comedies, dramas, and voice work in theater, television, and motion pictures. Music critic John Rockwell said, "Ives's voice .....
recorded this song on his 1961 album Songs of the West
Songs of the West (Burl Ives album)
Songs of the West is one of several albums from the early 1960s that signalled Burl Ives's move away from folk music into country western and pop. In Ives's discography this album is immediately preceded by The Versatile Burl Ives! and followed by It's Just My Funny Way of Laughin, two Decca...
.
Odetta
Odetta
Odetta Holmes, known as Odetta, was an American singer, actress, guitarist, songwriter, and a human rights activist, often referred to as "The Voice of the Civil Rights Movement". Her musical repertoire consisted largely of American folk music, blues, jazz, and spirituals...
recorded the song in 1963 on her One Grain of Sand
One Grain of Sand
One Grain of Sand is an album by American folk singer Odetta, first released in 1963. It was re-released on CD in 1997.-Track listing:All songs Traditional unless otherwise noted.#"Sail Away, Ladies" – 2:41#"Moses, Moses" – 3:00...
album.
The Shadows
The Shadows
The Shadows are a British pop group with a total of 69 UK hit-charted singles: 35 as 'The Shadows' and 34 as 'Cliff Richard and the Shadows', from the 1950s to the 2000s. Cliff Richard in casual conversation with the British rock press frequently refers to the Shadows by their nickname: 'The Shads'...
recorded this in 1965 for a television show; later released on the Italian compilation album Dakota.
Fleetwood Mac
Fleetwood Mac
Fleetwood Mac are a British–American rock band formed in 1967 in London.The only original member present in the band is its eponymous drummer, Mick Fleetwood...
also covered this song in 1982; it was the B-side to the single "Gypsy"
Gypsy (Fleetwood Mac song)
"Gypsy" is a song by the rock group Fleetwood Mac. Stevie Nicks wrote the song originally circa 1979, and the earliest demo recordings were recorded in early 1980 with Tom Moncrieff for possible inclusion on her solo debut Bella Donna. However, when Nicks' friend Robin Anderson died of leukemia,...
.
Other covers of the song were done by Riders in the Sky, Jack Scott, Ramblin' Jack Elliott
Ramblin' Jack Elliott
Ramblin' Jack Elliott is an American folk singer and performer.-Life and career:Elliot Charles Adnopoz was born in Brooklyn, New York to Jewish parents in 1931. Elliott grew up inspired by the rodeos at Madison Square Garden, and wanted to be a cowboy...
and Slim Whitman
Slim Whitman
Ottis Dewey Whitman, Jr. , known professionally as Slim Whitman, is an American country music singer and songwriter, known for his yodelling abilities. He has sold in excess of 120 million albums in unit sales and has had numerous successful recordings...
, among others.
The Muppets
The Muppets
The Muppets are a group of puppet characters created by Jim Henson starting in 1954–55. Although the term is often used to refer to any puppet that resembles the distinctive style of The Muppet Show, the term is both an informal name and legal trademark owned by the Walt Disney Company in reference...
(Lubbock Lou and His Jughuggers) also covered the song on the set for "Singin' in the Rain" in Episode 501 after Gene Kelly refuses to go on.
The Gaither Vocal Band covered this song as well. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MT7_MUiiuRU&NR=1
Joni Mitchell
Joni Mitchell
Joni Mitchell, CC is a Canadian musician, singer songwriter, and painter. Mitchell began singing in small nightclubs in her native Saskatchewan and Western Canada and then busking in the streets and dives of Toronto...
recorded "Cool Water" (with revised lyrics), released on Chalk Mark in a Rainstorm
Chalk Mark in a Rainstorm
Chalk Mark in a Rain Storm is the thirteenth album by Joni Mitchell, released in 1988. It was her third for Geffen Records. The album features various duets with guest artists such as Peter Gabriel on "My Secret Place", Willie Nelson on "Cool Water", Don Henley on "Snakes and Ladders", Billy Idol...
, March 23, 1988.
Nellie Lutcher
Nellie Lutcher
Nellie Lutcher was an African-American R&B and jazz singer and pianist, who gained prominence in the late 1940s and early 1950s...
also covered this song.
Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan is an American singer-songwriter, musician, poet, film director and painter. He has been a major and profoundly influential figure in popular music and culture for five decades. Much of his most celebrated work dates from the 1960s when he was an informal chronicler and a seemingly...
and The Band
The Band
The Band was an acclaimed and influential roots rock group. The original group consisted of Rick Danko , Garth Hudson , Richard Manuel , and Robbie Robertson , and Levon Helm...
recorded "Cool Water" during the Basement Tapes sessions, but the cover is only available in bootleg
Counterfeit
To counterfeit means to illegally imitate something. Counterfeit products are often produced with the intent to take advantage of the superior value of the imitated product...
form.
Leo Kottke
Leo Kottke
Leo Kottke is an acoustic guitarist. He is widely known for his innovative fingerpicking style, which draws on influences from blues, jazz, and folk music, and his syncopated, polyphonic melodies...
performed a version on the album Burnt Lips
Burnt Lips
Burnt Lips is an album by American guitarist Leo Kottke, released in 1978. It peaked at #143 on the Billboard Pop Albums charts.-History:Burnt Lips includes two selections from the soundtrack of Terrence Malick's film Days of Heaven. Only one is heard in the movie; an abbreviation of "The Train and...
.
The Replacements recorded this song around 1986; it is on a re-released version of Pleased to Meet Me
Pleased to Meet Me
Pleased to Meet Me is the sixth full-length album by The Replacements. It was released on July 7, 1987 .The album to some degree maintains the style of the previous album, and major label debut, Tim...
.
Johnny Cash
Johnny Cash
John R. "Johnny" Cash was an American singer-songwriter, actor, and author, who has been called one of the most influential musicians of the 20th century...
covered this on his second posthumous record American VI: Ain't No Grave
American VI: Ain't No Grave
Upon its release, the album received generally positive reviews from music critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album received an average score of 78, based on 19 reviews, which indicates "generally favorable reviews"...
Courtney Jaye
Courtney Jaye
- Biography :Courtney Jaye was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and moved to Alpharetta, Georgia, when she was a freshman in high school. It was at this time she discovered The Grateful Dead and Neil Young, and also began to play the guitar. After becoming immersed in the bohemian culture, she...
and Peter Hayes
Peter Hayes
Peter Hayes is a contemporary sculptor now based in Bath, England, whose work is displayed in public locations including the UK, US, Canada and Belgium.- Life and works :...
- Cool Water's cover (2008)
Ramblin Jack Elliot recorded "cool water" on his album Country Style/Live
Charts
Frankie Laine version| Chart (1955) | Peak position |
|---|---|
| United Kingdom (NME NME The New Musical Express is a popular music publication in the United Kingdom, published weekly since March 1952. It started as a music newspaper, and gradually moved toward a magazine format during the 1980s, changing from newsprint in 1998. It was the first British paper to include a singles... ) |
2 |
| United Kingdom (Record Mirror) | 1 |
Sources
- Bob Nolan 1994 WMA Hall of Fame Member last accessed February 22, 2007.
- Vaughn Monroe -1973 last accessed February 22, 2007.
- The Legendary Frankie Lane last accessed February 22, 2007.
- Gypsy/Cool Water (1982) - Fleetwood Mac last accessed February 22, 2007.
External links
- Bob Nolan website
- http://www.lastfm.fr/music/Courtney+Jaye+and+Peter+Hayes