Even the nature of the "house" itself is ambiguous: Most listeners assume it's a brothel, even though the best-known versions of the song never say so.īut Anthony argues that debates over "original versions" and even "authenticity" are misleading.
(Anthony acknowledges, however, that hypothetical early black versions are more likely to have been left undocumented.) Moreover, the song had long been sung from both male and female perspectives. In fact, the song is likely rooted in the 17th-century British ballad tradition, and the earliest known versions were all sung by poor Southern whites. And then there's the notion that until The Animals got hold of it, and switched genders for commercial reasons, it had always been about "the ruin of many a poor girl," not Burdon's "poor boy." For instance, many believe that the song had African-American origins.
Meanwhile, listeners who know that "Rising Sun" had been a folk standard often cling to other myths. "So many people say right out, 'Oh, The Animals wrote that song,'" says Anthony from his office in New York City, where he's an editor for The Associated Press. But it's also where misconceptions about the song begin. The Animals' version, of course, is iconic for a reason: With that arpeggiating electric guitar, spooky organ and Eric Burdon's spine-rattling howl, it's arguably the first folk-rock hit, and perhaps even prefigures psychedelia.
Where did that song come from, he wondered - and how did it end up here? But his continuing fascination with "House of the Rising Sun" began in the least likely, and therefore most appropriate, of places: the Thai restaurant in a New Hampshire town where he heard the song rendered almost unrecognizable as background music. Just when you thought you knew a song: Like most everyone, Ted Anthony believed he had a handle on "The House of the Rising Sun," that lyric of warning, lament and doom The Animals immortalized in their 1964 chart-topper.īut the accomplished journalist, a Pittsburgh native, didn't know the half of it - something he discovered only after an obsession with the tune set him to researching his first book, Chasing the Rising Sun: The Journey of an American Song (Simon & Schuster).Īnthony, 39, grew up in Hampton Township.
0 kommentar(er)
