Dalton, whose heritage was Cherokee, was born Karen J. Cariker in Enid, Oklahoma. Her bluesy, world-weary voice is often compared to that of iconic jazz singer Billie Holiday. She sang blues, folk, country, pop, Motown - making over each song in her own style. She played the twelve string Gibson guitar and a long neck banjo.
In his 2004 autobiography, Bob Dylan wrote this in his description of discovering and joining the music scene at Greenwich Village's Cafe Wha? after arriving in New York City, New York, United States in 1961: "My favorite singer in the place was Karen Dalton. Karen had a voice like Billie Holiday and played guitar like Jimmy Reed... I sang with her a couple of times."
Dalton's second album, In My Own Time (1971), was recorded at Bearsville Studios and originally released by Woodstock Festival promoter Michael Lang's label, Just Sunshine Records. The album was produced and arranged by Harvey Brooks, who played bass on it. (Harvey Brooks played bass also on the Miles Davis album Bitches Brew, on the Bob Dylan album Highway 61 Revisited and on the Richie Havens album Mixed Bag.) Piano player Richard Bell guested on In My Own Time. Its liner notes were written by Fred Neil and its cover photos were taken by Elliot Landy. Less well-known is Dalton's first album, It's So Hard to Tell Who's Going to Love You the Best (Capitol, 1969), which was re-released by Koch Records on CD in 1996.
Both Dalton's albums were re-released in November 2006: It's So Hard To Tell Who's Going To Love You The Best, on the French Megaphone-Music label, included a bonus DVD featuring rare performance footage of Dalton. In My Own Time was re-released on CD and LP on November 7, 2006 by Light In The Attic Records.
The version of the song Something on Your Mind (composed by Dino Valenti) that is sung by Dalton on her album In My Own Time is the soundtrack during the ending credits of the 2007 film Margot at the Wedding, which was written and directed by Noah Baumbach and starred Nicole Kidman and Jennifer Jason Leigh.
Known as "the folk singer's answer to Billie Holiday" and "Sweet Mother K.D.", Dalton is said to be the subject of the song Katie's Been Gone (composed by Richard Manuel and Robbie Robertson) on the album The Basement Tapes by The Band and Bob Dylan. She struggled with drugs and alcohol for many years. It has been widely reported that she died in 1993 on the streets of New York City after an eight-year battle with AIDS.
However, an article in Uncut magazine confirmed that Dalton was actually being cared for by the guitarist Peter Walker in upstate New York during her last months.
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A cult singer, 12-string guitarist, and banjo player of the New York 1960s folk revival, Karen Dalton still remains known to very few, despite counting the likes of Bob Dylan and Fred Neil among her acquaintances. This was partly because she seldom recorded, only making one album in the 1960s - and that didn't come out until 1969, although she had been known on the Greenwich Village circuit since the beginning of the decade. It was also partly because, unlike other folksingers of the era, she was an interpreter who did not record original material. And it was also because her voice - often compared to Billie Holiday, but with a rural twang - was too strange and inaccessible to pop audiences. Nik Venet, producer of her debut album, went as far as to remark in Goldmine, "She was very much like Billie Holiday. Let me say this, she wasn't Billie Holiday but she had that phrasing Holiday had and she was a remarkable one-of-a-kind type of thing.... Unfortunately, it's an acquired taste, you really have to look for the music."
Dalton grew up in Oklahoma, moving to New York around 1960. Peter Stampfel of the Holy Modal Rounders, who was in her backup band in the early '70s, points out in his liner notes to the CD reissue of her first album that "she was the only folk singer I ever met with an authentic 'folk' background. She came to the folk music scene under her own steam, as opposed to being 'discovered' and introduced to it by people already involved in it." There is a photograph from February 1961 (now printed on the back cover of the It's So Hard to Tell Who's Going to Love You the Best reissue) of Dalton singing and playing with Fred Neil and Bob Dylan, the latter of whom was barely known at the time. Unlike her friends she was unable to even capture a recording contract, spending much of the next few years roaming around North America.
Dalton was not comfortable in the studio, and her Capitol album It's So Hard to Tell Who's Going to Love You the Best came about when Nik Venet, who had tried unsuccessfully to record her several times, invited her to a Fred Neil session. He asked her to cut a Neil composition, "Little Bit of Rain," as a personal favor so he could have it in his private collection; that led to an entire album, recorded in one session, most of the tracks done in one take. Dalton recorded one more album in the early '70s, produced by Harvey Brooks (who had played on some '60s Dylan sessions). Done in Bearsville Studios in Woodstock, it, like her debut, had an eclectic assortment of traditional folk tunes, blues, covers of soul hits ("When a Man Loves a Woman," "How Sweet It Is"), and contemporary numbers by singer/songwriters (Dino Valente, the Band's Richard Manuel). The Band's "Katie's Been Gone," included on The Basement Tapes, is rumored to be about Dalton.
Take Me
Karen Dalton Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
Close every window and bolt every door
The very first moment I heard your voice
I'd be in darkness no more
Take me to the most barren desert
A thousand miles from the nearest sea
The very moment I saw your smile
There's not any mountain too rugged to climb
No desert too barren to cross
Darlin' if you would just show a sign
Of love, I could bear with all loss
Take me to Siberia
And the coldest weather of the winter time,
And it would be just like spring in California
As long as I knew you were mine
Karen Dalton's song "Take Me" expresses the longing for love and the willingness to do whatever it takes to be with the person who inspires those strong feelings. The lyrics paint a vivid picture of the depths of the singer's desperation for love. The first two verses describe a desire to be isolated with the object of affection, even to the point of being in a dark room with no escape, or in a barren desert far away from everyone else. The singer is willing to face extreme environments as long as they are with the one they love. The final verse is the most intense, suggesting that the singer would willingly endure the harshest living conditions just to be with this person, indicating a profound intensity of feeling that surpasses any physical hardship.
The song is both tender and intense in its expression of the desire for love. Karen Dalton's soulful delivery adds depth to the lyrics and enhances their meaning. The song is a declaration of the lengths that love can make a person go to find happiness. "Take Me" is a poignant expression of the quest for love, and the intense longing it can arouse in the human heart.
Line by Line Meaning
Take me in your darkest room
Take me into your hidden self, a place you don't reveal to many.
Close every window and bolt every door
Shut everything out and let us be alone with each other.
The very first moment I heard your voice
From the very beginning, when I first laid my ears on your voice.
I'd be in darkness no more
I'll find the light in your voice and no longer feel lost.
Take me to the most barren desert
Take me to the most lifeless place, where there's nothing but emptiness.
A thousand miles from the nearest sea
The place where there's no sea, for miles and miles.
The very moment I saw your smile
From the start, when I was first captivated by a simple smile.
It would be like heaven to me
It would mean more than anything else in the world to me.
There's not any mountain too rugged to climb
There's no obstacle that's too difficult to overcome.
No desert too barren to cross
No place that's too lifeless or empty to pass through.
Darlin' if you would just show a sign
If only you'd show me some indication of your love.
Of love, I could bear with all loss
I could cope with any hardship as long as there's love.
Take me to Siberia
Take me to the coldest place on earth.
And the coldest weather of the winter time,
In the depths of winter, where it's freezing cold.
And it would be just like spring in California
It would feel like the warmth of spring in California despite the cold.
As long as I knew you were mine
Because of the assurance of your love being mine.
Contributed by Callie W. Suggest a correction in the comments below.
Djifa72
Just discovered this watching Tales From the Loop. Love it!
Jacqueline Alvarez
Same
crank 7777
Take me, take me to your darkest room
Close every window and bolt every door
The very first moment I heard your voice
I'd be in darkness no more
Take me to your most barren desert
A thousand miles from the nearest sea
The very first moment I saw your smile
It would be like heaven to me
There are not any mountain too rugged to climb
No desert too barren to cross
Darlin', if you would just show a sign
Of love, I could bear any loss
Take me to Siberia
And the coldest weather of the winter time
And it would be just like spring in California
As long as I knew you were mine
Yes, it would be just like spring in California
As long as I knew you were mine
Take me, take me
King George
Great song
Joseph Harder
genius
c brigolas
Tales from the loop :)
BankerMonk
Stasis.......!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!