Lyr Req: Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues (Bob Dylan)

Subject: when it rains in juarez ....
From: Crazy Lady
Date: 12 Oct 99 - 08:57 PM

"when it rains in juarez and negativity don't pull ya' through" Does anyone know what song this is from?

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: when it rains in juarez ....
From: Barbara
Date: 12 Oct 99 - 09:25 PM

Bob Dylan wrote it.
The first line is " When you're lost in the rain in Juarez..." and I'll just bet there are a bunch of Dylan sites out there with the words. I haven't got time to search for them now, but I bet someone here can connect you with the necessary info.
The old forgettery is nudging me with the name, what's not the first line. I don't think.
Anyway,

When you're lost in the rain in Juarez,
And it's Eastertime too,
And your gravity fails ya,
Negativity just don't pull you through
don't put on any airs on Rue Morgue Avenue
They got some hungry women there,
They'll sure make a mess outa you-oo-oo.

Blessings,
Barbara

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: when it rains in juarez ....
From: dwo
Date: 13 Oct 99 - 04:12 PM

I'm pretty sure it's titled "Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues". Judy Collins recorded it too, on the album "In My Life". Who else remembers that record with great fondness?

doug

Subject: Lyr Add: JUST LIKE TOM THUMB'S BLUES (Bob Dylan)
From: Peter T.
Date: 13 Oct 99 - 06:41 PM

This is from memory, so the verses may be out of order, and there may be one or more missing. As the literary critic Christopher Ricks once said, Dylan is the only poet who would think of using the murders in the Rue Morgue, and add the English word meaning street that has a "ue" ending to it. What nerve!
Yours, Peter T.


When you're lost in the rain in Juarez, and it's Eastertime too
And your gravity fails, and negativity won't pull you through,
Don't put on any airs when you're down on Rue Morgue Avenue,
They got some hungry women there, and they'll really make a mess out of you.

If you see St. Annie, please tell her thanks a lot
I cannot move, and my fingers they are all in a knot,
I haven't got the strength to get up and take another shot,
And my best friend the doctor, won't even say what I've got."

Sweet Melinda, the peasants call her the goddess of bloom
She speaks good English, and she invites you up into her room
And you're so kind and careful not to go to her too soon,
And she takes your voice, and leaves you howling at the moon.

Up on Housing Project Hill, it's either fortune or fame
You can pick one or the other, though neither of them are to be what they claim,
And if you're looking to get silly, you better go back to from where you came,
Cause the cops don't need you, and man they expect the same.

All the authorities they just stand around and boast,
How they blackmailed the sergeant-at-arms into leaving his post,
And picking up Angel, who just arrived here from the coast
Who looked so fine at first, but left looking just like a ghost.

Well, I started out on burgundy, but soon hit the harder stuff,
Everybody said they'd stand beside me when the game got rough
But the joke was on me, there was nobody even there to bluff
I'm going back to New York City, I do believe I've had enough.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: when it rains in juarez ....
From: Jeremiah McCaw
Date: 14 Oct 99 - 04:03 AM

And (trivia time) the first recording I ever heard by Gordon Lightfoot, almost the first record (45) he ever made.