I got to play harp behind him and the band The Call at their Austin show. Michael Been, the leader of The Call, was in The Last Temptation of Christ with Harry and they jammed a lot on location. That led to an acoustic tour. Harry is a cool guy who can play guitar and sing pretty good but defered to me for harp for the night. He didn't want to talk anything movies as he was a musician for those nights. Doug Sahm of Sir Douglas Quintent and the Texas Tornados also played with us. I got in on the show via Michael who was very supportive of my music and had my band open his Texas shows. I miss him as he died a while back. Most everyone I know musically is dead. Charlie Musselwhite is one of the few left from my days of playing full time. Walter ---------- walter tore's spontobeat - a real one man band and over 1 million spontaneously created songs and growing. I record about 300 full length cds a year in the Tunnel of Dreams Studio. " life is a daring adventure or nothing at all" - helen keller
It's a little thing, but I really liked the little micropause he took right before the final 'rain'.
The whole thing, the softness of the singing, even the sort of sloppy entrance on the harmonicas first note, really served the song well. It made it sound like something heartfelt rather than something produced... even the video, which was obviously very carefully shot, managed to avoid look very intimate.
You can get all the musical parts right, but being able to make it seem natural...
You know, I don't think I liked this song until I heard this version.
Saw this and thought of this thread... mostly it focuses on his acting. (Edit... warning, there are a couple brief moments of nsfw dialogue.)
On a side note, the YouTube series focuses on character actors. It would be kind of interesting to see something like this for journeymen/backing band guys if anyone wants to launch a YouTube career!
Harry Dean Stanton was one of my very favorite actors for decades and I never heard him play harmonica before. I knew he sang and played guitar but I didn't know about his harp playing. He was a very talented guy. RIP Harry.
If you start watching a lot of old movie's and TV shows, ya see him all the time, but I can only think of one movie where he played the harp, Kelly's Hero's, think it was made mid 1960s.
