On this day (August 1) in 1998, Garth Brooks topped the Billboard Hot Country Songs chart with a cover of Bob Dylan’s “To Make You Feel My Love.” Brooks originally recorded the song for the soundtrack of the 1998 film Hope Floats. He would later include it as a bonus track on Fresh Horses in his first Limited Series box set in 1998.
Brooks is one of the most successful artists in country music. He started his career with a string of hits. His debut single “Much Too Young (To Feel This Damn Old)” dropped in 1989 and was a top 10 hit. His self-titled debut album peaked at No. 2 on the Billboard Top Country Albums chart. He carried that momentum into the ‘90s and continued to release hit after hit, seeing success with both singles and albums.
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By the time Brooks recorded “To Make You Feel My Love,” he had released 31 singles. One of those missed the top 20 and 17 of them were chart-toppers. In short, he was on a hot streak and his cover of the Bob Dylan song would extend it.
Garth Brooks Recalls Recording “To Make You Feel My Love”
During a concert, Garth Brooks recalled how he came to record “To Make You Feel My Love.”
“Every artist looks for that one song where [the fans] write in and they say ‘This was me and my husband’s fist dance at our wedding’ or ‘This is what we fell in love to.’ My chance came in 1995, they were shooting a movie called Hope Floats with Sandra Bullock,” he told the crowd. “The phone rings and it’s Forrest Whitaker calling me,” he recalled.
Whitaker invited Brooks to come to see an early screening of the film and discuss adding a song to the soundtrack. He admitted being disappointed that they wanted him to record a cover for the movie. That is, however, until he learned that he would be covering Bob Dylan.
“You’re the coolest luckiest guy if you get to do Dylan’s stuff, man,” Brooks said. “This guy is a genius. If you haven’t figured it out, I’m going to try to BS my way all night long but Dylan is gonna shoot you straight from his heart to yours,” he added.
Brooks Decyphers Dylan
When the CD of “To Make You Feel My Love” came in the mail, Brooks found that he couldn’t understand most of what Dylan was singing and it didn’t come with a lyric sheet. “I didn’t panic, I played it cool. I decided to go buy every Bob Dylan CD I could. And then, I would take the lyrics out of those packages and, like hieroglyphics, I would match noises and phrases. But, people, there are no lyrics in any Bob Dylan packages,” he said as the crowd howled with laughter.
Luckily, the soundtrack’s producer, Don Was contacted him, assuming he was having an issue with the song and asked, “Are you panicking yet?” He then told Brooks that Billy Joel had just recorded the song for his most recent album which included lyrics.
After studying the lyrics from Joel’s album, listening to Dylan’s version of the song on repeat, and adding his style to the mix, Brooks was able to record his version of the song.
Featured Image by Jim Smeal/BEI/Shutterstock
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