Dead Songs in Depth

    
One More Saturday Night
w&m: Weir
AGDL: http://arts.ucsc.edu/gdead/agdl/snit.html
LASF: http://www.whitegum.com/songfile/ONEMORES.HTM
  

    
One More Saturday Night 
Lyrics: Bob Weir (note 1)
Music: Bob Weir

Copyright Ice Nine Publishing; used by permission.

I went down to the mountain, I was drinking some wine
I looked up into heaven, lord I saw a mighty sign
Writ in fire across the heaven, plain as black and white
Get prepared, there's gonna be a party tonight

Chorus:
Uh huh, hey, Saturday night
One more Saturday night
Hey, Saturday night

Everybody's dancing down at the local armoury
With a basement full of dynamite and live artillery
Temperature keeps rising, everybody getting high
Come the rocking stroke of midnight, the whole place is gonna fly

[chorus]

I turn on Channel Six, the President comes on the news
Says I got no satisfaction, that's why I sing the blues
His wife says don't get crazy, Lord you know what to do
Just crank that old Victrola, put on your rocking shoes

[chorus]

Then God way up in heaven, for whatever it was worth
Thought he'd have a big old party, thought he'd call it planet earth
Don't worry about tomorrow, Lord, you'll know it when it comes
When the rocking, rolling music meets the rising, shining sun

[chorus]
  

    



Tom Burnham writes:



The first time GD played in St. Louis, (1968, brought in by Jorge
Martinez), their venue was the St, Louis Armory, a repository for military
hardware. Curious to know if the line "down at the local armory" was inspired
by the concert locale.
Tom
  

    <scribbled by tnf Wed 8 Sep 04 17:33>
  

    
They also played the Santa Venetia armory in Marin County, I think. Have to
check Deadbase...
  

    
They rehearsed there, didn't they?
  

    
I don't know! But wouldn't it be great if they rehearsed there, and wrote
the song at that same time period. Any thoughts?
  

    

Seems to me the Keith Godchaux rehearsals from September 1971 took place at
teh santa Venetia Armory.  That could be around the time Bobby was writing
the song, which was introduced in October 1971.
  

    
I worked across the street from that armory for the past four years. I
wonder if there really is a basement full of dynamite?
  

    
Just don't light a match when you go down there ;-)
  

    
.....and live artillary?
  

    

I may be young and crazy
But I don't see Reason One
For fightin' and complainin'
When we should be havin' fun

- 10/26/71
  

    
Damn! A verse I don't have! Too late for the Annotated Lyrics book, I'm
pretty sure...
  

    

Over on DeadNet Central, Robert Hunter posted this verse from his original
lyric of "One More Saturday Night," which he had originally titled
"U.S.Blues"!!!


Dynamitin’ depot, bricks are pourin down
Cost your reputation if they catch you hangin round
Ev’ry choice you look at serves but to confuse
Reckon you could call it the United States Blues
Oh baby, One more Saturday night
Unhuh, One more Saturday night
  

    
David--can you give us a URL for that posting by Hunter?
  

    

It's in the Hunter discussion, in the Discussion Hotline folder, at DeadNet
Central - <http://hotline.deadnetcentral.com> )

I can't post a URL because last time I did that it included my password and
whoever clicked on it was logged in as me!

The exchange took place on July 30.
  

    
rh also declined to deny the conjecture that the "You can call this
song the United States Blues" line in "US Blues" was a statement to
Weir in view of the fate of the first song with that title, FWIW.
  

    
like many also-ran stanzas from the hunter book this one scans rather
awkwardly
  

    
Dennis McNally's book, "A Long Strange Trip" has an account of how
this song was written:
"[Weir and Hunter] clashed again over "One More Saturday Night."
Having gotten Hunter's lyrics, Weir rewrote them--badly in Hunter's
opinion--and then asked to call the resulting song "U.S.Blues," which
Hunter refused to permit. In the end, he declined any association with
the song and it was credited to Weir alone." [p393]

David Gans asked Bob Weir about this in an interview on 2 March 2004:
Gans: A story that ... I wanted to check out with you is, I've heard
rumors over the years that "One More Saturday Night" actually began as
a Hunter lyric and he took his name off it. Is that true?
Weir: Yeah, it began as a Hunter lyric. "One more Saturday night" was
his line. I wrote the rest. [laughs]
Gans: How did that happen?
Weir: I don't remember. I think he had a verse or something, a sketch
he gave me. I got started working on it and, it all happened in one
night. I got up a head of steam and cranked the song out, and I used
that one line. And as I was writing, the rest of that verse wasn't
ringing my lofty bells, and I kept intending to work it back in to the
tune, and then take everything I'd written and submit to Hunter and let
him correct it, but he... as far as he was concerned, the song was
done, so he took his name off it.

Maybe the verse Hunter posted on DeadNet Central was the one he
originally gave Weir?
  

    <scribbled by tnf>
  

    
All very interesting. And this discussion shows some of the actual
difficulty in correctly attributing songwriting credit where it is due.
  

    
Right, did Elvis Presley write any songs?
  

    
Does anyone know if Bruce Springsteen ever played this tune in concert
and if so do any recordings exists?
  

    
If he did, http://www.brucespringsteen.it/DB/Databasex.htm doesn't
know of it.
  

    
I had a vague recollection that I had heard of such a thing, and
Googling turns up <ddodd>'s site which says he did but without further
details.

<http://artsites.ucsc.edu/GDead/agdl/snit.html>

(P.S. I just noticed how nicely palindromic <ddodd>'s screen name is.)
  

    
I have read in a few places that he had played this, but I'm thinking
it might be the Nils Lofgren tune of the same name.