"I'll Keep It with Mine" is a song written by Bob Dylan in 1964,[1] first released by folk singer Judy Collins as a single in 1965. Dylan attempted to record the song for his 1966 album Blonde on Blonde.
In mid-January 1965, during sessions for the Bringing It All Back Home album, Dylan again recorded the song solo, on piano. This version, with the working title "Bank Account Blues", was released in 1985 on the Biograph retrospective. (The album notes contradictorily indicate that this performance was recorded in June 1964 and that it was recorded in January 1965. The latter is correct.[2])
A full-band rehearsal of the song, recorded during the early Blonde on Blonde sessions on January 27, 1966 (per album booklet), was released on The Bootleg Series Volumes 1–3. The rehearsal is rough and the recording starts well into the first verse, which is briefly interrupted by producer Bob Johnston on a talkback speaker, saying, "What you were doing".
During the seventh session for Blonde on Blonde – on February 15–16, 1966, at the Columbia Music Row Studios, Nashville, Tennessee – ten instrumental takes of the song were recorded. Takes 2, 4, 5, 6 and 7 are false starts, and takes 1 and 3 are interrupted.[3] Dylan is not present on these recordings, as he was late to the session. While they waited, Johnston had the musicians lay down through instrumental takes of the song - presumably either as rehearsals or to have Dylan overdub his parts later. When Dylan arrived at the studio he opted instead to focus on "Sad Eyed Lady Of The Lowlands". The song was not revisited during the Nashville sessions.
Dylan can be seen performing the song on piano in the film 65 Revisited, which was made during his tour of England in May 1965.
Rolling Stone rated the song #41 on its list of 100 Greatest Bob Dylan Songs, calling it a "ballad of friendship" featuring "a sweet, plaintive vocal."[4]
Judy Collins released the first recording of the song on a 1965 single on Elektra Records, which never appeared on any of her albums. In the liner notes of Collins' 1993 Geffen Records album Just Like A Woman, a Dylan tribute, she mentions that Dylan told her that he'd written the song for her.
Susanna Hoffs recorded a version for the Rainy Day project. The music critic Everett True wrote in 2000 that Hoffs's vocal at the start of the third chorus was "perhaps the sultriest moment committed to vinyl".[5]
