House of the Rising Sun

The Animals' version of "House of the Rising Sun" was so successful, it swept away all previous notions of what this song sounded like. Just about anyone covering it since since 1964 has clearly been working from the Animals' version, and yet it was not always so. Early folk and blues versions were typically in a major key; minor versions start cropping up during the Folk Revival. Dave Van Ronk seems to be the one who introduced the descending bass line to the song, giving it the chord progression Bob Dylan then recorded on his 1962 Columbia debut (and scooping Van Ronk's innovation in the process – Van Ronk, though signed to Folkways in 1959, had yet to put his arrangement on record, a detail that strained the relationship between the two). In all likelihood, Dylan's take on the Van Ronk changes provided the template for the hit British version two years later. Scroll through the playlist to hear all 11 versions.