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“The House of the Rising Sun” reflects an unpleasant place which has a bad influence on the writer’s life as a boy. The song speaks about picking up bad habits from this house in New Orleans as a young man. The writer describes his mother as a diligent woman who probably wanted him to make the best out of life by working hard and leading a decent life. The lyrics of The Animals’ version are a different take than the character “The House of the Rising Sun” is traditionally based on. For example, older renditions of the ballad were relayed from the perspective of a female who was considered to be either imprisoned or a working girl.
Nina Simone’s Version of “The House of the Rising Sun”
In 2014, Five Finger Death Punch released a cover version for their album The Wrong Side of Heaven and the Righteous Side of Hell, Volume 2. Five Finger Death Punch's remake reached number 7 on the US Billboard Mainstream Rock chart. They just didn’t capture the imagination of the American public as much.
The Serious Undercurrents of “Down Under” by Men at Work and Why It’s Not an Overt Display of National Pride

The arc of the horizon between the east point and the sunrise point is called amplitude. On June 21 it is 23-1/2° at the equator, and increases to 90° at the Arctic Circle, where the sun is up for 24 hours on that day. If you recognize the genre of folk-rock music, then you have The Animals’ “The House of the Rising Sun” being the first song to hit under this category. The track was released by MGM Records on 19 June 1964 as the second single from the band’s eponymous album, which was also their first.
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Altitude is the angular distance above the horizon measured perpendicularly to the horizon. It has a maximum value of 90° at the zenith, which is the point overhead. It is marked on the diagram at intervals of 10° along the vertical line in the center. That line represents the celestial meridian, which the sun crosses at noon.
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The writer mentions her sewing ‘blue jeans’, which is an American symbol representing people in the working class. This young man’s father is a gambler and unfortunately, this is the example he follows. He gives a picture of his father’s life as that of a typical gambler who doesn’t have time to maintain relationships. He’s unable to settle at a place for too long and is constantly moving his suitcase in and out of his car trunk across several towns.
The Animals' version

Still though there remains the moral undertone of the lyrics, as the singer is advising the listener not to fall prey to the “sin and misery” that he has. And the insinuation is that his vice is something along the lines of gambling and consequentially excessive drinking. This is because he acknowledges his own father as possessing those weaknesses. And the conclusive message is that somehow this lifestyle has gotten him, the singer, into serious trouble with the law. Moreover he has witnessed “many a poor boy” also have their lives ruined via ‘the house of the Rising Sun’. Although “The House of the Rising Sun” has a distinct storyline, it is actually based on a folk song that centered on a completely-different character.
Who is the Writer Behind “House of the Rising Sun?”
A warning song to keep our children safe - The Hospitalist Online
A warning song to keep our children safe.
Posted: Tue, 04 Jun 2019 07:00:00 GMT [source]
By the time the ’60s rolled around, the folk legend Dave Van Ronk included an intense take on “House of the Rising Sun” as a steady part of his live repertoire. His young acolyte Bob Dylan largely mimicked Van Ronk’s arrangement of the song and included it on his debut album. Across the pond at around the same time, Burdon apparently heard the song from a local folk singer in England. Burdon brought it into the Animals, who electrified the song for their 1964 self-titled debut album. Hilton Valentine played the stoic arpeggiated guitar part that foundations the song, while Alan Price tore into the organ solo as if trying to free every tortured soul trapped in this sinister place.
Five Finger Death Punch version
The Animals' version of the American folk song is considered one of the 20th century’s British pop classics. While the original version was sung in the character of a woman led into a life of degradation, the Animals' version is told from the view of a young man who follows his father into alcoholism and gambling ruin. Although the date and author of the song are unknown, some musicologists have said that it resembled ballads of the 16th century, and could very easily have derived from one of that time. As a popular folk song, the oldest record of “House of the Rising Sun” in reference to a song was 1905, and it was first recorded in 1933 by an Appalachian group. Other early recordings include Woody Guthrie’s version from 1941 and Bob Dylan in 1961.
And when The Animals did record the song they did so expeditiously, in fact in one only take. This is due to them having already perfected singing it on the road while they were simultaneously touring alongside rock-and-roll innovator Chuck Berry. A song is written, and, if it’s special enough, it hangs around waiting for an artist to claim it, putting their indelible stamp on it so that all other versions are henceforth compared to that one unforgettable take. Nobody is sure who wrote “House of the Rising Sun.” But we do know that the Animals, powered by the blustery vocals of Eric Burdon, claimed it. Colombian band Los Speakers covered the song under the title "La Casa del Sol Naciente", in their 1965 album of the same name.
Astronomers measure it from the south point, navigators from the north point. In our diagrams which follow the navigators’ rule, north is 0°, east is 90°, south is 180°, and west is 270°. Each degree of azimuth is shown in the circular band around the outside of the diagram, and numbers from 60 to 300 indicate the azimuth at intervals of 10°.
But it’s hard to imagine that anybody will ever again inhabit that doomed soul at the epicenter of the tale quite as well. "House of the Rising Sun" was not included on any of the group's British albums, but it was reissued as a single twice in subsequent decades, charting both times, reaching number 25 in 1972 and number 11 in 1982. The song was first collected in Appalachia in the 1930s, but probably has its roots in traditional English folk song. Versions of the song have been recorded by many notable artists including Lead Belly, Joan Baez, Ramblin' Jack Elliot, Dolly Parton, Waylon Jennings, Nina Simone, Adolescents, The Ventures, Duane Eddy and Five Finger Death Punch. The song is often heard in the soundtracks of popular TV shows (The West Wing and Supernatural) and movies (Suicide Squad).
In August 1980, Dolly Parton released a cover of the song as the third single from her album 9 to 5 and Odd Jobs. Like Miller's earlier country hit, Parton's remake returns the song to its original lyric of being about a fallen woman. The Parton version makes it quite blunt, with a few new lyric lines that were written by Parton.
In 1960, Miriam Makeba recorded the song on her eponymous RCA album. On March 21 and September 23 the sun is on the celestial equator, which intersects the celestial meridian at a distance from the zenith equal to the latitude. The writer consequently pleads with other mothers, who in his own experience seem more responsible than fathers, to not allow their children follow in his footsteps. Although he admits and regrets that his life has become a mess, he seems to have no option than to return to New Orleans to continue his lifestyle. He uses the words ball and chain as a metaphor to describe the extent to which he has now become a prisoner to his addiction of gambling and alcoholism.
At the same time, Earth’s orbital motion around the Sun and the tilt of its axis causes daily changes in sunrise and sunset and the length of the day. All of these movements and positions can be observed and predicted precisely, as shown in the tables on this page. And the producer is an English musician by the name of Mickie Most who was behind many hits from back in the day.
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