Diamonds And Rust

In this song, Joan Baez is singing to her former lover Bob Dylan, fondly reminiscing about their 1960s affair. Released as a single, this track became only her second top 40 hit in the States, and her biggest self-composed hit (her other hit came in 1971 with "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down").

Baez revealed to The Huffington Post that she wrote this song after Bob Dylan called her from a phone booth and sang her the lyrics to his song "Lily, Rosemary and the Jack of Hearts." Baez said that this gave her inspiration to write "Diamonds & Rust," and that she lied to Dylan, telling him it was about David Harris, to whom she was married from 1968-1973. Bob Dylan rarely reveals much about his songs, but his track "Queen Jane Approximately" is most likely his take on his relationship with Baez.

The British metal band Judas Priest covered this song in 1977. They pick up the tempo and electrify the song, but their version is sincere. They recorded it at the urging of their record company, which sent a copy of the Joan Baez original to the studio when they were recording their second album, Sad Wings Of Destiny, in 1976. At first, they dismissed it, but changed their tune when they gave it a good listen. "We sat down, listened to it closely, and realized it was a brilliant, sensitive song," lead singer Rob Halford wrote in his memoir, Confess. "'OK,' we decided. 'Let's show them what we can do with this.'" The song didn't make the album, but they held onto it and included it on their next one, Sin After Sin. It became one of their most popular songs, included on their compilations The Best of Judas Priest and Hero Hero, and on the live album Unleashed in the East. It remains a staple of their concert performances. In the 2000s, Priest performed a mostly acoustic version of the song more similar to the original than the "rocked up" recorded version. On Bob Dylan's album John Wesley Harding, there's a song called "The Ballad Of Frankie Lee And Judas Priest," which may have supplied the band name. Judas Priest took their name from a disbanded group that had been using it, so it's provenance isn't clear.