Manfred Mann – Quinn The Eskimo (Mighty Quinn)

Some songs are just fun…and this is one of them. Yes, I like the Manfred Mann version a bunch and I also like Bob Dylan’s released version. It’s a live version with The Band at the Isle of Wight. Bob’s voice fits this song so well…he is over the top, sloppy, and loud but it works. It’s an irresistible melody and hook that Bob wrote in this song. Bob’s version is the only version I knew for a long time.

Bob Dylan wrote this song and I first heard it through his Greatest Hits II album, and then the Basement Tapes of him and The Band. Some time later I heard the Manfred Mann version of it. Something different though…Manfred Mann was the first to release it. This usually didn’t happen but Mike D’abo from Manfred Mann explains it:  “We met in a publisher’s house as Bob Dylan was making some new material available to other artists, we heard about 10 songs and I thought ‘This Wheel’s On Fire’ would be the one to do, but Manfred liked The Mighty Quinn, which was called ‘Quinn The Eskimo’ then. It was sung in a rambling monotone but Manfred had recognized its potential. He sold me on the idea of doing this song, but I had to make up some of the words as I couldn’t make out everything he was saying. It was like learning a song phonetically in a foreign language. I have never had the first idea what the song is about except that it seems to be ‘Hey, gang, gather round, something exciting is going to happen ’cause the big man’s coming.’ As to who the big man is and why he is an Eskimo, I don’t know.” 

The Basement Tapes version is much more mellow. This is probably the demo that Manfred Mann received.

It is thought that Bob Dylan came up with the song after seeing the 1959 movie The Savage Innocents. In that movie, Anthony Quinn plays an Eskimo named Inuk…that would explain Quinn and why he mentions an Eskimo in a pop song.  That film also was the screen debut of Peter O’Toole.

Bob released the song in 1970 on his Self Portrait album… a live version recorded at the Isle of Wight Festival on August 31, 1969, with The Band backing him. His voice is great on this…it fits the song. The “heeyyyyyyyys” and the “whooooaaaas”s are perfect for it. 

Manfred Mann released this in 1968 and it was a huge hit for them. The song peaked at #1 in the UK, #3 in Canada, #1 in New Zealand, and #10 on the Billboard 100 in 1968.

A little trivia for Beatle fans…Klaus Voormann who drew the Revolver cover, was on this song, he played the flute part on the Manfred Mann version. I also believe he played bass but I can’t verify…that is what instrument he played.

Having turned down offers from bands like the Hollies and the Moody Blues, Voormann agreed to become a part of Manfred Mann. He got to know the Beatles when they arrived in Germany. When Stuart Sutcliffe quit playing bass…McCartney took over and a little while later Stuart volunteered…if he had spoken up sooner…you never know what could have happened.

Ron Cornelius who played on the Self Portrait album: “There’s everybody and his brother flying into Nashville to play on that thing. If you look at the credits, it’s amazing how many people were delighted to come and play on it. Out of everybody I’ve worked with, I don’t know of anyone who’s been any nicer than Bob Dylan.”

The Mighty Quinn

Come all without, come all within
You’ll not see nothing like the mighty Quinn
Come all without, come all within
You’ll not see nothing like the mighty Quinn

Everybody’s building ships and boats
Some are building monuments
Others jotting down notes
Everybody’s in despair
Every girl and boy
But when Quinn the Eskimo gets here
Everybody’s gonna jump for joy

Come all without, come all within
You’ll not see nothing like the mighty Quinn

I like to go just like the rest, I like my sugar sweet
But jumping queues and making haste
Just ain’t my cup of meat
Everyone’s beneath the trees feeding pigeons on a limb
But when Quinn the Eskimo gets here
All the pigeons gonna run to him

Come all without, come all within
You’ll not see nothing like the mighty Quinn
Come all without, come all within
You’ll not see nothing like the mighty Quinn

Let me do what I wanna do, I can’t decide ’em all
Just tell me where to put ’em and I’ll tell you who to call
Nobody can get no sleep, there’s someone on everyone’s toes
But when Quinn the Eskimo gets here, everybody’s gonna wanna doze

Come all without, come all within
You’ll not see nothing like the mighty Quinn
Come all without, come all within
You’ll not see nothing like the mighty Quinn

Come all without, come all within
You’ll not see nothing like the mighty Quinn
Come all without, come all within
You’ll not see nothing like the mighty Quinn

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Author: Badfinger (Max)

Power Pop fan, Baseball, Beatles, Alternative music, old movies, and tv show fan. Also anything to do with pop culture in the 60s and 70s... I'm also a songwriter, bass and guitar player. Not the slightest bit interested in politics at all.

63 thoughts on “Manfred Mann – Quinn The Eskimo (Mighty Quinn)”

  2. The Mighty Quinn is an Eskimo who arrives and changes despair into joy and chaos into rest and he attracts attention from the animals. Dylan is widely believed to have derived the title character from actor Anthony Quinn’s role as an Eskimo in the 1960 movie The Savage Innocents. Dylan has also been quoted as saying that the song was nothing more than a “simple nursery rhyme.” The Grateful Dead occasionally played this song at some of their shows. The most popular story involves a wild LSD party that The Grateful Dead hosted in a New York City hotel, where Bob Dylan attended as one of the party guests. The hotel received several complaints about the party noise and one of the guests at the hotel was Anthony Quinn. When Quinn reportedly complained about the noise from this drug-fueled party, that inspired a partying Dylan to write this strange and funny song and Dylan fashioned the song around him. The line in the song, “But when Quinn the Eskimo gets here, everybody’s gonna wanna doze”, could be saying that Anthony Quinn was a stick in the mud party pooper, spoiling all the fun.
    Another interpretation is that Quinn is based on the Sheriff of Dutchess County, NY named Larry Quinlan, who reportedly helped to arrest the American psychologist Dr. Timothy Leary and a group of his associates who were experimenting with LSD. Sheriff Larry Quinlan did raid the Castalia Foundation land in Millbrook, New York where Timothy Leary was arrested along with his group of hippies. Quinlan confiscated all the LSD and other drugs at the scene. The line, “all the pigeons gonna run to him” could mean the stool pigeons who ratted out Leary. The third theory about Quinn says that the same 2004 Chicago Tribune article named Gordon Quinn, co-founder of Kartemquin Films, who worked with Dylan and Howard Alk, but was not given credit for his editing assistance on the Dylan documentary Eat the Document.

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  3. I didn’t know the Dylan connection, sounds about right. Dylan once said many of his songs are just gibberish lyrics, not ones to change the world. This might be one of them. MM had a huge hit with this song, I loved it. Eskimos in rock music..who would have thunk it.

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  5. I’m glad you posted it, it wasn’t that long ago I learned it was a Dylan song originally. then I saw it referenced a couple of times in the book about the Band. Also interesting to know the inspiration – the movie, Quinn being the actor… sorta makes sense. Even if it didn’t, it’d be a good song. But, sorry to me it will always be a Manfred Mann song!

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    1. Sixties covers had that effect, didn’t they? Mr. Tambourine Man will always be a Byrds song for me, Silence Is Golden a Tremeloes one, Ob-La-Di Ob-La-Da a Marmalade one and With A Little Help From My Friends a Joe Cocker one!

      A bit later too, Blinded By The Light a Manfred Mann one.

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    2. Yea you heard the Mann version first…I didn’t… I feel for the song by Dylan but…yes I do like the MM version of it as well…I can easily listen to either one.

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  6. It is a great song choice today Max, and though I like both versions the same MM is a little more jaunty! Somewhat ironic that the band with hits that were covers gets the original song credit. Not that it matters to their pay checks. I guess only goofs like me care about that stuff.

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    1. lol… that is me also…I heard the Dylan version first but it doesn’t matter which version I hear…I like both of them. Dylan’s is a little…no cross that out…a lot rawer because of being live…and I like the Klaus connection to MM also.

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    1. LOL… yea it’s a fun song for him… he must have been in a playful mood. When he was with the Wilburys he was also more light hearted with his songs. I like both versions a lot.

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  9. Yep, another one of those MM songs that took off here. ( No young ‘uns, MM didn’t mean Marilyn Manson back then.) I knew it was a Bob song but had never heard the Bob version till now. Mention of ‘Wheels On Fire’ put me in mind of the first version that I heard of, by Julie Driscoll/Brian Auger, another Bob cover that they put out, and I can’t think of another they did that hit big: So a one-hit wonder here. A day late for One Hit Wonder day but WTH.

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      2. I probably told you…I was offered a job in Minnesota…any place where I would need an electric blanket for my car engine…is not for Max

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  11. Love Dylan’s songs and his own versions of many of them. But I prefer Manfred’s Mann’s version of “Quinn” because, like The Byrd’s “Mr. Tamborine Man” and Hendrix’s “All Along the Watchtower” it’s well-arranged and more melodic.

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  12. I really was into Manfred Mann’s Earth Band during my teenage years, which means only yesterday! 🙂

    There’s a live version on the Earth Band’s “Watch” album. That’s the version I came to love. Years later, I heard Manfred Mann’s 1968 single and liked it as well right away.

    I hadn’t heard Dylan’s live version with the Band – love it and agree it goes really well with his vocals! Speaking of Herr Dylan, how do we feel about Bob’s recent unannounced appearance at Farm Aid with Mike Campbell, Benmont Tench and Steve Ferrone, formerly of the Heartbreakers?

    For those of you who haven’t watched it, here’s the entire set: Maggie’s Farm, Positively 4th Street and Ballad of a Thin Man – the first time in many years the maestro performed these songs. They sound surprisingly similar to their ’60s original recordings!

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    1. Thats really cool man! I didn’t know about that appearance… hell they should go on tour. Of the 8 times I saw him…he never played Positively 4th Street. That is really cool.

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      1. Isn’t it amazing? I also had missed it initially until I saw a reference on my Facebook – sometimes it’s good for something! 🙂

        It’s remarkable in many ways. The song choice. The fact you can easily recognize them. Dylan’s vocals – yes, they sound weathered, but not bad overall and remind me of “Nashville Skyline”. Also, apparently, Dylan hasn’t played electric guitar during live performances for quite some time.

        Of course, I guess the whole thing was very Dylan. Even though he co-founded Farm Aid, he didn’t feel the need to say one word to the audience, not even “hello”. The band came on stage literally in the darkness and just started playing. Then they pretty much left the stage in the same fashion – all slightly odd! 🙂

        Still, a cool moment in Dylan history!

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      2. Yea it was one concert…one. That he talked his damn head off. I was kind of giggling because he would not shut up…the other times…you might get a word introducing a song…and one time he broke out in a dance during a song….people went nuts. You never know what you are getting from him.
        I have to say one thing about him…he keeps tickets reasonable…. (reading Ringo????) but to be fair… that was probably the Ryman because it’s so small.

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      4. I can’t believe he is not swinging through the south…he always does…maybe they will get added. I hope comes here. I haven’t seen him since 2016

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      5. I think I’ve forgiven Dylan for that disastrous experience I had in Germany during the second half of the ’80s and would be interested in seeing him again – this time without listening a million times to “Before the Flood” or making any other attempts to “prepare”! 🙂

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      6. Yea lol…no he didn’t sound like that all…even in the 80s when I saw him.
        It’s like the Stones…I wanna hear Get Your Ya Ya’s out…but that won’t happen.

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  13. I love this one by Zimmy & Friends. Manfred Mann does a good job on it also. Cool bit of trivia on Klaus; I never would have recognized him in the live video. I’ve got the song on the giant collection of Bob Dylan, “Biograph” (highly recommend that “boxed set” btw) Also, I think Jim Adams did a very thorough write-up on this song including what was behind the lyrics, and maybe Jim’s already mentioned it in the comments but haven’t read them yet. Great song choice.

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    1. It is a fun song and I’ve always liked it. I remember hearing it from Bob and loving it…although different from him from what I heard at the time.

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  14. I’m surprised every time I’m reminded that this is a Dylan song. The Manfred Mann version is the only one I’ve ever known, and I’ve always loved it. Bob’s version with The Band is very pleasant. I’m glad to know of it now. His version makes it sound like an entirely different scenario than the MM version.

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    1. His version makes it sound more urgent I guess…his live version. He and the Band recorded it the same night when Chris O’Dell flew to take his harmonica’s to him at the Isle of Wight

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      3. I did not finish it. I got well into the part where she was with the Stones, and thought it’s going to become sad and less fun reading from here on. So I set it aside. I need to finish it. I did like it up to that point. She had the most unbelievable journey.

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  15. One of the first cassettes I owned of Bob was I believe (More Greatest Hits) or Vol II which appears ‘The Mighty Quinn’. Fantastic. ‘Self Portrait’ got and continues to get a hammering, but gee-wizz there is some great stuff on it.

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  17. As we discussed recently, I love this one. Never heard it on the radio but it was a favourite on a Solid Gold Hits comp that my parents had.

    Dylan did a bit of songwriting for hire in that era – Fairport Convention got hold of some Dylan tunes like Percy’s Song.

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    1. I had written up the Doo Wah whatever song but you made me think of this one. I forgot about it because I always place it with Dylan.

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