Gordon Lightfoot, Canadian Folk Rock Troubadour, Dead at 84 [View all]

Gordon Lightfoot, a genius-level Canadian singer/songwriter whose most enduring works include “If You Could Read My Mind,” “Sundown,” “Carefree Highway,” “Early Morning Rain,” and “Rainy Day People” — died on Monday, the CBC confirmed. He was 84.

Lightfoot’s deceptively simple songs, which fused folk with pop and country rock, have been covered by everyone from Bob Dylan and Neil Young to Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, the Grateful Dead, and Barbra Streisand, Jerry Lee Lewis, Eric Clapton, Jimmy Buffett, and the Replacements.

He scored a series of hits in his native Canada throughout the Sixties, but most Americans first heard his work in 1970 when “If You Could Read My Mind” reached #5 on the Hot 100.

“I can’t think of any Gordon Lightfoot song I don’t like,” Bob Dylan said. “Every time I hear a song of his, it’s like I wish it would last forever.”

At: https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-features/gordon-lightfoot-dead-obituary-1234716529/