Lyrics

Someone posed the question tonight on my favorite musician's fan page which song was personal to us.  Well........

Several come to mind but then you're talking about so many songs since the 90's for him.  So, I opened up the music on my phone and started looking through it.

I still say he writes some of his songs for me.  Hell, I've thought he has written a whole album for me before.  It is called Afraid of Ghosts and I saw him do a residency in Venice Beach, CA......a show a night for a week with that album.  Didn't take but five seconds into the first song before I had chills and they never left.  Hearing his voice singing those lyrics to those songs was indescribable.  The end of every show he turned the lights down and you just saw a shadow of him on stage singing.  He did it because those last few songs were so emotional.  He cried singing them every night and we all cried listening.  

I could never pick just one song though.  Lyrics are everything.  They're the words you don't know how to say and he says them for you.  So many leave me misty eyed at certain parts and then there was the Afraid of Ghosts album where every one could have you all out crying.  I've never known anyone to write such amazing, beautiful, and touching lyrics that hit you right where you are at the time and then put the music with them that he can play every instrument to AND then sing it with that voice of his.  Nothing probably makes me feel more excited or better that the anticipation before a show or new album or series of shows.  I'm lucky enough to get to go to three shows on this tour he just started.  He's playing new music from the new album not yet out and it is just as amazing as anything else.  

The other thing is that all these songs and shows I've been to span so many years and go right along with memories.  

So, here is my list:

Take Tomorrow (probably the first one)
Let Me Go (yeah, I cry at one part just about every time)
Cigarette Lighter Love Song
If(Jeannie's Song)-my song for Seattle/Ocean Shores
Mixtape (he wouldn't play this one live for awhile but he is again now)
Best Thing You Never Had (most emotional song he always plays live-it is everyone's song)
Don't Move (till someone ruined that one for me)
That Side of You
Summer Scarves (gave me chills first time he sang the beginning lyrics which is all he had written at the time)
Vessels (a happy song for me even though it is about when things change)
The Weight of Her (my first truly feel good happy song he did)
Wilder in the Heart (put that one out on FB the night I got my first tattoo....yeah, he wrote that one for me)
Spark:Lost 
Record Store (gets me every time and he made a shirt for it and sold it at ONE show only and I have it!)
The Taste of Red
This is the Sweetest Little Song 
Stateline
So At Last (my song for LA and flying there)
I Just Want You to Want This Again
Did We Ever Really Fall In Love?
Roll Me Out(everyone needs to hear that song)

The Afraid of Ghosts album......
Afraid of Ghosts
21+
Father's Day
The Dark
Chrissie Hynde
Autumn Leaves
......all the sad ones

Then......
I Love You (such a sweet song)
Bed On Fire (hmmmm, nothing is sexier that this song, the lyrics, the video, the live performance on Jimmy Kimmel, and especially watching him perform it live at a show)

When the video was released to Bed on Fire Jaimie and I had to watch it and watch and watch it.  Dissect it.  Look for all the things in it you just won't get unless you are a true fan.  Figure out all the meanings of the video compared to the meanings of the song. And just enjoy it and enjoy it.  That one....of course it got such recognition and that's why he got asked to play it on Jimmy Kimmel.  Annoying of all annoying things .....he recorded that for the show when I was there and had I known in advance, could have at least tried to get into the show.  

Bed on Fire

Really, those are just a list of songs.  It is the lyrics that speak to you every time you hear the song. Too time-consuming to write out all the lyrics I love so much. 

Then there are the memories.  Small acoustic show/album signing/picture taking when I told him I'd see him the next night in Athens for his show there.  Leaning on this door waiting to get into the Athens venue and having it open from the inside.....falling backwards a little and it was him who opened it and there we were....face to face and all I could say was "I told you I'd see you tonight." and him just smiling that smile.  

So many memories.  The last time he ever threw the drumstick into the audience after he banged on the drums during Three Kids in Brooklyn was the time it hit me right in the head and I saw stars while my best friend thankfully grabbed the stick and gave it to me....telling me I earned that one.  Taking it to his acoustic show/meet and greet the next night so he could sign it and letting him know it was indeed me he hit with it...LOL.  All the time we were sitting in the photo booth they brought in while they changed the film out in it before we could get our pictures made. 

The night the "love of my life", if you could call him that, went with me to a show after we were just friends because he wanted to see the person I go so crazy over and can't stop talking about.  Surreal moment to be down front where I always am and having him standing behind me, kind of leaning on him because it was just too crowded and both of us listening to it together live.

Front row no matter where pretty much and he starts The Weight of Her and that's my song so you know I sing every word to that one and it makes me happy   Every show and every time he sings that one he always looks straight at me and smiles.  He knows.  

So many more....

But got three shows coming up....one that is way too big and I know I won't get close to my usual spot in the front row because I just get too claustrophobic to battle that kind of crowd for front row.  

But that's okay....I have VIP tickets to the Cancer Fundraiser All Day shows in LA for my birthday where I get to hang out with a select few with him backstage before he plays last.  It has been a few years before I actually got to have a conversation with him.  Not since Afraid of Ghosts came out.  I really hope I don't cry if I decide to say something about him putting my dad in his Father's Day video but I probably will.  

The one thing I can count on always.......pure joy at his music, the amazing person he is, and happiness when sometimes there is none but what you get at a show.