“Why She’s Gone” - a song about pretend
Recorded in Sanford, FL. Thank you to Ryan and Shannon for giving me a place to reset and create.
Story Pairing
Ah the re-write. I really don’t do it. When it comes to a song I have always been of the camp that it comes to me in the version that it wants to be and that deserves to be left alone. As I’ve sat with those sort of thoughts over the years my stubborn-ness when it comes to creating seems to be crumbling a bit. I’ve wanted to go back and sit with songs written and then put up in a cupboard somewhere to collect dust forever. One of the reasons I may not be playing some of those older songs, is because I never made them mine.
Maybe when the muse gives you a song it’s the equivalent of a pair of pants that need hemmed up. You can be a purist and refuse to alter them and then in turn throw them in the back of you closet to never be clumsily worn, or you can realize the gift is yours to tweak as you please to make it comfortable. Those tweaks don’t have to be destructive, and they aren’t hurting anything they are giving a second life to a treasure that deserves it.
This is a song, one of a list of around 30 that I pulled from my “closet” that I felt was worth hemming. I took out some of the original verses, changed a word or two, and gave it a slightly different feel. At the end I didn’t have a sense of loss, the song wasn’t screaming in pain from its tweaks, and now it isn’t rotting away in my dropbox.
I’ve played it and some of the other tunes from that list at recent shows, and it’s added a little spark into my playing. I’m not just going through the same setlists that I can play on autopilot, I’m having to really think about these songs. They are making me work a bit harder as penance for forgetting them for so long, and that seems fair.
Song Structure
Verse: G - C - G - D - G
Embellishment: D walk-down to the G
Voice Memos
No Notebook Page
Written in 2018
I don’t have a notebook page of it, so here is a picture of a woodpecker I took at the spot where I recorded the video.
Lyrics
You wonder why she’s gone
You wonder where she went
Took your favorite things and left
Every letter that you wrote
You wonder why she’s gone
They wonder where you’ve been
You wonder where you put
That bottle you had just began
It’s got you wandering again
You wonder why she’s gone
What it’s all about
She’d ask you just to talk
All you do is shake and scream
So wonder why she’s gone
Claim it’s her fault in the end
Get drunk inside your cave
Hate and play pretend
It’s got you wandering again