written: 20191113.0927
key: A
time: 3/4
one for the lonely
I set out to write a “holiday song” a few years back, even daring to dream of expanding the thought into an EP I would definitely call A Very Westy Holiday.
The EP’s still a dream, but I was home in NYC a couple weeks back, and dusted off the track, while also dusting off Jolie, my Gibson ES335 modded by Paul Schwartz of Peekamoose Guitars.
Here, Jolie runs direct into my Fender Super Champ, no pedal board. My voice was ravaged earlier this year by covid, and my falsetto has turned into an adventure. This video is the 5th and final take I managed that day, and was the only take where my voice held up ok in both choruses. In my brief time back in NYC, this was the sole recording I was able to make.
I am thankful it held together at all.
I was never crazy about TTOY’s original final verse, penned in 2019. It spiraled into a blithe pessimism that felt a betrayal to the true sentiment of reflecting on a year’s passing. For the record, it went like this:
so we bury secrets deeper
so everyone thinks we’re
at peace and everything’s fine
but we’re here, and friends
no need for amends
it’s okay to walk that line
As much as we fake our feelings and bury our secrets during the holiday season, as maddened as the consumerist crush and travel nightmares leave us, the end-of-year days are still built on a foundation of peace and joy and optimism.
That original final verse above left me alone, and separated from joy. The period from Thanksgiving to New Years Eve without doubt brings bittersweet inflection points, but it is also an opportunity to reframe, renew, release, and re-steel yourself. These lyrics were too much bitter; not enough sweet.
So in that spirit, that recording session allowed me to finally re-cast the verse as a means to hope and a sense of belonging. Be gone secrets, alienation, and regret! Shoo fly shoo!
secrets may haunt usYour being here with me this year made my year. Thank you.
but they won’t define us
there’s peace in our world tonight
we’re here, and friends
no need for amends
together we’ll walk that line
LYRICS
arm-in-arm, hand-in-hand
cheek-to-cheek, side-by-side
paired up love cats
weaving parallel tracks
thru quiet sidewalks of whitetrees a’ twinklin
laughter and singing
through windows as i walk by
as if no regrets
as if to forget
the memories in every lighthard times turn lonely
in crowds of the disappeared
and hard times only get harder
when they find you this time of yearthe things i got to do
things i never do
1/2 of these things are the same
the other 1/2 is reckoning
with not feeling anything
just to get through these daysa new lease a new leaf a new new you
maybe we can remake all that’s truesecrets may haunt us
but they won’t define us
there’s peace in our world tonight
we’re here, and friends
no need for amends
together we’ll walk that line