The Highwayman
The Highwayman
This song has been a bit of an obsession for me for the last three days. I've been trying to put my finger on it, I have a couple reasons that I'd like to indulge here. But honestly, I really just wanted to share this with you all.
First, I'm pretty sure you can absolutely hate country music and you will still watch this and realize that it's 2:54 seconds of absolute brilliance. The talent, lyrics, music, ambiance, all of it. It's a moment of stunning perfection. It's one of those rare things, that eludes most people, and is only captured momentarily. But when it is, you see it. It grabs you and sort of gnaws at your soul a bit as you try to fathom what you've just seen. Most of the time when that happens you don't catch it in a re-playable format. It gets stored in your memory and you wonder later if you imagined how great it was as the feelings associated with that memory fade...and soon the memory itself alters and you lose that too. In this instance, we have a video, that we can all watch, as many times as we want. I've lost track of the number of times I've replayed this in the last 72 hours. I haven't gotten sick of it, or found a flaw, yet. Amazing.
Second, the last verse sung by Johnny Cash. Here are the lyrics:
I fly a starship across the Universe divide
And when I reach the other side
I'll find a place to rest my spirit if I can
Perhaps I may become a highwayman again
Or I may simply be a single drop of rain
But I will remain
And I'll be back again, and again and again and again and again and again and again...
This verse is perhaps one of the simplest worded, most wonderful allegories I've ever heard in song. And it speaks to me. A lot. That's all I can really say about it.
I listened to a different version of this song, performed by the same men. It's not even in the same zip code of the vicinity as this. I don't know what aligned that night for this, but it's awesome, and should be appreciated.
This song has been a bit of an obsession for me for the last three days. I've been trying to put my finger on it, I have a couple reasons that I'd like to indulge here. But honestly, I really just wanted to share this with you all.
First, I'm pretty sure you can absolutely hate country music and you will still watch this and realize that it's 2:54 seconds of absolute brilliance. The talent, lyrics, music, ambiance, all of it. It's a moment of stunning perfection. It's one of those rare things, that eludes most people, and is only captured momentarily. But when it is, you see it. It grabs you and sort of gnaws at your soul a bit as you try to fathom what you've just seen. Most of the time when that happens you don't catch it in a re-playable format. It gets stored in your memory and you wonder later if you imagined how great it was as the feelings associated with that memory fade...and soon the memory itself alters and you lose that too. In this instance, we have a video, that we can all watch, as many times as we want. I've lost track of the number of times I've replayed this in the last 72 hours. I haven't gotten sick of it, or found a flaw, yet. Amazing.
Second, the last verse sung by Johnny Cash. Here are the lyrics:
I fly a starship across the Universe divide
And when I reach the other side
I'll find a place to rest my spirit if I can
Perhaps I may become a highwayman again
Or I may simply be a single drop of rain
But I will remain
And I'll be back again, and again and again and again and again and again and again...
This verse is perhaps one of the simplest worded, most wonderful allegories I've ever heard in song. And it speaks to me. A lot. That's all I can really say about it.
I listened to a different version of this song, performed by the same men. It's not even in the same zip code of the vicinity as this. I don't know what aligned that night for this, but it's awesome, and should be appreciated.