RIP Justin Townes Earle
Posted: Sun Aug 30, 2020 12:23 am
I was saddened to hear this week of the passing of Justin Townes Earle. I have to confess that I never got around to his music in his lifetime but I have been trying to make amends over the past week. Perhaps the one song that has stuck with me is Mama’s Eyes, a song that references directly just what he inherited from his parents, a song that cuts deep and speaks to a lifetime beset with the pain of addiction and the burden of personal responsibility and accountability. Like all of the great songwriters, so much of the pain of life is compressed in such few words. What a talent.
“I was a young man when
I first found the pleasure in the feel of a sin
I went down the same road as my old man
I was younger then
Now it’s 3 am and I’m standing in the kitchen
Holding my last cigarette
Strike a match and I see my reflection in the mirror in the hall
And I say to myself
I've got my mama's eyes
Her long thin frame and her smile
And I still see wrong from right
Cause I've got my mama's eyes
Yea I've got my mama's eyes”
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=LTKvIbM1bHo
“I was a young man when
I first found the pleasure in the feel of a sin
I went down the same road as my old man
I was younger then
Now it’s 3 am and I’m standing in the kitchen
Holding my last cigarette
Strike a match and I see my reflection in the mirror in the hall
And I say to myself
I've got my mama's eyes
Her long thin frame and her smile
And I still see wrong from right
Cause I've got my mama's eyes
Yea I've got my mama's eyes”
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=LTKvIbM1bHo