Mayfield said the song almost didn’t make it on the album.

Behind The Lyric While some of the lyrics for “Beautiful Way” border on cliché, the song’s ethereal arrangement puts the lyrics in a dreamlike context, so that lines like “Egyptian bells are ringing when it’s her birthday” don’t have to make sense. While Beck lyrics can sometimes border on the absurd, the songwriter defended “Beautiful [...]

The Band, in front of Levon and Rick’s house, Bearsville, Woodstock, New York, 1968. Photo © Elliott Landy/www.LandyVision.com “Stage Fright” Now deep in the heart of a lonely kid Who suffered so much for what he did, They gave this ploughboy his fortune and fame, Since that day he ain’t been the same. See the [...]

I’m at my best when I’m at my worst I’m at my worst when it’s not rehearsed I don’t wanna know the goddamn words I don’t wanna have to spell it out don’t wanna mumble what I’m trying to say I wanna scream it from my foaming mouth shoot out the lights and ride away [...]

I’ve been looking for a peace of mind/ I’ve been searching every day all my life

Hate reads the letter and throws it away/ “No one here cares if you go or you stay/ I barely even noticed that you were away. I’ll see you or I won’t whatever”

These four walls of Farnworth / Are closin’ in on me / My final meal is over / They’re gonna set me free

Turpentine and dandelion wine/ I’ve turned the corner and I’m doin’ fine/ Shootin’ at the birds on the telephone line/ Pickin’ em off with this gun of mine

You know, man when I was a young man in high school you believe it or not / I wanted to play football for the coach / and all those older guys they said he was mean and cruel/ but you know I wanted to play football for the coach

She’s been runnin’ half her life/ The chrome and steel she rides/ Collidin’ with the very air she breathes

Stepping out to Angellucci’s for my coffee beans / Checking out the movies and the magazines / The waitress she watches me crossing from the Barocco Bar / I get a pickup for my steel guitar

She smiles, walks the other way/ As the last ship sails and the moon fades away/ From Black Diamond Bay