Saturday, February 2, 2019

Song Lyric of the Day (David Gates, Summing Up How I Feel About My Dad)


“I would give everything I own,
Just to have you back again.”—David Gates, “Everything I Own,” from the Bread LP Baby I'm-a Want You (1972)

For nearly 50 years, I had interpreted Bread’s “Everything I Own” as a song of romantic loss. Then, after listening to a different hit from this Seventies MOR band on YouTube, I became curious about this live version of the tune, performed solo by Gates more than two decades after it rose up the charts.

Listening to his introduction, I was astonished to hear the singer-songwriter say he had written it not after the loss of a wife or sweetheart, but after the death of his father. This time, I paid attention more closely to the lyrics. Yes, I could see that this time.

I wondered how Gates could have expressed my feelings now, exactly one year after the death of my father (pictured). But I guess that’s why we have musicians: to wring harmony out of our individual emotional confusion, to find the words to say simply what we don’t know how to.

No comments: