Somebody's Angel

I’ve got no regrets, we tried everything

they did their best it’s no ones fault the surgery didn’t take.

And a war can bring much more than a marriage down

and I know you’d still want me to be happy now.

And the first time I kissed somebody new

I cried when I thought about you

and all the good times we had and the living that we been through

and I’m here for you forever or long as I am able

I gotta be Somebody’s Angel

Sunday mornings at the home

too young they say and still a lifetime to go.

I’m still young enough to want someone to hold through the night

and no amount of wishing can bring you back and make things right

And despite any evil doings I mighta done

or any hurt I mighta caused someone

or any living ahead I got while your times run

I’m here for you forever or long as I am able

But I gotta be Somebody’s Angel

(bridge)

They’re sayin’ now, you won’t be with us long

All my time and my love couldn’t fix the damage done

I pray each day he’ll bring a daddy to our son

But I’m here for you, forever, or long as I am able

and I gotta be Somebody’s Angel

Somebody's Angel was recorded in San Diego, pretty much live and recorded by Ben Moore. Danny Frankel came down from LA to play drums, Ben Campbell on upright bass, Paula Luber on vibraphone and me on my electric (borrowed an amp from my friend O) Gibson 330. We finished this song and An Affair of the Heart within 2 hours and then brought in the strings: Renata Bratt on cello, Glen Campbell (Ben the bassists father) on cello, Christopher Vitas on violin. We recorded strings for this song and "Affair" within an hour or two. 

I might add that Id had a lousy case of Shingles a few weeks before the recording and I was just the other side of that thing. While in the early throes of it, Renata and I were conferring by phone on the string arrangements. She kept us on task and on time, while I languished much of the rest of the day. Meanwhile co-producer Ben Moore's wife had just had a baby the day before the recordings.
A few days after the recording my son and I were filmed for a Covered California Health Care commercial that was aired later that year, and where we met photographer/film-maker Joe Murray.
Sometimes all the shit goes down in a week or two. And that was the case here. 

*       *       *

Considering all I'd gone through with my husbands brain injury and later the dementia related to that brain injury there was probably only one person that could write this song. Well, that's pretty much what Dave Alvin told me when I saw him in early 2011, he'd said "You know, there's something only you can say in a song, with everything you've gone through, and you are the one to say it. That's the song you need to write. " And with that, I wrote the song. Later, I read the lyrics to another music friend who is a very much admired songwriter and legendary figure, he questioned the word "surgery" , as in "they did their best its no one's fault the surgery didn't take". I thought about what he had to say, "don't make it so blunt, keep it softer, surgery is a hard word to hear", and I decided to keep it as it is. The rest of the song softens somewhat and maybe is propelled by the hard-ass concept of a failed surgery. 

Was this song about me and Paul? Only a little bit. I wouldn't have been able to write it if it'd been completely confessional. Im only vaguely a confessional songwriter. I needed to see it as a song with a different narrator then myself, and so, in some regards I wrote it as a song Ruby wrote. That is, the woman, the caregiver, in Ruby Don't Take Your Love To Town. My song too address' a spouse that has been to war and comes back irreparably altered.

I also knew that for the sake of the rest of the album I needed to address my unusual situation early on in the album, with a feeling of "lets get this damned uncomfortable stuff over quick". Once it was addressed I felt like the rest of the album which is mostly about the various feelings you have in romantic love, could have a voice. You could say Somebody's Angel is the emotional-white-elephant of the album , and you wouldn't be wrong.

(photo of CLB by Joe Murray)