One time, and one time only, I heard on E Street Radio (the Sirius/XM Bruce Springsteen channel) a haunting song. Due to whatever circumstance at the time (driving and talking on the phone so no free hands?) I did not glance at the title of the song and so I seek your help in finding it.
The song was written as a kind of a letter, from a condemned man to die that night at midnight. The point was that he had led a life of crime, been on death row for decades, and in this letter to family (Mother perhaps?) he was explaining how much he regretted his actions and not being able to see them, and how this was the best night of his life because he “would be home by morning”.
The arrangement, as I recall was sparse, more like Nebraska or Ghost of Tom Joad-ish that Born to Run-ish.
I don’t recall that it was a live song, although I could be wrong about that.
Bruce has recorded over the years, including those by many others such as Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger. I searched the official Springsteen web sight (backstreets.net IIRC) for lyrics with the word “morning” which I certainly remember was in the song, and did not find it.
Well, when I try to watch that video I get "This video contains content from Sony Music Entertainment, who has blocked it in your country on copyright grounds. " I am in the US.
But I looked at the lyrics and no, definitely not that one.
Seems kind of hard to believe
That I’m goin, goin home at last
They say that things have changed
Well I guess a lot of time has passed
And just a few more miles and a little more time
Before you know it I’ll be there
And I’ll be waltzing arm in arm
With my darling electric chair
But it’s not in letter format either and there’s no mention of mother.
My daughter has just about everything he’s ever recorded. I’ll ask her.
