I was happy to see Marty Brown‘s recording of “I Don’t Want to See You Again” is now on YouTube. Regular readers know Chimesfreedom is a fan of Marty Brown’s music, and this song is certainly in my top ten Marty Brown songs and one of my favorite songs of all time.
“I Don’t Want to See You Again” appears on Brown’s sophomore album from 1993, Wild Kentucky Skies. The album is full of songs written by Brown that I love, but “I Don’t Want to See You” is one of only two songs on the album not written by Brown. It is easy to see why he chose this song written by Jackson Leap, as it suits his voice perfectly. Why do I love the song so much? Well, here are ten reasons.
1. The opening line tells you everything you need to know about the story: “Don’t look so surprised,/ I told you I’d say goodbye/ if you couldn’t just make up your mind.” Perfect.
2. In true empowering kiss-off fashion, the singer wants true love but realizes that the object of his song cannot give him the love he wants and deserves.
3. The singer’s lover apparently has not been a good one, but she is still surprised by the news.
4. The singer not only says goodbye, but he does not want to see or feel his lover again, which is the best way to end a bad relationship.
5. The singer knows that his love will regret losing him (“When your teardrops finally come. . . “).
6. The singer wants it all.
7. The great country guitar riff playing throughout the song.
8. Marty Brown yells “Babeeeee” and then “Yeeeeeeeeah” near the end. The latter is a scream of freedom.
9. Although there is an underlying sadness of two lovers parting ways, the song sounds joyous, capturing the hope for the future.
10. Marty Brown sings it.
What is your favorite kiss-off song? Leave your two cents in the comments.
There are numerous songs about being in love. And there are almost as many songs about being hurt or angry at the end of a relationship, like No Doubt’s “Don’t Speak,” Coldplay’s “The Scientist,” Adele’s “Someone Like You,” Justin Timberlake’s “Cry Me a River,” and Alanis Morissette’s “You Oughta Know.” There are also songs about leaving a loved one, like Lynyrd Skynyrd’s classic “Free Bird” and Dolly Parton’s and Whitney Houston’s “I Will Always Love You.” But few songs focus on the personal healing process when the post-relationship hurt and anger start to drift away. There are some such songs, and artists like Willy Porter and the Cowboy Junkies have addressed the slow process of recovery after a relationship’s end.
Heartbreak Recovery & Heartbreak
There are a number of reasons why few songs capture this post-relationship self-discovery state. That stage is not as exciting as love or anger, and not everyone goes through it. One may skip or block out that stage or maybe never fully reach that level of forgiveness necessary to be at peace.
But the post-relationship self-discovery stage is a wonderful step in one’s growth. It is just as important as other emotions because this step is about coming to terms with finding oneself as someone no longer defined by the former love/anger/hate.
A few popular songs come close to addressing this relationship stage without fully addressing it. For example, Kelly Clarkson has made her career on relationship ending songs like “Don’t Waste Your Time.” But her pop songs often focus on the anger.
Similarly, some of the lyrics of Fleetwood Mac’s “Landslide” seem to be about this stage (“Well, I’ve been afraid of changing / Because I, I built my life around you”). But Stevie Nicks has explained the song is more about career and life directions. In “Missing You,” John Waite protests that he does not miss his love, but it is clear that the singer is still heartbroken and has a ways to go.
A major difference between the heartbreak recovery songs and heartbreak songs is the focus of the song. The songs written about the immediate end of a relationship focus on the other person, often having “you” in their title (“Since You’ve Been Gone,” etc.). The songs about healing and recovery are more about the singer, i.e., “I” or “me.”
“I’m Alive”
Jackson Browne captures this healing process in “I’m Alive.” The song appeared on his 1993 break-up album of the same name that was released after the end of a relationship.
Browne’s “I’m Alive” only covers the start of the transition from anger and hurt to the recognition of being alive (“I’m gonna have to block it out somehow to survive / ’cause those dreams are dead / And I’m alive.” It is one of my favorite Jackson Browne songs.
“Angry Words”
Two other songs go even deeper into end-of-relationship healing, including one by Willy Porter, a singer-songwriter from Wisconsin. Willy Porter’s “Angry Words,” from Dog-Eared Dream (1994), does an excellent job of capturing that feeling of relief where, after a relationship has ended, one wakes up one morning realizing life goes on.
I have cursed your name a thousand times or more; Your photograph lies deep at the bottom of my drawer; But when I looked at it this morning, I had no angry words to say, no angry words to say.
“Angry Words” has similarities to Gloria Gaynor’s classic “I Will Survive” and Elton John’s “I’m Still Standing.” But whereas Gaynor’s and John’s songs are about empowerment and surviving after a bad relationship, Porter’s song is about getting to that stage. Porter is not trying to prove anything to his lost love or convince himself he is fine. He is sorting through who he is and who he is going to be.
In “Angry Words,” the singer refers to “The coffee maker that you gave me it finally broke down.” The coffee maker reference shows time has passed while also symbolizing that the singer has reached a stage of breaking where he is building himself again: “I learned a little ’bout forgiveness, learned a little ’bout sin/ A little ’bout the soul of a man living within this skin.”
And that is what the stage of forgiveness is all about: learning about yourself and not letting the angry words dictate who you are.
“Sun Comes Up”
A song with a similar theme from the woman’s point of view is “Sun Comes Up, It’s Tuesday Morning” by the Cowboy Junkies with lead singer Margo Timmins. “Sun Comes Up” is a highlight from the band’s 1990 The Caution Horses album.
The singer in “Sun Comes Up” is not quite at the stage as the singer in Willy Porter’s “Angry Words.” But she struggles to find peace.
The singer in “Sun Comes Up” meets her friend Jen for lunch. She sees that her friend has been battered by a boyfriend or husband, so she remembers there are worse things than loneliness.
The singer then stops herself from calling her former lover. She reminds herself, “And anyways I’d rather listen to Coltrane / Than go through all that shit again.”
At the end, the singer is still struggling, but she realizes there are some simple benefits to being on your own, even if you miss the person you once loved.
Yeah, sure I’ll admit there are times when I miss you, Especially like now when I need someone to hold me; But there are some things that can never be forgiven; And I just gotta tell you, That I kinda like this extra few feet in my bed.
I love the line about the extra few feet in bed, because it is such a small thing. But the first step toward happiness is appreciating the small things.
After the song ends, I imagine some more time will pass, her coffee maker will break down, and she will end up with no angry words. And then, like the singer in “Angry Words,” she will not be “afraid of a new love that could be starting.”
The Power of Music
You know that the sophisticated and mature people in these songs will be okay, even as the songs provide insight to the listener too. On YouTube under one of the live videos of “Sun Comes Up, It’s Tuesday Morning,” someone confessed, “There were at least 5 years of my life that I would not have survived if it weren’t for this song.”
It is amazing what music can do for us, and I wish more songwriters would explore this stage of love. But we are lucky to have so many songs covering the stages of love. For all the lovers, the broken-hearted, and the healing hearts, may you find your song.
Check out a live version of the Cowboy Junkies’ “Sun Comes Up,” and an additional solo live version of Willy Porter’s “Angry Words” with some great guitar work. Can you think of any other songs fit this category of heartbreak recovery songs and coming to peace about lost love? Leave a comment.
During the summer of 1963, Bob Dylan and Joan Baez were driving on a trip to perform together. During the trip, an incident occurred that would inspire one of Dylan’s great songs, “When the Ship Comes In.”
A Hotel Stop
On the road, Dylan and Baez were in ragged clothes when they stopped at a hotel for the night. At this point in their careers, Joan Baez was the more famous of the two nationally. Dylan, however, still was highly regarded in the folk community, had recorded two albums, and had his songs covered by several artists.
The motel clerk recognized Baez and gave her a room, even though she was not wearing any shoes. But the clerk refused a room to Dylan because of his scraggly appearance. Baez was angry and stepped in on Dylan’s behalf, persuading the clerk to give a room to her unkempt companion.
It must have been difficult for Dylan to face the rejection and then have to be saved by Baez. His embarrassment must have been magnified because he was just starting — or hoping to start — a relationship with her.
When the Ship Comes In
For someone with Dylan’s talents, though, the best revenge was his music. That night, in his hotel room, in his anger and humiliation, Bob Dylan sat down and began writing the following words:
A song will lift As the mainsail shifts, And the boat drifts on to the shoreline; And the sun will respect Every face on the deck, The hour that the ship comes in.
When the Ship Comes In (live) – Bob Dylan (press play)
His new song, “When the Ship Comes In,” was a song of revolution that came out of a personal slight that evening. And Dylan was not in a forgiving mood. He sang about the forthcoming change where chains will bust and fall to “be buried at the bottom of the ocean,” elevating his slight into something Biblical:
Then they’ll raise their hands, Sayin’ we’ll meet all your demands; But we’ll shout from the bow “your days are numbered,” And like Pharaoh’s tribe, They’ll be drowned in the tide; And like Goliath, they’ll be conquered.
The March on Washington
Not many weeks after the motel incident, Dylan and Baez performed “When the Ship Comes In” at the March on Washington in August of 1963. So the song born out of pique at a hotel clerk took stage alongside Martin Luther King Jr. when he gave his “I Have a Dream” Speech.
Thus, Dylan’s song framed MLK’s speech with the warning, “The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.”
Revolution
Revolutions are often borne out of personal slights. But personal slights are often symbols of the system, so there is nothing wrong with such a genesis.
One instigation for the American Revolution was a tax on tea, but the tax was symbolic of something deeper. The Occupy Wall Street movement was fueled partly by people fed up with a system that had slighted them individually. Similarly, one can look at recent protests around the world to see movements that started small and grew into something unfathomable.
The year after Dylan wrote “When the Ship Comes In,” the song appeared on Dylan’s The Times They Are A-‘Changin’ (1964) album, his first album of all original songs. Some of the themes of “When the Ship Comes In” are echoed in the title song of the album: “There’s a battle outside ragin’;/It’ll soon shake your windows/And rattle your walls.”
Maybe the battle does not rage in the U.S. like it did in the 1960s, but it still continues here and around the world.
Bonus Source Information: In Martin Scorsese’s documentaryNo Direction Home, Baez tells the story about the hotel and the “devastating” song, not Dylan. So he may have a different perspective on the night. In Keys to the Rain, Oliver Trager, who calls the Live Aid version above “botched,” notes that Dylan once explained that “When the Ship Comes In” was less about sitting down and writing a song than being a type of song “[t]hey’re just in you so they’ve got to come out.” A better live version of the song was recorded at Carnegie Hall on October 26, 1963, two months after the March on Washington performance. It is included on the soundtrack to the Martin Scorsese documentary on No Direction Home: The Soundtrack (The Bootleg Series Vol. 7).
The two Bob Dylan songs below, “Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands” and “Idiot Wind,” show a drastic range of human emotions. Like several of Dylan’s songs, these two were inspired by his first wife, Sara Lownds, who is also the mother of Jakob Dylan of the Wallflowers. The songs reflect the vast divide between being in love and being angry at one you once loved.
The first is “Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands,” released as the final song on Blonde on Blonde in 1966, early in his 1965-1977 marriage to Lownds. (“Lowlands”/Lownds, get it?) The song is used to great effect in the movie “about” Bob Dylan, I’m Not There.
Although the lyrics are not a clear narrative, the poetry and the music convey pure affection: “With your silhouette when the sunlight dims / Into your eyes where the moonlight swims / And your match-book songs and your gypsy hymns.”
The second song, is “Idiot Wind,” written almost a decade later in 1974 and released on Blood on the Tracks as the Dylan-Lownds relationship was crumbling. The performance below from the 1976 Rolling Thunder Tour is amazing for its intensity and venom. It’s Bob Dylan punk.
To Dylan’s surprise, Sara showed up at the concert, and he is performing it for her. You can see what he is feeling. This blog post title’s reference to “hate” is not really accurate, as I should describe it more as pain and anguish covered to seem like anger. But one may only guess her feelings hearing this song.
Idiot wind, blowing like a circle around my skull, From the Grand Coulee Dam to the Capitol. Idiot wind, blowing every time you move your teeth, You’re an idiot, babe. It’s a wonder that you still know how to breathe.
There is some debate about how much of the song is really about Lownds and how much is about other things going on in Dylan’s life at the time. Dylan being Dylan, he leaves it ambiguous, as it is for the artist to let the listeners hear for themselves.
Below is the angry live performance during the Rolling Thunder Tour with Lownds in the audience. The performance, which is also available on the Hard Rain live album, is worth seeking out. If you’ve ever been angry at someone, put it on full screen and crank it up loud.
One of the brilliant touches is the final chorus where the angry finger-pointing evolves into a more understanding and humble “we’re idiots, babe. . . .” That line sounds more convincing in a slower and sadder version of the song he initially recorded for Blood on the Tracks before rerecording the song and replacing it with the angrier version that ended up on the album.
That alternate version is worth seeking out. It is available on the first official “Bootleg” series his record label released in 1991, and it is also available on various unofficial bootlegs of the New York City Sessions version of Blood on the Tracks. Check out this alternate slower and sadder version of “Idiot Wind” from the New York Sessions below.
, Baez tells the story about the hotel and the “devastating” song, not Dylan. So he may have a different perspective on the night. In 
, Oliver Trager, who calls the Live Aid version above “botched,” notes that Dylan once explained that “When the Ship Comes In” was less about sitting down and writing a song than being a type of song “[t]hey’re just in you so they’ve got to come out.” A better live version of the song was recorded at Carnegie Hall on October 26, 1963, two months after the March on Washington performance. It is included on the soundtrack to the Martin Scorsese documentary on 
.
The two Bob Dylan songs below, “Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands” and “Idiot Wind,” show a drastic range of human emotions. Like several of Dylan’s songs, these two were inspired by his first wife, Sara Lownds, who is also the mother of Jakob Dylan of the Wallflowers. The songs reflect the vast divide between being in love and being angry at one you once loved.