Dedicated To…
Alex Campbell (1925-1987), Hamish Imlach (1940-1996), Derroll Adams (1925-2000)

I knew you long before we met

I’d be trying to sound like you

Less than half your age, and not quite sure

What it takes to really have the blues

And though you didn’t use the many chords either

You played them in a different way

Had you told me to hold my guitar upside down?

I’d have thought that was quite OK

You’d been on the road so long

You knew how to read the signs

And when they told you to slow down

You saw the running out of time

And when I get my backstage pass

To that big gig in the sky

I’ll be proud to tell those bouncers

I’m looking for some friends of mine

You never ran out of stories

And you never ran out of songs

And I could not wait for the very first time

You would ask me to play along

So I added eight strings to the six I had

And I practiced till my fingers hurt

But I still could not make quite the music

That you put into a single word

You’d been on the road so long

You knew how to read the signs

And when they told you to slow down

You saw the running out of time

And when I get my backstage pass

To that big gig in the sky

I’ll be proud to tell those bouncers

I’m looking for some friends of mine

When you reached the end of your Sporting life

It seemed a few verses too short

But if you had not played it like you did

You’d not be missed over half the word.

You won’t be there when the Saints march in

Though  you  could  teach  them  in  your  sleep

How  to  laugh,  how  to  sigh  and  how  to  sing

And  to  make  your  undertaker  weep

You’d been on the road so long

You knew how to read the signs

And when they told you to slow down

You saw the running out of time

And when I get my backstage pass

To that big gig in the sky

I’ll be proud to tell those bouncers

I’m looking for some friends of mine