///*****/// [Intro] (Slow twelve-bar blues shuffle, organ swell, guitar answering the vocal) Take it down. Way down. Just like the old days. [Verse 1] There's a bottle on the amp and it's older than the band There's a burn hole in the setlist where my cigarette had planned The monitor is howling and the ceiling's dripping sweat This is the part of the evening that nobody will forget I learned this in a barroom off a highway in the south From a man with three good fingers and a graveyard in his mouth He said, boy, you can chase the lights and you can chase the fame But the blues is gonna find you and it's gonna know your name [Pre-Chorus] So pour it slow and let the feedback ring Some songs you play, some songs play you [Chorus] Whiskey, smoke and wire That's all I ever owned Whiskey, smoke and wire That's all I'm taking home Six strings and a low-down fire And a road that never ends Whiskey, smoke and wire, my only friends [Verse 2] I've been sober and I've been sorry and I've been both at once I've been the biggest thing in Dallas and a nobody in months I have watched the young ones burn like paper in the rain And I've buried better players than I'll ever be again But every night at ten o'clock the same old ghost appears And he plugs into the amplifier and he plays away the years Ain't nothing here but honesty, no mirrors and no lies Just a room full of survivors and the truth behind my eyes [Pre-Chorus] So pour it slow and let the feedback ring Some songs you play, some songs play you [Chorus] Whiskey, smoke and wire That's all I ever owned Whiskey, smoke and wire That's all I'm taking home Six strings and a low-down fire And a road that never ends Whiskey, smoke and wire, my only friends [Guitar Solo] (Long, aching, slow blues bends, volume swells, whole band dropping to a whisper) [Breakdown - Just Voice and Guitar] Nobody move Nobody breathe Just listen to this old thing sing That's it. That's the sound. [Bridge] They can build their perfect records out of tape and out of glass But they'll never catch the moment when a room becomes a mass When a thousand strangers hold their breath because a note went right That's the only kind of magic I have ever known in life [Final Chorus] Whiskey, smoke and wire That's all I ever owned Whiskey, smoke and wire That's all I'm taking home Six strings and a low-down fire And a road that never ends Whiskey, smoke and wire, my only friends My only friends [Verse 3] There's a young man in this audience who plays a little too Who thinks that he'll be standing here in nineteen ninety-two And I hope he gets it, honestly, I hope he gets it all But I want him to remember what I'm telling him tonight It's the hours nobody sees you, it's the rooms that stay half full That's the price, and it is heavy, and it's higher than they say But the thing you buy with all of it is worth it anyway [Outro] (Guitar sustaining, organ fading, crowd cheering slowly and warmly) Thank you. That one costs me something every time.
