The Story Behind the Song: Montana

This is one of the tunes on the Many Ponies CD, which we should have samples up for next week. I figure, if nothing else, folks in Montana might like it.


Montana

Don’t know what I went lookin’ for
Don’t know what I was tryin’ to find
I can’t remember anymore
I guess I kinda lost my mind

Now you can have your city lights
If that’s the kind of thing you need
I’d rather see the stars at night.
I’d rather be where I can breathe

Comin’ home to you, Montana
Are you still wild and free?
Coming home to you Montana
If I can find my way back
That’s where I want to be.

I’ve been the wayward wind too long
Maybe I’m tired of bein’ alone
Maybe I heard it in a song
Sayin’ it’s time to come back home

I may go lookin’ for a smile
See if she still remembers me
Maybe we’ll walk and talk awhile
Maybe we’ll just see what we see

Comin’ home to you, Montana
Why did I ever stray?
Coming home to you Montana
If I can find my way back…
I’m comin’ come to you, Montana
Why did I ever stray?
Comin’ home to you, Montana.
If I can find my way back
That’s where I’m gonna stay.



Listen to the song here.



No doubt about it, Montana's a beautiful place. Perhaps because it's the about the least populated place this side of the Amazon rainforest. So the tune is certainly an homage to that and I do hope the good people of Montana will enjoy this song.

But there's more, too.

Obviously, Montana is about a guy who wants to go home again.
But what exactly is “home?”
Is it just a geographical location?
I don’t think so.

One of my favorite films is Sam Peckinpah’s classic, The Wild Bunch. There’s a scene in which this gang of aging outlaws, past their prime and past their time, are taking five in a little village in Mexico. The leader of the gang, Pike Bishop (William Holden), is sharing some booze with a village elder, and is astounded at seeing a couple of his trigger-happy desperados frolicking in a pond like seven-year-olds.
“We all dream of being a child again,” the elder shrugs wisely. “Even the worst of us. Perhaps the worst most of all.”

Sure, home is where you grew up.
But home isn’t just a place.
It’s a time.
A time when you were new and fresh, and the world was full of wonder and mystery, and every dream seemed possible.

Then you make choices.
The choices all seem “right” at the time, or you convince yourself they are. But every choice you make eliminates some possibilities and makes others inevitable.
Doors close.
Bridges burn.

Maybe you choose yourself right into a corner.
Maybe you lose track of where your choices were supposed to take you, the person you were supposed to be.
Maybe you look in the mirror one day and 20 years have gone by and you’re farther from your dream than ever and you count your losses and ask, like Jake Holman in THE SAND PEBBLES, “What happened? What the hell happened?”

It’s easy to get caught up in chasing shadows on the wall of the cave.
Extrinsic rewards.
Artificial things.
Fame.
Money.
Easy money and fast women (or is it the other way around?) All the trappings, all the symbols of success.
Maybe you do all this stuff, get all this stuff and find yourself asking, “Is that all there is?” Maybe you long for something else, something more, something real.
Did you ever notice it always seems to be the rich, successful guys who blow their brains out?

The thing is, you realize it, too late. Before you can say tempus fugit, you’re so far off course that you’re not even sure what galaxy you’re in.
And way past that point of no return.
And the farther from your dream you’ve gone, the more you long to go back home, find your way back to your Montana.

Some of it’s a longing for possibility. Some of it’s a weariness of responsibility. Weariness of freedom, I suppose, which features responsibility on the B-side and, rumor has it, is just another word for “nothin’ left to lose.”

Part of the thing about childhood for most people is that they don’t have to be responsible for too much. They can kick back and let somebody else drive.
If you’ve ever been on the road a long time and, despite multiple cups of bad coffee, you can barely keep your eyes open and focus, you know that letting somebody else drive for a while has a lot of appeal.

But there isn’t anybody else.
There’s just you.
Just you.

So now it’s the last round and you’re way behind on points, and you can barely hold your arms up, let alone throw effective punches. Yet you know the only way you can win it at this point is by knock-out.
So somehow, you keep going.
Somehow you get up off that stool.
You answer the bell one more time


We’d all like to believe this guy makes it back to his Montana, wherever, whatever, or whoever that means to him.
Shangri-La,
Bali-Hai.
Blue Bayou

We hope that he recaptures his long-ago dream, the freshness and optimism of his childhood, because, if he does, then there’s a chance we might be able to do it, too.
And we desperately need to believe in that possibility.

Now, I wouldn’t advise you to lay any heavy bread on our hero's success.
But me, I’m famous for playing long shots.
I may be the only person on earth who bet on Douglas over Tyson.

Sometimes, the impossible happens.
And when it does, it's sweet.

sj