No easily recallable memory of whether the lyrics or chords came first but I think I had the title and then it flowed from there (but not sure) – the basic concept is about the elections following the 2nd Iraq War (Mesopotamia being the ancient name for the land between the Tigris and the Euphrates roughly encompassing modern day Iraq, Kuwait and Syria) and the subsequent re-election of Bush in 2004 (especially) and Blair in 2005 (less so, as a Labour voter I didn’t think I had that much choice)…

…“but oh the morning after we all saw what you did, looks like you lost your head”…

…the song lyrics tried to use the trick of making the whole thing seem like it was about one thing (a relationship) and not another (castigating US voters for re-electing Bush)…

Another main influence on the song (besides Helm, Hudson, Danko, Manuel & Robertson) was the Uncle Tupelo song ‘Anodyne’…check it out on youtube if you haven’t heard it for a while…I borrowed a copy for a few years from Sid (understandably he made me give it back eventually) and I’d always loved the slow pacing of the lyrics with the held title refrain in the chorus during the first sections sounding really beautiful before the steel kicks it up a gear…and overall it’s a great album too with their cover version of Doug Sahm’s ‘Give Back The Keys To My Heart’ with Doug guesting amongst many highlights (a shame Farrar and Tweedy couldn’t get on with each other and make more music as UT, but that’s the way it goes)…

I’ve tried to put this song back in the set (last time in March 2013 when line-up changed) since it fell out (during the 2008 touring) but it’s too damn slow and we’ve always got loads of other slow ones that take priority…maybe someday…

Next up at Number 8 a track from what is probably our most political album overall, it’s album six (again), ‘The Chuck Norris Project’…

http://mp3tube.video/mp3-download-southern-tenant-folk-uni…/