There were these phone calls in the middle of the night. Molly was dead, from Covid. We had just gotten back to talking again, putting the past in place, cracking jokes about the old days when we played at CBGBs. Just a day before, I had begun writing a new single, "She never slept in the Chelsea Hotel. But she bought an old guitar, just 'round the corner." That is how this unexpected tribute came to be. Those lines were about her, I just did not know it yet.

Molly lived such a mysterious life, full of contradictions and left turns. How was I going to write a song about her? Well, I knew I did not want to candy-coat the past. In the end this is a song about the survivors, as much as the friend that went too soon.

Once I had the song in place and the lyrics were working, I felt like chasing my own personal Brian Wilson experience, to really try and arrange it, find the big parts and the small details, my own attempt at Good Vibrations, or In My Room. I know that is just laughable, but I thought that the sheer act of TRYING would take me somewhere new. I played mandolin and bass on this for the first time, so anything felt possible.

The tracking of the supporting instruments on this was just epic. I tried a million things, and some of them worked, often mixed so far down you don't know they are there but if I turned them off you might miss them. That mandolin line at the very end of the song is a shining moment, an example of what I wanted the whole thing to feel like. Well, I got there for a few seconds.