The breakup is a messy and complicated affair. At least one person is going to get hurt, but usually two when it’s something that has mattered for a long time. There’s the actual breaking up, a tough one for both sides, it hurts to lose someone, and it hurts to disappoint someone you’ve cared about for so long. There’s the telling of friends and family, the explanations and the sympathy, or sometimes, the relief. There’s always the guilt and the pain and the unanswered questions – sometimes easier than the answered ones.

Then, usually later, but no too much later, come the breakup blues. Those nagging thoughts that maybe you made a mistake, maybe you let the one and only get away. You remember all the good times and forget about the bad. You forget that her dad never really liked you. You forget the fights and the disagreements, but you remember the sunsets, the wine and roses, and the road trips, the laughs, movie night and Christmas.

This is when the inexperienced will go charging back in and take a stab at winning her back. It can be done, and, sometimes it works. But, more often than not, as soon as she takes you back (in most cases, she shouldn’t) it all starts to slide back to that same situation that brought you to the breakup in the first place, and then, at some point, you have to start the whole process, again. It’s not fair to either party, but especially the one that did the taking back, because they’re the ones that have laid it all out there and, once again, wear their heart on their sleeve for all the world to see.

It’s hard to place blame on either party in these situations, in most cases. The human heart is a complex machine, and the brain is rarely any help. All one can do is try to navigate the waters as best they can and hope that time and experience can lend a hand, hoping that nobody gets hurt, again. But that’s a tall order, for the breakup is a messy and complicated affair, friend to no one but the masochist, the poet and the songwriter.

During the first sessions in February, while trying to use up some extra studio time, I showed the guys “Breakup Blues,” and we laid down a basic rhythm track and scratch vocal. A few days later, I listened to it at home and thought it was pretty cool, but it was missing a third verse. So, I wrote one more, and we re-recorded it the next morning. Cody and Bukka played a kinda Cajun NOLA style accordion/fiddle thing on the chorus that sent it in a whole new direction, and Charlie played a guitar part that brought it all together, including one of my favorite solos on the record.