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DEAD MAN WALKIN'

There's a pale horse comin'
And I'm gonna ride it
I'll rise in the morning
My fate decided it
I'm a dead man walkin'
I'm a dead man walkin'

In Saint James Parish
I was born and Christened
Now I've got my story
Mister, ain’t no need for you to listen
It's just a dead man talkin'

Once I had a job, I had a girl
Between our dreams and actions lies this world

Hey in the deep forest
Their blood and tears rushed over me
All I could feel was the drugs and the shotgun
And my fear up inside me
Like a dead man talkin'

'Neath the summer sky my eyes went black
Sister I won't ask for forgiveness, my sins are all I have

Now the clouds above my prison
Move slowly 'cross the sky
There's a new day comin'
And my dreams are full tonight

Bruce wrote this song for the motion picture: Dead Man Walking. The connection is mostly made in the way we're forced to see this cold-blooded murderer as a human being and as a victim himself. Like in the best of Bruce's songs we get to walk for a while in another person's shoes. Think of JOHNNY 99, HIGHWAY 29 and... well... DEAD MAN WALKIN' and you get the same humanistic view of people who forced by circumstances they couldn't control end up as the outcast of society.

Played during The Ghost Of Tom Joad and Reunion tours. Appeared on singles in 1996 with HIGHWAY 29, THIS HARD LAND (live), and DOES THIS BUS STOP AT 82ND STREET? (live).

Available on:

The Essential (disc 3- track 11)
The Soundtrack of the motion picture: Dead Man Walking - 1995 (track 1)

Liner notes by Bruce Springsteen in the The Essential booklet:

Written for the Tim Robbins film. I tuned the E string on my guitar down to a D and cut it in as low a key as possible to get as much deepness and darkness I could out of the music.