Colin Weaver - Long Black Veil (Originally by Lefty Frizzell)
I’ve always loved this song, but The Band’s version is my favorite, and so this was sort of inspired by that. The song itself is beautiful and sad. It’s about a man who was executed for a murder he did not commit; he refused to offer his alibi so that no one would know that he slept with his best friend’s wife. She visits his grave wearing a long black veil. It was written based off a legend of an unknown woman seen visiting a man’s grave. Here are the lyrics:
Ten years ago on a cold dark night
someone was killed beneath the town hall lights
There were few at the scene, but they all agreed
that the man who ran looked a lot like me
She walks these hills in a long black veil
She visits my grave when the night winds wail
Nobody knows, nobody sees
Nobody knows but me
The judge said “Son, what is your alibi?
If you were somewhere else, then you won’t have to die”
I spoke not a word, though it meant my life
for I’d been in the arms of my best friend’s wife
She walks these hills in a long black veil
She visits my grave when the night winds wail
Nobody knows, nobody sees
Nobody knows but me
Now the scaffold is high, and eternity’s near
she stood in the crowd, she shed not a tear
But sometimes at night, when the cold wind moans
in a long black veil, she cries over my bones
She walks these hills in a long black veil
She visits my grave when the night winds wail
Nobody knows, nobody sees
Nobody knows but me
