I've been tempted, again,
To do things I shouldn't even be thinking of.
My minds been wandering, day dreaming,
Distracted by feelings that pretend to be love.
I know you're trusting me to be faithful
I'm being trusted more than I ever had
Oh baby, let me go, let me be bad.
Ah most women, they don't want me
That's ok, I'm past that phase of my life
But there's a woman, this one woman
If I close my eyes I may recall I already have a wife.
I know you're trusting me to be faithful
I promised to God, I know I had
And I got to keep holding on, but I want to be bad.
Older's not necessarily wiser
It's just a commonly held myth.
I'm not so old that I can't remember
What can happen when inhibitions shift
Let's figure out another way
So I don't carry this face of shame
When I look at you in the morning
I want to smile and see your smile just the same.
Instead of getting angry 'cause I'm human
Reward me for staying strong.
Let's get a babysitter, let's light some candles.
Let's make something right since I've done nothing wrong.
We can make a game out of my desire
It could be the best night that we've ever had
We could turn bad into our good, let me be bad.
Let's play doctor, let's play college, let me be bad.
Let's play dress-up, let's play heaven, let me be bad.
Let's play twister, let's play blind date, let me be bad.
Commentary
I wrote this song earlier this year, and the lyrics are among the favorites of mine. It started with the first line which I thought said so much in just a few words:
"I've been tempted, again"
We learn that the singer not only has been tempted, but it's happened before. We also suspect that he hasn't submitted to the temptation either now or earlier, because if he had it wouldn't be described as just "temptation", it would be "I was bad" or something like that.
After I thought of this line I sat back and heard the rest of the story. It took about 15 minutes to finish the lyrics, hearing the melody in my head. I didn't write the line "let me be bad" until I got to that point of the song and needed a rhyme with "had".
Once again we've got the pattern that I use so often:
Verse
Verse
Bridge with a different pattern
Verse
An admission: as I was writing this song I heard Leonard Cohen's voice singing it, very low, in the voice he had in the song "Be For Real". When I sing it, I sing it an octave higher than I hear his voice sing it in my head.
