Return to the Ballad of the Sad Cafe

Just as a postscript to our truly depressing item on Emmit Rhodes last week, here's one of his early songs to put the whole thing in some weird kind of perspective.

From the eponymous 1967 album by The Merry-Go-Round, it's Emmit's often covered and truly exquisite "Time Will Show the Wiser."




A great track, obviously, but the thing about it that really hits me over the head of late is -- what a young man's song it is, at least lyrically. I mean, we all know the feeling, but I can't imagine many people past their teens who'd be capable of articulating it so nakedly and naively.

Of course, the Beatles/psychedelic touches are pretty damned sophisticated for a bunch of guys barely out of a high school when they recorded it.