Presumably written by Bob Dylan
Recorded during the Basement Tapes sessions (Summer 1967)
Tabbed by Eyolf Østrem
The lyrics below are obviously wrong. As John Howells says: "The lyrics seem to be nonsense and exist only to fill in for what would be the real words, if they ever existed." If you have better suggestions, drop me a note.
The electric guitar which plays the arpeggiated fills throughout uses a small number of figures (here transcribed relative to the capo, for consistency's sake, although it is most certainly played without a capo). The direction is mostly downwards first, but the opposite occurs as well:
C G7 D
: . . : . . : . .
||-8-----------------||-3-----------------||-5-----------------||
||-----8-----------8-||-----6-----------6-||-----6-----------6-||
||-------9-----9-----||-------4-----4-----||-------5-----5-----||
||-----------10------||-----------5-------||-----------3-------||
||-------------------||-------------------||-------------------||
||-------------------||-------------------||-------------------||
The parts at "One for the road" and "one for my baby" go something like:
F G F C
: . . : . .
|-------------------|-8-----------------|
|-10----8----6------|-----8-----------8-|
|-10----9----7------|-------9-----9-----|
|-------------------|-10--------10------|
|-------------------|-------------------|
|-------------------|-------------------|
one for the road
C G7 C F
: . . : . .
|-------------------|-------------------|
|-------6----8------|-10--------------10|
|-9-----7----9------|-----10------------|
|-10----------------|-------10----10----|
|-------------------|-----------8-------|
|-------------------|-------------------|
one for my ba -- -- by
In the standard position, they can comfortably be played:
F G F C
: . . : . .
|-------------------|-0-----------------|
|-1-----0-----------|-1-----------------|
|-2-----0-----2-----|-0-----------------|
|-------------3-----|-2-----------------|
|-------------------|-3-----------------|
|-------------------|-------------------|
C G7 C F
: . . : . .
|-------------------|-1-----------------|
|-------------------|-1-----------------|
|-------------0-----|-2-----------------|
|-2-----3-----2-----|-3-----------------|
|-3-----5-----------|-3-----------------|
|-------------------|-1-----------------|
[...]
F G F C
One for the road
C G7 C F
One for my baby
F G F C
and one for the road
G7
I cry alone at night
F
Please tell me it's only snight
C
And she's calling me back at night
G
And she's already home
C
One for my baby
F G F C
One for the road
C G7 C F
One for my baby
F G F C
and one for the road
I cry alone at night
There is no friend in sight
I love getting back at night
But I wish I don't
One for my baby
One for the road
One for my baby
and one for the road
This bottle is dried up too
And I'll be all cried up soon
I can't see no God on the moon
It's a long way to go
One for my baby
One for the road
One for my baby
and one for the road
I cry alone at night
He's not alone at night
I'll be there my whole night
But I wish it was whole