Gaslight Anthem ( The ) - History Books

First performance: no live dates


Coverinfo

no live dates

Songinfo

app.com
"History Books" is the title track of The Gaslight Anthem’s album, released Oct. 27 2023. 
 
 
  
 
Media:
 

Other cover versions

Bruce on the artist

Bruce on Brian Fallon :  
 
"And Brian, I know Brian Fallon from The Gaslight Anthem, he was a fan but he does something, he just manifests something that's completely his. I've played with his band onstage a few times and I love doing it. It's just wonderful. We played in Asbury Park at Convention Hall one night and we did "American Slang" and it was just great. You hear little bits of [your music in other songs] but then they take it to another place. They take it to a place where you wouldn't have taken it, you know. And that's what you hope for."
 
Source  
Brian Fallon on the Performances : 
 
Article posted on The Ringer about Gaslight Anthem's 10 year anniversary of their second album The '59 Sound:
 
"It was what it always was, come to manifest. It was everything I was going for, and I knew this was my opportunity. It might be my only chance. For me, it was sheer and utter determination to not fail in front of those people. This might be my only chance to speak my voice and get my emotion across. I didn’t care who was watching and how many people were there. I didn’t even care what the E Street Band thought. Bruce invited me to do this thing and give me a chance to put my flag in the ground, and that’s what I’m going to do. And it was super scary because if you do mess up, you’re messing up in front of, essentially, the world. To me, the [actual] world didn’t matter, that was the world I was looking for. That was the world I was trying to reach. The people that would take an artist like Bruce Springsteen, look at him, and go, "I relate to that." It was my future in the balance. I was going out there and representing everyone that I was working with. I was representing the band. I was representing Bruce in a way, and his taste. I’m representing a song. I’m representing my parents, who’ve allowed me to do this. I’m representing all of this."
 

Lyrics

What's that you say?
I knew you when?
You don't look too much like my friend
Those history books
Filled up with crooks
Stories I don't want to read again

I've tried to live
One thousand years from here

When I think of it now
It just brings me down
When I think of you now
And when I think of it now
It just brings me down
When I think of you now

I'm keeping time
One day goes by
I try to live till the next one
But these history books
Full of haunted looks
From people I don't want to see again

'Cause I've learned to live
But they try to hold me here

When I think of it now
It just brings me down
When I think of it now
And when I think of it now
It just brings me down
When I think of you now

You just remind me of the
Nights of smoke and dirty jokes
Darkened rooms with lonely ghosts
And they were beautiful some time ago
But time keeps rollin' us on

When I think of it now
It just brings me down
When I think of you now
And when I think of you now
It just brings me down
When I think of you now

You just remind me of the
Nights of smoke and dirty jokes
Darkened rooms with lonely ghosts
And they were beautiful some time ago
But time keeps rollin' us on
Rollin' us on
Rollin' us on
Rollin' us on
Rollin' us on
Rollin' us on