51.   That night the songs had no political double meaning, no provocative allusion to money or drugs.

52.   The celebrities trying to hit the high notes of his deceptively breezy songs had to find a comfortable spot alongside a daunting legend.

53.   The letter also stated that the song had only two verses, putting to rest an oft-repeated story that a third verse had been lost.

54.   The new songs have that lived-in feeling.

55.   The old mono recordings have held on to their immediacy, and so have the songs.

56.   The songs had the feel of short, Southern Gothic fictions, pumped up by musicians who came of age chugging beers to the Rolling Stones and Neil Young.

57.   The songs have stop-time sections to show off the vowel, and it was sung upward and downward, made to cry or to float.

58.   The song probably has its origins in the Southern Appalachians, where it is still passed on as part of an oral tradition.

59.   The songs have the fragile grace of a moment of imminent collapse.