This song was already writing itself in my sleep. As I was slowly waking up one morning a deep Rem dream was just ending with a scene of a very detailed charcoal-sketch of Aqualung reposed in a recording studio tracking room setting. My view from the back of the room looked forward to the control room where there appeared someone seated at the controls looking out through the glass toward the tracking room. The charcoal-sketched figure of Aqualung was blocking my view, so I couldn’t make out who it was. As I stared intently to see through a glass darkly, sketchy old Aqualung literally faded away into the ether whereupon I saw, at first, an LP album cover leaned up against the control room glass. The cover art was The Sacred Heart of Jesus with the Crown of Thorns.

And at the controls? There was the holy icon of Infant Jesus of Prague.

I had no idea what it all meant, it was just a dream after all. But it was unusually dramatic, even for a dream. Snapping suddenly to wakefulness, I realized that I was audibly repeating the title line and mulling over the first verse lyrics and tune now resonating insistently. I bolted out of bed and headed straight to my desk in order to capture the incoming gift of the Muse that was now inhabiting me in the full. My first inclination was that the song was about a Knight or a Crusader with their horses going into battle, but the lyrics insisted it was my battle and my beast was not only my steed, but God himself carrying me into the battle of conquering my own pride. It wasn’t clear, which is not unusual with initial inspiration. The Song, when it arrives, firstly demands that the writer be its servant at any rate. Songwriting is a minor gift of the Holy Spirit after all and I am always prepared as a craftsman to comply with the Holy Spirit. Saddled With Me is a bit like the biblical story of Saul of Tarsus on the road to Damascus.