The song Caroline is a track off the band’s third album Give Up The Ghost, produced by Rick Rubin.
It’s written about Brandi Carlile’s niece, (her brother Jay Carlile’s daughter) and she said it had a “funky old-time rock-and-roll feel to it” and felt it suited Elton John.
The song features Elton John on vocals & piano, and Chad Smith (Red Hot Chilli Peppers) on drums and percussion. Brandi Carlile also plays banjo on this track.
It was written (credited) by all three members of the band.
In 2009, Brandi Carlile discussed the track and Elton John with NME. “It was amazing. I’ve never seen a person of any age so excited about music and so inspired,” she said. “He did piano and vocals in under an hour and a half. It was unbelievable. And he told me about a whole bunch of bands I had no idea about and got after me for not knowing them and started sending me records. The whole time it was like an out-of-body experience. Every once in a while this total panic would come over me when I realised who I was talking to.”
In a Songfacts interview she said about the song (and her neice) “I had so much to say about her that I couldn’t fit all the words into that song,” she told us. “It was like a total tongue twister, that one is.”
At the time, Elton John wrote a note to Caroline which Brandi kept safe until she was old enough to understand it’s importance.
On 22 February 2023, Caroline joined Brandi on stage at her solo show in Durham to sing the song together.
Little discussed fact. It wasn’t the first time Elton John had reached out to Brandi Carlile. The first time was when they were recording The Story – a more official type phone call, “it was one of those freak out moments…it was like this official call, to tell me the the record was good”, Brandi sharedduring the 2021 Broken Horses live stream promotions.
Image © The Unofficial Archivist
Lyrics
I woke up long after dawn
Twenty years had come and gone
I know when it changed for me
A day in June, you came to me
I’ve seen through someone else’s eyes
With nothin’ on the other side
Every motel, every town
Pieces scattered all around
Promises that I can’t be
Someone’s heart that I can’t keep
Days so long, I couldn’t speak
Roads so rocky, I can’t sleep
I’ve seen things so beautiful
All around this broken world
That pale in comparison to you
Caroline, I’m on my way back home to you
Can’t imagine what I’m goin’ through
Without you by my side
It’s been a long long time
Oh won’t you say a prayer for me
I hope you will remember me
You’re always on my mind
I have seen the canyon lands
Crooked lines like in your hands
You’d swear the earth was split in two
I wouldn’t lie, I promise you
That I have seen it, you will too
You could not believe if not for
Photographs I took for you
Caroline
They’ve built towers to the sky
It hurts sometimes to watch them try
They run themselves into the ground
But I know you will love them
And their city lights and city sounds
There’s beauty in the struggle
Anytime I feel it get me down
I see you smiling
Caroline, I’m on my way back home to you
Can’t imagine what I’m goin’ through
Without you by my side
It’s been a long long time
Oh won’t you say a prayer for me
I hope you will remember me
You’re always on my mind
My Caroline
Now I have seen things in the sky
Stars and lights and birds and I
I’ve been rocky mountain high
And told them all about you
Because you are still the only thing
That constantly amazes me
I love the road and I’ve been blessed
But I love you best
Caroline, I’m on my way back home to you
Can’t imagine what I’m goin’ through
Without you by my side
It’s been a long long time
Oh won’t you say a prayer for me
I hope you will remember me
You’re always on my mind
You were always on my mind
My Caroline
