FCS Daily Music Video – ‘The Letter’ (Wayne Carson) Joe Cocker, Leon Russell (piano), Mad Dogs and Englishmen (Woodstock 1970)

John Robert “Joe” Cocker OBE (20 May 1944 – 22 December 2014) was an English singer known for his gritty, bluesy voice and dynamic stage performances that featured expressive body movements.

This song is about a guy who gets a letter from his former love telling him that she wants him back, and the guy wants to fly out and see her immediately. The Nashville songwriter Wayne Carson Thompson wrote the song after his father gave him the line, “Give me a ticket for an aeroplane.”

Lyrics below

Gimme a ticket for an aeroplane
Ain’t got time to take a fast train
Lonely days are gone, I’m-a goin’ home
Oh, my baby, just-a wrote me a letter

I don’t care how much money I gotta spend
Got to get back to my baby again
Lonely days are gone, I’m-a goin’ home
Oh, my baby, just-a wrote me a letter

Well, she wrote me a letter
Said she couldn’t live without me no more
Listen, mister, can’t you see I got to get back
To my baby once-a more
Anyway, yeah!

Gimme a ticket for an aeroplane
Ain’t got time to take a fast train
Lonely days are gone, I’m-a goin’ home
Oh, my baby, just-a wrote me a letter

Well, she wrote me a letter
Said she couldn’t live without me no more
Listen, mister, can’t you see I got to get back
To my baby once-a more
Anyway, yeah!

Gimme a ticket for an aeroplane
Ain’t got time to take a fast train
Lonely days are gone, I’m-a goin’ home
Oh, my baby, just-a wrote me a letter
Oh, go, my baby, just-a wrote me a letter