Ghosts & Arrows

When crafting songs, I’ve come to learn they come in all kinds of shapes and sizes. Some are like ghosts that will haunt you and your role is to pick up the guitar (or instrument of choice) and Ouija board-like divine them into reality. Others come at you like an arrow and you can’t escape their inevitable strike. “Joseph” was both. 

The arrow came first: Hiking the North Cascade mountains with our daughter a few weeks back, the entire melody for the song– verse, chorus, breaks– came to me in its entirety. On this occasion, using the voice memo feature on my iWatch, during the descent of our hike, I thankfully made a reference recording of me humming and whistling the entire tune. The title was also there, however with a very different opening verse:

Hey, Joseph
You’ve been on my mind
Saw you standing at the altar
You may have stumbled
But you did not falter

I know, it’s weak and unfocused, but it helped me get a fix on the melody for recording the tune while trail hiking. In the embryonic stage of a song, I’ve learned not to shy away from nonsense lyrics. While often they get tossed, I also find “working lyrics” provide a trusty portal that allows me to easily re-enter that magic moment of original inspiration. And, in this case, the opening phrase did provide a channel of ideas, images, actions and emotions that I used to develop the entire lyric making it all the way to the final cut.

Then the ghost began to haunt me: Capturing the melody (and underlying harmony) proved to be the easy part. Lyrically, the song went through at least three iterations that I worked on over a one month period. Joseph took on multiple characters — real, imagined and often a combination of both. Given its historical significance, I explored the universal attributes of the name. None of those felt right and were too far removed from what the song itself was trying to reveal to me. This turned out to be a key insight: A song writer friend and I were having a text exchange about a song she was writing and her “aha moment” came when she decided to just let the song be what it needed to be. Instinctively I understood that “Joseph” wanted to reveal itself ultimately as a story of redemption. 

Using the Joseph character as the protagonist, I constructed the lyric as a conversation reflecting on choices and consequences while refraining from judgement. I believe many of us have a “Joseph” in our lives and I hope this song allows listeners to find space to hold their Joseph with grace and love.

PS: with gratitude to my songwriting friends Mike, Amy, Charles & Colleen for giving this an early listen, your useful advice and kind support.

Listen to (demo) on Bandcamp:

“Joseph”    [ music & lyrics (c) 2025 Mark Ippolito ]

Hey Joseph
You’ve been on my mind
Like a yellow moon
On a summer night

Hey Joseph
You always made me smile
Strutting through every room
Like you were royal

But when you said goodbye
I could tell by the look in your eye
The heat was coming and 
We were losing you

Hey Joseph
I watched you face the fire
But what good’s a witness
When everyone’s a liar?

CHORUS
Check your mirrors
Leave your tracks in the dust
Grip the wheel 
And go, go where you must
Time is a diamond
Try to save a little for us
‘Cause the miles between us
Won’t really matter 

Hey Joseph
We surely let you down 
Hard growing up right
On the wrong side of town

Hey Joseph
We made it out alive
Found our faith 
In unlikely places

When you drove away
Said that you couldn’t be late
It’s time to leave when
You know what you’re chasing

CHORUS

Check your mirrors
Leave your tracks in the dust
Grip the wheel 
And do, do what you must
Time is a diamond
Try to save a little for us
‘Cause the miles between us
Won’t really matter 
No, they won’t really matter 

Hey Joseph