Well,
I wrote this song in the middle of the night.
It was actually after I was watching a movie called
Raging Bulls,
a story of Jake LaMotta with Robert De Niro
and Martin Scorsese.
And it's been out forever.
I don't know what year it was.
But
I was watching it a few years ago.
And
I was in between record deals and in between
management deals and in between a whole lot of things
and starting a whole lot of other things.
I just had a baby.
And my wife just had a baby, actually.
I was part of it.
But
I was kind of wondering.
I knew the fire that I still had inside to make music
and to get my music heard.
But I was in an awkward spot to try and do anything about it.
And a friend of mine, who's a music critic, who
liked my last record,
had started out a
piece on me
saying he could have been a contender.
And this was before I saw the movie.
But it kind of pissed me off a bit,
because I kind of thought, you know,
fairly young guy.
And to kind of write off an entire decade's worth
of work with he could have been a contender,
I thought,
I just thought it was a little early for that.
And so I was watching the story of Jake LaMotta.
And I just thought it was funny and the similarities between the music
business and the boxing business and what bloody sport it can be.
And
I started thinking about it.
And I figured,
well,
you got to learn how to take a punch.
You still never let them knock you down.
He could have been a contender.
The next great white hope.
Not just another pretender.
Not just the next big joke.
You had to reach for the stars, though.
Nobody gets it all.
Without playing the game, son,
you're going to take a fall.
You never knocked me down.
Never knocked me down.
Never knocked me down.
Never knocked me down.
You don't get nothing for nothing.
Ain't that what they all say?
We're all fighting for something.
But there's a price we pay.
And you could stand there forever.
Just take it blow by blow.
Nobody else is the wiser.
They just came for the show.
You never knocked me down.
Never knocked me down.
You never knocked me down.
You never knocked me down.
In the fists of a stranger,
there's a shadow of doubt.
Go on, pretend you're a winner.
Go on, say yourself out.
You never knocked me down.
You
never knocked me down.
You never knocked me down.
You never knocked me down.
You never
knocked me down.
You never knocked me down.
You never knocked me down.