These Days

This sad, hurting song was originally written by Jackson Browne when he was just 16 years old in either 1964 or 1965. It appeared on a Browne demo in early 1967 under the title "I've Been Out Walking." Later in the same year it gained its first release when Andy Warhol's protégé Nico recorded it on her Chelsea Girl album, with Browne playing acoustic guitar. Other artists covered it over the following few years, including the Nitty Gritty Junk Band on their Rare Junk album and Tom Rush on his 1970 self-titled set. Browne himself recorded the song on his 1973 For Everyman LP, with an arrangement written by Gregg Allman (who also covered it around the same time on his Laid Back debut solo set). Browne's version differed from Nico's both in style and lyrics. In the latter case several lines were changed or omitted, such as a couple of lyrics about "rambling" and "gambling." This song has continued to be covered by a number of acts including Fountains of Wayne who used it as the B-side of their 1999 single "Troubled Times."

Browne was very young when he wrote this song, but even then he had a feel for heartbreak. Talking in a radio interview about the first breakup one endures, he said, "That came be the most formative time in your life. Trying to get through your early years is a harrowing experience for a lot of people."

Nico's version of the song has the original lyric: I've stopped my dreaming I won't do too much scheming When Browne released his version, he changed it to the much more hopeful: I'll keep on moving, moving on Things are bound to be improving these days "Over the rest of my teenage years and into my 20s I developed a kind of optimism, a kind of resoluteness, so I changed it to 'I'll keep on moving, keep improving,'" he said. "That's more to me what life is made of, the idea that I'll get through this, I'll continue looking."