Lyrics:

The Song:

"Go It Alone" is one of my favorite tracks on Guero, as it is one of the grooviest songs Beck has recorded. Jack White from the White Stripes plays an infectious bassline, as Beck harmonizes a lot with himself and lazily raps over the groove.  And there's still a bit of a bluesy touch to the song, which I think really makes it stand out even more.

Beck was asked about the collaboration, and said Jack White walked in, picked up a bass, started playing, and they literally took five minutes to put the song together. He also has said that Jack was in town for a few nights, and they messed around together, creating songs, and this was the idea that "bore fruit." (Outtakes one day perhaps?)

As for the song itself, ... It begins with a very effective image of a character: "I'm coming over / See me down at the station / By the lane / With my hands in my pocket / Jingling a wish coin / That I stole from a fountain / That was drownin' / All the cares in the world." Beck occasionally does this constant extending of sentences, which makes it a very striking opening line. Standing at a station, presumably watching someone leave, hands in pocket, wishing things were different. He's been left to go it alone. He doesn't want to.

Beck has in the past talked about how sometimes he thinks of songwriting as like making little movies. This is one song where that is very obvious, as he moves through a bunch of scenes. Next he's jumping a fence, with a "ring and a question." A jilted proposal? Then he moves into the blues of working the coalmine and duststorms. Finally, he escapes it all, alone in his car, with all his troubles in the rearview mirror.

There's a lot of great scenes in the song, and the bass and guitar work so well together. There's even a little cool "Where It's At"-y organ riff at the end for extra flavor. Also if you listen closely, there's a lot of muttering and voices in the background (even behind the "na na na"s).

Live:

Played live 14 times:
Earliest known live version: February 15, 2005
Latest known live version: December 9, 2006

Beck and his Guero/Info band never played "Go It Alone" very regularly. We have it for just 14 setlists over the two years of touring.

One bootlegged version, from Detroit in September 2005, begins with Beck commenting that he wrote it with Jack White (who is from there). The arrangement and performance sounds very straight to the record--a groovy bass performance by Justin Meldal-Johnsen, cool background vocals from Brian LeBarton, Beck seems into the lyrics and doesn't forget much. They play it a few other times in September too. (September 25 in Cleveland has the best sound quality recording; Beck messes up a lot of the lyrics then though.)

Then in 2006 they resumed touring after finishing off Info but before it was released. They played the song twice. Then there were two more later that fall, after the album was released. The version on October 30 had a lengthy bass intro before Beck started singing. It sounds a bit more rock than groovy though. (Beck adlibs some lines though, including "ride a bus down to DC from New York City!" which they had done that night.)