If Not I'll Just Die

Album: Mr. M (2012)
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Songfacts®:

  • Just over a year after the release of Lambchop's Ohio album, frontman Kurt Wagner received the bad news that his close friend and sometime collaborator Vic Chesnutt had died, following an apparently deliberate overdose of muscle relaxants. Wagner dedicated his band's next album, Mr. M, to his late soul mate and many of its tracks reflect his passing.
  • This song opens the album and like several other tracks, it conveys the healing power of love. Wagner explained to UK newspaper The Sun: "I certainly hope that what I'm getting at here is more about what can be found after loss and the positives that can be attributed to the dealing with it and how it makes the good in us all shine a bit stronger."

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