Exquisite Tenderness

Album: Red Dragon Cartel (2014)
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Songfacts®:

  • This ballad was the first song that Red Dragon Cartel frontman Jake E. Lee ever wrote. He told Glide Magazine; "I started playing piano when I was six and I didn't start playing guitar until I was twelve. So right around when I was thirteen or fourteen, on the piano, I just came up with that. That was the first song I ever wrote and I never knew what to do with it. I mean, it wasn't an Ozzy song, it really didn't seem like any song that you would put on a rock record, and I just never really knew what to do with it, but I always had it."

    "The studio that Ron (Mancuso co-producer) and I recorded in is right next to a restaurant that has a Jazz lounge in it ," Lee continued, "and we were in there late at night and I saw a piano and I was like, I hadn't seen one of these in a long time (laughs) so I sat down and I started playing that and Ron said, 'What's that?' And I said, 'That's the first song I ever wrote, never knew what to do with it.' And Ron said, 'I know what to do with it' (laughs) and I said, 'What?' and he says, 'Let's put it on the record.' 'Really?' It just seemed really weird to me but he said, 'I think it would be a great way to end a rock record, with something like that.' And I think he was right. I'm just thankful that after forty-plus years I'd finally be able to put that song on something."

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