One Monkey Lyrics

Lyric discussion by nspdx 

Cover art for One Monkey lyrics by Gillian Welch

The monkey and the engineer occurred to me as well. I've been playing that this week, and there's a monkey and a train... Maybe something there, she does identify as a deadhead. Welch sometimes weaves her stories into the music (wrecking ball, everything is free), so maybe she had a foolish person (monkey?) that potentially endangered the trajectory of the band, but this person wouldn't be allowed to stop the show, the train kept on... That might make her the captain with the steady wheel. Or maybe it's about life and god... Maybe not.

My Interpretation