From the moment my friend Shooter Jennings once asked me if I ever wrote lyrics, the way I have approached songwriting has never been what I imagined it would be. A word or a phrase will catch my mind’s eye, and I will just start writing. TOMBSTONE OPERA, for example, was born of a need for revenge when our beloved neighborhood was burned to the ground by the policies of crooked politicians. Two words evolved into an operatic saga of terror on the plains of the American West. From that experience, I came to love the idea of a “concept” album as a way to delve into the dark secrets of the American story. As I watched our great nation succumbing slowly and inexorably to the forces of Evil, I could feel an apocalyptic story stirring in my songwriter’s soul. Three magic words leapt to the page, and I was off and running…
This album has now become a saga of the final battle between Good and Evil, two forces I truly believe are real entities, not just reflections of man’s behavior or historical events in retrospect, but actual forces of nature. Though I have always wanted to protect the privacy of others throughout my life as a public person, I was compelled to tell this tale through the story of my brush with the devil as a young man. I had a short-lived relationship of sorts with a young woman in my early days as an actor on location. Unbeknownst to me, she was married to a notorious serial killer. Though he was incarcerated, I have spent a lifetime trying to imagine what it must have been like to have been that close to pure Evil. THE KILLER’S WIFE is a fictional saga derived from that event in my life.
Produced by Shooter Jennings and James Woods, lyrics/vocals by James Woods, vocals/music by Bob Wayne, art direction by Sara Miller-Woods.