C                            F                  G
 I can still remember when I bought my first guitar,
         C                                   F             G
Remember just how good the feeling to put it proudly in my car,
       C7                                A7            Dm
And my fam'ly listened fifty times to my two song repertoire.
                               F          G
I told my mom her only son was gonna be a star.
C                                  F                 G
 Bought all the Beatles records, I sounded just like Paul,
  C                                F        G
I bought all the old Chuck Berry's 78's and all
  C7                              A7              Dm
I sat by my record player playing ev'ry note they played.
                                F     G         C
I watched them all on TV making ev'ry move they made.

C                                 F
Rock and roll, I gave you all the best years of my life
        G                             F              C
All the dreamy sunny Sundays, all the moonlit summer nights.
                                      F
I was so busy in the backroom writing love songs to you
               G                           F          C
While you were changing your direction and never even knew 
           G           F          C
That I was always just one step behind you.

C                               F            G
 '66 seemed like the year I was really going somewhere;
        C                            F              G
We were living in San Francisco with flowers in our hair,
C7                                 A7               Dm
  Singing songs of kindness so the world would understand,
                                                F              G
To the guys and me you were something more than   just another band.
         C                   F              G
And then sixty-nine in L. A. came around so soon, 
        C                         F               G
We were really making headway and writing lots of tunes,
       C7                                      A7          Dm
And we must have played the wildest stuff that we had ever played, 
                                            F          G      C
And the way the crowds cried out for us, we thought we had it made.

C                                 F
Rock and roll, I gave you all the best years of my life
        G                                F             C
All the crazy, lazy, young days, all the magic moon at night.
                                  F
I was so busy on the road singing love songs to you,
               G                           F          C
While you were changing your direction and never even knew 
           G           F          C
That I was always just one step behind you.

C                         F            G
 Seventy-one and so alone when I met Susanne,
      C                         F              G
I was trying to go it solo with someone else's band.
    C7                        A7              Dm
She came up to me later and I took her by the hand,
                                       F              G
And I told her all my troubles and she seemed to understand.
        C                                     F             G
And she followed me through London, through a hundred hotel rooms, 
          C                            F              G
Through a hundred record companies who didn't like my tunes; 
    C7                         A7             Dm
She followed me when finally I sold my old guitar, 
                                    F       G    C
She tried to help me understand I'd   never be a star.

C                                 F
Rock and roll, I gave you all the best years of my life
        G                             F              C
All the dreamy sunny Sundays, all the moonlit summer nights.
                                      F
And though I never knew the magic, of making it with you
       G                                F            C
That I thank the lord for giving me the little bit I knew
          G           F          C
And I was always just one step behind you.