2 Songs Loretta Lynn and Elvis Costello Wrote at the Cash Cabin in 2007 and Their Final Duet Together

While touring around his fifth album Trust in 1981, Elvis Costello and the Attractions popped in for a session at Studio B in Nashville to record a few songs, including Hank Cochran’s “She’s Got You,” (as “He’s Got You”), which was first recorded by Patsy Cline in 1962 and again by Loretta Lynn in 1977, giving both women a No. 1 hit.

A year later, Costello also covered Lynn’s 1960 hit “I’m a Honky Tonk Girl” on his EP I’m Your Toy. “It’s a weird song for me to record, because I didn’t even reverse the gender,” Costello told Uncut in 2016.

“Loretta was our guiding light,” added Costello. “While I was in Nashville, this girl came by our
hotel, and she turned out to be the president of Loretta’s fan club, and we all joined.”

It would take another 25 years before Costello would actually meet Lynn through John Carter Cash, when the two went to Cash Cabin studio to write a few songs in 2007. “I was there on my own and suddenly Loretta arrives,” recalled Costello. “She was like a ball of fire. She’s got this box file, with ‘Songs’ written on it. She tips it out, and every kind of piece of paper tumbles out: Telephone note pads. Fancy stationery. Hotel stationery. Bits of old receipts. Bits of cardboard boxes.”

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Costello continued, “All with lyrics written on them. Some of them are quite famous, and I even
said, ‘Why isn’t this in the Country Music Hall of Fame?’ “

While he manned the computer, Lynn worked with a pencil and a piece of paper, and the two ended up writing two songs during their Cash Cabin session, which ended up on two Costello albums.

“We looked at one another like, ‘What’s going to come out of this?’” recalled Lynn. “He was laughing about it, but I didn’t think it was funny because that’s the way I write all my songs. When I write a song, I don’t want to be on a computer.”

[RELATED: The Final Song Loretta Lynn Sang to Her Husband, “Wouldn’t It Be Great?”]

“Pardon Me, Madam, My Name is Eve” (2008)

Written by Loretta Lynn and Elvis Costello

Costell and Lynn’s first collaboration was a mouthful: “Pardon Me Madam, My Name is Eve.” The song came from Lynn’s “Song” box of lyrics she shared with Costello upon first meeting him in 2007. It was featured on Costello’s 2008 album Momofuku but was never released as a single.

“Some of the songs were half a verse and some of them were just titles, like ‘Thank God For Jesus,’” remembered Costello. “There was one that said, ‘Pardon Me, Madam, My Name is Eve.’ I said, ‘I know what that is.’ Loretta said, ‘Well, what is it?’ ‘It’s Eve’s song to Adam’s second wife.’ She laughed at that.”

Pardon me, Madam, my name is Eve
I think it’s time for you to leave
I don’t believe that we have met
That’s one thing you would not forget

In another time or life
When I was his only wife
When I was his only bride
Before I was torn out from his side

In the orchard, apples are withering
In the shadow,s something is slithering
So go along there if you must
And try to do as I suggest
He’s just a gathering of dust

“I Felt the Chill Before the Winter Came” (2009)

Written by Loretta Lynn and Elvis Costello

Costello’s album Secret, Profane & Sugarcane featured his second song with Lynn. Produced by T Bone Burnett, the Americana and country-blended album peaked at No. 13 on the Billboard 200 and featured the re-recording of a song Costello had originally written for Johnny Cash in the ’90s, “Complicated Shadows.” When Cash turned it down, Costello recorded it with the Attractions for his 1996 album All This Useless Beauty.

Lynn and Costello’s lyrics form around the anticipation of losing a love, while metaphorically facing a difficult season, a winter, ahead.

Well, there’s a difference in the way that you kissed me
And there’s a sadness in your eyes that you can’t hide
Why do you tremble when I hold you?
I wonder if you feel the same
I felt the chill before the winter came

But it’s easy to say that I won’t give in again
I was just tempted for a moment and then some
But it’s so easy when you love, to lose control
Now look here if you will
At the faithful man, you stole

I felt the chill before the winter came
I suffered the guilt and then accepted the blame
I wanted you before you ever spoke my name
But I knew that we would go wrong
Just as they do in all those old tragic songs
Did that melody haunt your mind?
Just like a linger of perfume
Now you’re in someone else’s arms,
Locked up in another room

The song came from a working title Lynn had. “I could hear it in my head the minute she showed it to me,” recalled Costello of how the song came together with Lynn. “I just started playing, and we were easily completing the couplets. Any time I went off the rails into anything more baroque, musically or lyrically, she’d rein me back in to keep it plain. I think she allowed me the line ‘a linger of perfume.’”

He added, “She liked that one, but that was about as fancy as it got. Whenever I attempted anything more, she’d question it. That was good, because it meant that it was in her voice.”

“Everything It Takes” (2016)

Written by Loretta Lynn and Todd Snider

In 2016, the pair teamed up again for a duet on “Everything It Takes,” written by Lynn and Todd Snider and released on her 43rd album, Full Circle. Lynn called the song a “woman song—something more for a woman,” admitted to writing it “real fast,” within 30 minutes.

“Sometimes I can write a song real fast, and sometimes it’ll take me two or three days,” said Lynn. “And I get so aggravated that I’ll probably lay it down and go back to it later. But that song came easy. I’ll come up with the title first and, when I come up with the title, I always know I got a good title.”

Costello provided backing vocals on the chorus throughout the track. The first time Lynn heard Costello sing was for “I Felt the Chill Before the Winter Came,” and the second time was on “Everything It Takes.”

“The first time I heard Elvis sing since that day was on the record,” said Lynn. “I couldn’t believe it. I wasn’t even there when we did it, but we did a good job.”

Photo: Donna Svennevik /American Broadcasting Companies via Getty Images