Video hit Bob Seger

Bob Seger - Turn the page

Turn the Page is a song originally released by Bob Seger in 1973 on his Back in '72 album. Though never released as a single, Seger's live version of the song on his 1976 Live Bullet album became a mainstay of album-oriented rock radio stations, and still gets significant airplay to this day on classic rock stations.

"Turn the Page" is about the emotional and social ups and downs of a rock musician's life on the road. Seger wrote it in 1972 while touring with Teegarden & Van Winkle.

Drummer David Teegarden (of Teegarden & Van Winkle and later the Silver Bullet Band) recalls:

“We had been playing somewhere in the Midwest, or the northern reaches, on our way to North or South Dakota. [Guitarist] Mike Bruce was with us. We'd been traveling all night from the Detroit area to make this gig, driving in this blinding snowstorm. It was probably 3 in the morning. Mike decided it was time to get gas. He was slowing down to exit the interstate and spied a truck stop. We all had very long hair back then – it was the hippie era – but Skip, Mike and Bob had all stuffed their hair up in their hats. You had to be careful out on the road like that, because you'd get ostracized. When I walked in, there was this gauntlet of truckers making comments – "Is that a girl or man?" I was seething; those guys were laughing their asses off, a big funny joke. That next night, after we played our gig – I think it was Mitchell, S.D. – Seger says, "Hey, I've been working on this song for a bit, I've got this new line for it. He played it on acoustic guitar, and there was that line: "Oh, the same old cliches / 'Is that a woman or a man?' " It was "Turn the Page."

The lyrics:

On a long and lonesome highway

East of Omaha

You can listen to the engine

Moanin' out his one note song

You can think about the woman

Or the girl you knew the night before

But your thoughts will soon be wandering

The way they always do

When you're ridin' sixteen hours

And there's nothin' much to do

And you don't feel much like ridin',

You just wish the trip was through

Here I am

On the road again

There I am

Up on the stage

Here I go

Playin' star again

There I go

Turn the page

Well you walk into a restaurant,

Strung out from the road

And you feel the eyes upon you

As you're shakin' off the cold

You pretend it doesn't bother you

But you just want to explode

Most times you can't hear 'em talk,

Other times you can

All the same old cliches,

"Is that a woman or a man?"

And you always seem outnumbered,

You don't dare make a stand

Here I am

On the road again

There I am

Up on the stage

Here I go

Playin' star again

There I go

Turn the page

Out there in the spotlight

You're a million miles away

Every ounce of energy

You try to give away

As the sweat pours out your body

Like the music that you play

Later in the evening

As you lie awake in bed

With the echoes from the amplifiers

Ringin' in your head

You smoke the day's last cigarette,

Rememberin' what she said

Here I am

On the road again

There I am

Up on the stage

Here I go

Playin' star again

There I go

Turn the page

Here I am

On the road again

There I am

Up on the stage

Here I go

Playin' star again

There I go

Turn the page

There I go

There I go