Story Behind the Song: Vince Gill, ‘Bread and Water’

Vince Gill's 2011 album Guitar Slinger is an emotional roller coaster ride, mixing fun, uptempo tunes with tear-jerking ballads ... and a few songs that tap into the icon's darker side. All of the project's tracks, however, have one main thing in common: They're inspired by various people who have touched Gill's life in one way or another. "Bread and Water," for example, is a poignant track about a seemingly homeless man who wanders into a mission looking for food but ends up finding a whole lot more; however, as Gill tells The Boot below, his brother Bob, who passed away in 1993, helped inspire the track.

"Bread and Water" was a song I wrote with Leslie Satcher. I threw out this line: "One night, he wandered into that old mission ..."

The first lines of songs are the most important part of the songs. If you really want to tell a story, that first line has to capture you. I said that line and then got a big lump in my throat and almost teared up. It reminded me of my brother.

My brother had a rough stretch of life: He had a car wreck at age 21 and was almost killed. He was in a coma for many months and wasn't expected to live, and he never really fully recovered. He did pretty great considering the depth of the injuries, and as a result of it, he would spend some time kinda hobo-ing around and not checking in with us. We didn't know where he was for periods of time and [would find] out he's been down in the mission, or working at the Salvation Army or out picking fruit somewhere.

So the song is loosely based on my brother.

This story was originally written by Beville Dunkerley, and revised by Angela Stefano.

See a Childhood Photo of Vince Gill