I think it’s a pretty simple, pretty beautiful song. Somewhere in the distant past, Pancho and Lefty were buddies. Lefty’s was a bandit and Pancho was maybe an accomplice, but at any rate was guilty by association.
Lefty sells Pancho out to some lawmen, in return for which he’s allowed to escape scott-free and is given enough money to go far away, where he can supposedly start a new life.

The song sets the two characters in opposition: Pancho, who’s a badass but is always his own man and dies young, and Lefty, who’s a survivor but has to pay the prices: remorse, and a long life reflecting on what he did and wondering whether he was right.

Townes points out that it’s easy to mythologize the bandit, but let’s not forget the survivor: “He only did what he had to do/And how he’s growing old.”

There’s a lot of meat on the bone in this song. First, there’s the masterful descriptions: for xample, “Pancho was a bandit. boys/His horse as fast as polished steel/He wore his gun outside his pants/For all the
honest world to feel,” and “Lefty, he can’t sing the blues/All night long like he used to/The dust that Pancho bit down South/Ended up in Lefty’s mouth.” Then, there’s the poetic contrast between the lawless, hot Southern wilderness and the cold, “civilized” city where Lefty ends up (Cleveland).

Finally, there’s the first verse, which seems to come out of nowhere at first but which ultimately seems directed at Lefty, who’s now “growing old”: “Living on the road, my friend/Was gonna keep you free and clean/Now you wear your skin like iron/Your breath’s as hard as kerosene/You weren’t your mama’s only boy/But her favorite one it seems/She began to cry when you said good-bye/And sank into your dreams.”

To me, the song is all about compromising your principles, which the song simultaneously calls into question AND shows compassion for. That’s why the chorus makes the point that the Federales let Lefty go free, even though (the song implies) he was guilty of something. This is something really difficult to do successfully in any work of art, and even moreso in a short pop song: to tell a morally complex story in a way that is both deep and immediately understandable, without offering simple conclusions yet without being hopelessly vague (as are so many of today’s “poetic” rock stars, e.g. REM).

I think it’s really beautiful and a genuine work of art, which is rare in the world of songwriting. I’ll conclude by saying that it’s one of the few songs I sing almost every time I pick up my guitar and play.

–
Tom Meltzer

FIVE CHINESE BROTHERS

I always thought that it was a contrast was between Pancho who was killed outright, and Lefty who sadly and bitterly grew old, ending up a shadow of his former self (not being able to sing the blues like he used to) and livin in cheap hotels. So although Pancho “bit the dust”, Lefty ended up with the dirty bitter taste of fading away slowly.