JESSE TAYLOR (RIP) with THE LIFTERS - "Old Town" at The Continental Club, Austin, Tx. 10/25/04

JESSE TAYLOR (RIP) with THE LIFTERS - "Old Town" at The Continental Club, Austin, Tx. 10/25/04

In the waning light of a winter's afternoon, Jesse Taylor turns away from his drawing table and grabs a caramel-colored acoustic guitar — a trusty Fender — that he keeps next to his desk. Taylor doesn't play much in public anymore, and he can't find a guitar pick among all these boxes of colored pencils.

Yet Jesse plays with confidence as he breaks into a loose, happy version of "Don't Give Up" — a rousing get-off-your-seat instrumental that opens his last studio album ("South Side Guitar," in collaboration with John X. Reed). Jesse penned the song himself, about the time he learned he was sick.

"Whenever anybody says to me, 'You're dying' or 'You're going to die,' I think to myself, 'Well, you're dying too. We're all dying. We start dying from the day we're born," says Taylor. "As far as my own thoughts on mortality, well, it's a bummer. Because I've got so much I want to do. So much I need to do. And I get afraid, sometimes, that some of it is going to get cut short."