TOM RUSSELL - 2
Song Album
1. Joshua Tree Road to Bayamon
2. Walkin’ On The Moon Poor Man’s Dream
3. Roanie Cowboy Real
4. What Do You Want? The Rose of the San Joaquin
5. The Road It Gives, The Road It Takes Away Borderland
6. Crucifix in a Death Hand/Carmelita Modern Art
7. Van Ronk Hotwalker
8. Grapewine Hotwalker
9. The Pugilist at 59 Love and Fear
10. Stealing Electricity Love and Fear
11. Four Chambered Heart Love and Fear
12. Guadalupe One to the Heart, One to the Head
13. Criminology Blood and Candle Smoke
14. Mississippi River Runnin' Backwards Blood and Candle Smoke
15. Don't Look Down Blood and Candle Smoke
16. Mesabi Mesabi
17. Sterling Hayden Mesabi
1 JOSHUA TREE 2 WALKIN’ ON THE MOON
No one knows the age of those The lights of the town were just shutting Trees on White Tank Mountain down They're timeless as a legend The sun was fresh on the rise They'll hold you in their spell I met momma at the door, she'd been walking the floor And 'neath those ageless roots they say She said boy, you've got stars in your eyes There rolls a secret fountain Fed by ancient waters And momma I was walking on the moon last From hidden mystic wells night And two loving arms held me tight The lizard's resting wisely near As the stars danced around so bright The rocks of White Tank Mountain I was walking on the moon last night Keep one eye on the desert And one eye on the sea Now momma she did weep, boy you've been walking in your sleep The lizards tell the story of You can't keep your feet on the ground A man who drank the fountain It's not always what it seems, young love may And left his ashes blowin' be a dream Cross the sands of Joshua Tree And some angels fly high just to fall down
And some called him a holy man But momma I was walking on the moon last And some called him insane night Might have been his alibis And two loving arms held me tight As he put the crowds to shame As the stars danced around so bright I was walking on the moon last night And some called him the seer Flying blind and soaring free Now the lights of the town are glowing Like a bird above the fault line yellow brown In the land of the Joshua Tree The moon is beginning to rise And I left momma at the door, I said don't So if you climb the rocks along worry any more The road to White Tank Mountain I've seen daddy put those same stars in your You might hear a song blow by you eyes With his ashes in the breeze And momma I'll be walking on the moon The song is just as sacred as tonight The waters in the fountain And two loving arms will hold me tight And it's message is as ageless As the stars dance around so bright As the roots of a Joshua Tree I'll be walking on the moon tonight
And some called him a holy man And I'll be walking on the moon tonight And some called him insane And two loving arms will hold me tight Might have been his alibis As the stars dance around so bright As he put the crowds to shame I'll be walking on the moon tonight
And some called him a seer Flying blind and soaring free Like a bird above the fault line In the land of Joshua Tree
4 WHAT DO YOU WANT?
This ole Martin Guitar made in nineteen forty six Its cracked, scratched, and splintered from finger nails and picks But it's been my close companion since nineteen sixty two Please don't ask me to decide between this guitar and you
What do you want from me, what do you want, Do I have to give you everything What do you want from me, what do you want Do I have to give you everything
Well, all my friends quit drinkin’, you can’t smoke nowhere no more I think I'll take up smokin’ though I've never smoked before I'm getting tired of decaf coffee, I crave high test in my cup too young to die of bored and too old to grow up
Well I've unloaded boxcars, Ive sold bibles door to door yeah id be rich and famous if I weren't alone and poor Blessed are the the poor in spirit 'fore they'll inherit the earth but the day I hand the world to you, you'll ask me what it's worth
6 CRUCIFIX IN A DEATH HAND then it's best to go back to the bars, the same (Bukowski) bars wooden, stale, merciless, green yeah, they begin out in a willow, I think with the young policeman walking through the starch mountains begin out in the willow scared and looking for trouble, and keep right on going without regard for and the beer is still bad pumas and nectarines it has an edge that already mixes with vomit somehow these mountains are like and an old woman with a bad memory and decay, and you've got to be strong in the a shopping basket, shadows we are in a basin, that is the to ignore it, to ignore the poor and to ignore idea, down in the sand and the alleys, yourself this land punched-in, cuffed-out, divided, and the shopping bag between your legs held like a crucifix in a death hand, down there feeling good with its avocados this land bought, resold, bought again and and sold again, the wars long over, oranges and fresh fish and wine bottles, who the Spaniards all the way back in Spain needs down in the thimble again, and now a Fort Lauderdale winter? real estaters, subdividers, landlords, freeway 25 years ago there used to be a whore there engineers arguing. this is their land and with a film over one eye, who was too fat I walk on it, live on it a little while and made little silver bells out of cigarette near Hollywood here I see young men in tinfoil. the sun seemed warmer then rooms although this was probably not listening to glazed recordings true, and you take your shopping bag and I think too of old men sick of music outside and walk along the street sick of everything, and death like suicide and the green beer hangs there I think is sometimes voluntary, and to get just above your stomach like your a short and shameful shawl, and hold on the land here it is best to return to the you look around and no longer Grand Central Market, see the old Mexican see any old men. women, the poor . . . I am sure you have seen these same women CARMELITA (Warren Zevon) many years before arguing I hear Mariachi static on my radio with the same young Japanese clerks And the tubes they glow in the dark witty, knowledgeable and golden And I'm there with her in Ensenada among their soaring store of oranges, apples And I'm here in Echo Park avocados, tomatoes, cucumbers - and you know how these look, they do look Carmelita hold me tighter good I think I'm sinking down as if you could eat them all And I'm all strung out on heroin light a cigar and smoke away the bad world. On the outskirts of town
9 THE PUGILIST AT 59 And a used up old clown
Rolled out of bed No, this is Hollywood, kid Threw some water on my face Fear strikes out Twenty five sit-ups Miracles turn around Run in place One-sided bouts I put the coffee on, Get off the floor, kid But the pot ain’t clean The sweet science Oh you little devils of alcohol and caffeine of them old romantic lines. Hey the champ’s coming back, boys Handful of vitamins The Pugilist at 59 Dropped ‘em on the floor My ex-girlfriend’s are laughin’ from the ice box door 10 STEALING ELECTRICITY I put their photos up there Yeah, we talk all the time There’s a Mexican dead on a power line But they ain’t talkin’ back no more He’s deader than yesterday’s communion the Pugilist is 59 wine He was tryin’ to get something he couldn’t Cold chicken salad afford, for free Glass of iced tea Just a poor man stealing electricity Phone bills, gas bills, electricity And the mortgage and the junk mail His heart went da da da da...... One old father’s day card Go sweat it out kid Ten thousand volts and now he’s gone It’s a 108 in the yard Hangin’ on a cross high above Babylon Hey baby ain’t that just like you and me? So you water the lawn Love is like stealing electricity Trim them old trees Pray that your gut don’t fall down to your Two hearts go da da da...... knees Then Archie Moore whispers in your ear When the poverty of your spirit and the „Get up kid you’re still in your prime,“ weakness of your flesh „No, the champ’s on the ropes, Arche, Go dancing every night through other „the Pugilist is 59.“ people’s trash If you don’t love yourself baby And the Rock and the Roll What the hell are you doin’ with me? And the fight for your soul You’re gonna burn baby, burn, from stealin’ goes on and on electricy You put on the gloves You’re always ready for love Two hearts go da da da da...... Pray your passion ain’t used up and gone We all climb so high in search of a kindred The harder we love soul The harder we fall Til we grab hold of a live wire up on a high It’s cauliflower hearts line pole and old medicine balls The laws of nature say you get nothing for And backstreet affairs, free in all these water tank towns And love is like stealing electricity Where there’s a mighty thin line between a heavy weight champ Two hearts go da da da da......
12 GUADALUPE
There are ghosts out in the rain tonight High up in those ancient trees and I have given up without a fight Another blind fool on his knees
And all the gods that I'd abandoned Begin to speak in simple tongue And suddenly I've come to know There are no roads left to run
Now it's the hour of dogs a-barking That's what the old ones used to say It's first light or it's sundown Before the children cease their play
When the mountains glow like mission wine And turn grey like a Spanish roan Ten thousand eyes will stop to worship Then turn away and head for home
She is reaching out her arms tonight and, Lord, my poverty is real I pray roses shall rain down again from Guadalupe on her hill
And who am I to doubt these mysteries Cured in centuries of blood and candle smoke I am the least of all your pilgrims here But I am most in need of hope
She appeared to Juan Diego She left her image on his cape Five hundred years of sorrow Cannot destroy their deepest faith
So here am I your ragged disbeliever Old doubting Thomas drowns in tears As I watch your church sink through the earth Like a heart worn down through fear
13 CRIMINOLOGY
I had a gun pointed at my head on several occasions, Yeah Nadine I was scared. Something about a black man with a machine gun make you wish you said your prayers, It was Nigeria, the year was 1969 I was teaching criminology, playing a little guitar on the side.
In Apache Pass, Prince Rupert, Injun Jack puts a gun to my head He said ‘how do you like it now gentlemen? How’s your blue eyed boy Mr Dead? It was Canada this time, the year was 1971 I was performing at the club Zanzibar In the neon world of knives and guns
Oh excuse me if I’m boring you dear listener, accept my humble apology. You may think I’m just a folk singer, no, I’m a master in the art of criminology.
When Picasso died, the Indians cried in a Prince George motel room. We were drunker than a thousand white men playing lumber camp saloon. It was Canada again, the year was 1973 There were grizzly bears walking down main street What an amazing sight to see. well the devil rides a cubist horse, the devil he’s got angles but God is an expressionist, he got the devil strangled down in purgatorian limbo in hell Ahh them southern rip joints just like that God’s waiting room is full of painters and poets and old black jazz saints in pork pie hats
Oh excuse me if I’m boring you dear listener, accept my humble apology. You may think I’m some jive folk singer, no, I’m a master in the art of criminology.
So I got off a plane in Nigeria, it was 1969. Arrested by Ton Ton Macoute. Taking photos was a war zone crime, they were going to hack me up with machetes a US ambassador come home paid my bribe So I played guitar with Victor Uwaifo and taught a little criminology on the side
Yeah that’s my story and I’m sticking to it No regrets, no surrender, no apology I know a little bit about a lot of things I’m a master in the art of criminology Yeah that’s my story and I’m sticking to it No regrets, no surrender, no apology I know a little bit about a lot of things I’m a master in the art of criminology
14 MISSISSIPPI RIVER RUNNIN' BACKWARDS
Old man river, that old man river he just keeps rolling along.
Mississippi river runnin' backwards, earthquake shook the land, it happened down here in 1912 it's happening here again.
Feast and famine ya'all fire and flood, abominations you understand, don't need no old testament profit to tell me we ain't living in the promise land.
"Everybody sing blow Gabriel blow, …
I saw carpet sweepers, microwave ovens, I saw busted down television screens. Empty t.v. Evangelist cats with their hair all slicked up with brill cream.
Now the gospel news truly real bad news no need to invent all the doom and gloom, it's a one legged race to the liquor store, it's a hop skip and jump into the doom.
"Everybody sing blow Gabriel blow, …
Steamboat whistle blowing under water, everything is backwards and upside down, baby Moses in the bulrushes paddling sideways to higher ground.
Old ladies gambling inside river boat casinos, whirlpools swallowing em down insurance executives and fuller brush salesmen bushwhacked trying to leave town.
But their lifeboats went backwards up the mississippi river to the ancient Missouri side up thru Iowa, Minnesota into the hands of a righteous God.
"Everybody sing blow Gabriel blow, …
16 MESABI
17 STERLING HAYDEN