New album now at the printers!

Clark Street Carols,The new Adam Selzer and his Revolving Door All-Stars album, featuring "Crooked Houses," "When Kevin Comes Marching Home," "New York Rain," "One Last Short Poem," "Bells of St. Julians," "I Don't Believe in Summer," "Barbara Allen's Grave," "But Not the Songs," "Your Neighborhood Gives Me the Creeps," "Long Way Home," and "An Intellectual COuntry Song About Joan Baez."

can't choose (Who do you love?)

Technically should be "whom" do you love, but that just sounds stuffy, doesn't it?

CAN'T CHOOSE

like a child of three
I want whatever I see
even what don't belong to me
sometimes we can't choose where we fall

it's pretty smoky in here
& you're standing so near
is it our words or just the beer
that keep us talking so long
(long after you should be gone?)

I'm in no place to fall
I'm in no place to fall
I have no grace to fall
I'm in no place to fall

what a sly little glance
do I have a chance?
I'd snap my fingers and dance
if that would turn your head
(What would turn your head?)

with a shy little smile
you stayed for awhile
playing your new songs in the old style
tell me who do you love?
(who do you love?)

repeat chorus
first & last verse

____

This is my second new song in as many weeks...I'm very prolific when my heart's been broken.

Since You've Been Gone

I ride the bus to the end of the line
Cause since you’ve been gone I’ve had nothing but time
To think about all the ways I did you wrong

I stand unknown in unknown streets
Performing poems and miraculous feats
Inspired by the ways I’ve been done wrong

Since you’ve been gone
I’ve taken the long way home
since you’ve been gone
I’ve changed my tone

since you’ve been gone
I’ve found a new way to play
Since you’ve been gone
I’ve been trying to get away

Since you’ve been gone

I walk the streets until the morning light
Looking for something to make it alright
But all I find are reminders that you’re gone

I sing my songs til I’m deaf from the sound
But still you don’t seem to want me around
You’re sitting up front but still you’re long gone

I can no longer wait at the bus stop
That I once waited at with you
I can no longer sing all the sad songs
That I once sang for only you
You’re a thief who cannot be trusted with love

Composed today, with the exception of the first two verses, which were composed earlier...hell if I remember exactly when.

sigh

It never fails.... the album heads off to be printed tomorrow, if all goes well, and tonight I come up with a new song with a really catchy chorus that I can't stop playing

WHICH SIDE ARE YOU ON
The drove the trucks with the missiles down my street today
shortly after dinner, we'd sent the kids all out to play
and then, about eight thirty, the streetlights all came on
and the kids all had to come inside before the trucks were gone
chorus:
shut and quit shouting at me baby
don't you know there's a war going on
shut up and quit shouting at me baby
don't you know there's a war going on

(a some point the last line of the chorus will change to "which side you are you on"). This'd probably be overkill on the same album as "When Kevin Comes Marching Home," but maybe I'll play it live.

I Wish I Was Your Whiskey (Sweet Perdita)

Here's the beginning of a song I'm working on right now. I'm not trying to get into the habit of posting unfinshed lyrics, but I really like these so far. Inspired by Julie Jurgens' "Whiskey Song."

I Wish I Was Your Whiskey (Sweet Perdita)

Every Monday night
And every other Wednesday
Sweet Perdita gently breaks my heart

And I pour her drinks for free
And hope the boss don’t see me
But when sweet Perdita’s singing, I ain’t so smart.

She takes one shot of Jack
For every love song
That I dream she sings for me alone
She needs two shots of Beam
In between her covers of Nina Simone

I wish I was your whiskey
‘Cause I can ease your pain
I’d cheer your ass up
Before you put down the cup
And if you fuck up
I’ll take the blame

I wish I was your whiskey
Ain’t nothing that I’d rather be
I’ll help you be bold
Warm you up when you’re cold
And you can drown all your sorrows in me

To be continued...

Hello from Narciso

Hello everyone.

Sorry I've been AWOL lately. My dad's really sick from colon cancer and has been in the hospital. I haven't had any time to post, much less write.

I miss you guys, and I'll be back soon.

If you guys want to read up on his situation, you can do so at:

anythingfordad.blogspot.com

Ciso.

mostly these days

chorus:
sometimes I wish I were silver
so I wouldn't mind being so cold
and sometimes I wish I were water
so I wouldn't mind growing old
but mostly these days I wish that I were
embroidered on your pillow
so I wouldn't have to worry about convincing you
to take me home

verse 1
have you changed your destination
or are you just taking the long way around?
I don't fault you for your hesitation
but I don't want to lose what I've found

it took me a long time to get here
so don't blame me for wanting to stay
besides I still need to figure out
why at night all cats are grey

chorus

verse 2
now that your ticket's in hand
you're ambivalent about wanting to do
it's hard to help you understand
all the things that I want you to know

the train will be leaving the station
with or without you, my friend
will I be a destination
or simply a means to an end?

chorus

verse 3
now I'm a bird on the wire
your love is my parasol
will you catch me in your desire?
or just watch me spin as I fall?

I have no change in my pocket
just some poison and poetry
I know you don't believe in summer
but I wish you'd believe in me

chorus



The chorus is a variaton/derivative of a Pablo Neruda poem. I loves me some Pablo Neruda.

I am annoyed, a little, at the fact that I used "destination" so much, but any other word wouldn't fit as well, and would smack of "trying too hard." (God knows I try as hard as I can, but one never wants it to come across that way).

"Now I'm a bird on the wire" is a direct reference to the Cohen song. "Your love is my parasol" refers to a line from love letter that Zelda Fitzgerald wrote to F Scott.

Other references abound, easily discernible to the intelligent, close listener.

I'd love to write more train songs. I've always lived near trains, and there's something mythical about them, that and the fact that they are chock full of hoboes. I loves me some hoboes almost as much as I loves Pablo Neruda.

not quite a lyrics post

Not quite a lyrics post, but here's a preview of the tray card for my album, which is now being mixed. I especially like the shot in the bottom left; it's like a picture old men playing cards in the cafe have of themselves from back in the 30's.

So, lyrics (from the last album) to follow.



Sixty-Six
I spend my nights at the Salvadore Deli
Eating bowls of chili that are hotter than hell
Talking to some Dickensian man who speaks
Three languages poorly and no language well
Slicer stole the paper and he's sitting at the bar
Freddie's digging out a couple pennies from the jar


CHORUS
And the old men all play 66
With the cards
They all play 66
In the corners
They all play 66
And they won't deal me in


Lila ran away on a bitter old night
From a Foster Freeze outside of St. Mark's Clearing
Grabs a seat in my booth and she plays with a spoon
Says "I'm way too young to be this world weary"
Casts a throwaway glance at the late night clerks
And pets a tiny kitten that she keeps in her purse

Chorus

It's raining again and I'm all out of change
Barely awake but I don't want to sleep
Freddie's outside and Slicer disappeared
And Lila moves over puts her hand on my knee
But I just look out the window, my thoughts are still on you
And I wonder if you're staring at a rainy evening, too

Chorus

(this is usually ended with a few lines from "Rumania Rumania" by Aaron Lebedeff when I do it live - an old Yiddish standard about all the things you can get to eat in Romania. Since my Yiddish is lousy, on the recording I just repeated the word "pastramala" (need I translate?) for the coda)

poems in my grave

Will you throw your poems in my grave?
Or will you publish all my letters under your own name?
Will you forever hide yourself away,
Or will you one day come to me and let yourself be tamed?

If there’s a hell and I end up there
Will you lead me out with a song?
Or will you pretend that you don’t even care,
And tell everyone that I had done you wrong?

Would you forsake me for a chance at fame?
Would you still love my songs even if no one knew my name?
Are you afraid of me because I let myself be tamed?
Will you throw your poems in my grave?

Brand new. Wrote the first line in my head on my walk home from work tonight...and here's the first, and probably final, draft (includes minute tweaks, but essentially this is how it came out).

I read in Sexing The Cherry about some mad Victorian poet--Browning or Keats--throwing all of his most recently composed poems into his wife's open grave upon her death (later he fetched them, but what a gesture!). I really want for someone to love me that much, but am doubtful as to whether or not anyone ever will.

Additionally, the idea of "being tamed" has returned to my work...not that I think mad, messy, fucked-up complicated artist folk should be tamed, per se--the world needs us, traipsing about in all our weird, fucked up glory--but I do believe in being tamed by one person for that person...tamed meaning more of a bending rather than a breaking. Being tamed shouldn't be a beating down, it should be a wearing in, the way one molds one's body to a pair of jeans, or to their pillow or bed. Patterns and habits pleasing to the beloved become more prominent and like second nature, and those that are displeasing recede into the background. Being tamed isn't losing oneself, its becoming more fully the self that you've always wanted to be.

...
|
|
|


Ah, fuck, don't read that shit anymore. I'm not even drunk, I'm just a silly girl who wants to be kissed while she isn't looking.

Long Way Home (again)

Think I've got a line on this one now....

LONG WAY HOME (version 4 or 5)

January's coming to the transient hotel
where I've been staying too many nights
we strike our matches against the moon of old Chicago
and look to see how hard it's snowing in the light
When I forget to light the candles (as I do most Friday nights)
Emily comes and lights them for me
she says that I'd be lost if I didn't have her
next door to the room where I sleep
But I have never been lost
I have never been lost
I have never been lost
I've just taken the long way home

Three doors down, Levy looks about 90
and claims that he's older than that
Says he fought with Jack Johnson back in the early 20's
and was knocked out in two minutes flat
He's been at the hotel since his wife died
which was nearly two decades ago
but he says he can't leave, because when the light is just right
he can sometimes see her face in the snow
he has never been lost
he has never been lost
he has never been lost
he's just taken the long way home

The bar at the hotel has wood paneled walls
we sit in line from soprano to baritone
Emily's an alto, she drinks vodka tonic
Levy's pumping coins into the phone
so when they start up the countdown on the TV
we'll be ready to sing Auld Lang Syne
and at the risk of starting to sound a bit greedy
we'll ask God to bless us all, please, one more time
we have never been lost
we have never been lost
we have never been lost
we've just taken the long way home

lay me down

Lay me down in the field
Where the weeds grow tall
Lay me down beside you
Before I fall
Before I fall

Sing a song of love
Sing a song of hate
Sing a song of dreams
That always have to wait
Have to wait

Lay me down by still deep water
Where the flowers talk in rhyme
Lay me down for I’m weary
And I’ve been running for such a long time
All of my life

Sing a song of hope
Sing a song of loss
Sing a song of dreams
That are worth the cost
Worth the cost

Lay me down in the field
Where the weeds grow tall
Lay me down beside you
Before I fall

if i die

If I die don’t mourn me none
Just raise a glass to all the things I’ve done
If you must shed a tear
Just don’t let it water down your beer

If I die before my baby
Please tell him I was always true
And if he dies shortly after me
That’s just the chivalrous thing to do

And if I die before I have children
Find a little girl with cold green eyes
Give her my guitar, and a taste for whisky
And teach her my songs about wicked, loving lies

If I die don’t mourn me none
Just raise a glass to all the things I’ve done
Sing my songs and drink til you’ve forgotten
That I am gone, gone, gone…

welcome, welcome, welcome

I want to welcome Shannon and Dustin to our little lyrics collective.

Post away, gentlemen.

fondly,

Julie "Perdita" Jurgens

someone said something...

...on this blog once that reminded me of this quote: All art is a kind of confession, more or less oblique. All artists, if they are to survive, are forced, at last, to tell the whole story; to vomit the anguish up.

James Baldwin wrote that, and that just about sums up the creative process for me.

Sorry About That

So, the other night, I was bored and tossed off some kind of half-assed poem/lyric/thing that was supposed to go to another blogspot site. It wound up here, because I didn't pay attention to where I was signing in. Sorry.

...and one more

This is probably my biggest holiday "hit."

COMMUNIST BLOC
(tune of "Jingle Bell Rock")

Communist, communust, communist bloc!
spend all our time just waitin' in line
all o' the bourgeouise feared revolution
now the commie regime has begun!
Communist, communust, communist bloc!
seizin' the means to halt the machines
dancin' and prancin' around the red square
in the frosty air!
The prolateriate will this year get
to rock the night away
the manifesto, from the get-go
seems to work in theory, anyway
Hammer and sickle laid down at our feet
capitalists are stopped
reds and pinkos, Cubans and Chinese
That's the Communist,
That's the Communist,
That's the Communist Bloc!

Winter

Here's my other holiday-ish song. I always thought the chorus, tune and opening line of "God Rest Ye, Merry Gentlemen" were fantastic, though the rest keep it from getting on my list of
Christmas Songs I Can Sing Without Worrying About What My Rabbi Would Say. So I stole the chorus and used it to close out my last album.


WINTER


Mr Emery sings a bit on certain holidays
But he never really talks much anymore
He just sits there in the corner with his cider in his hand
While his wife says "well, he had a hard war."
He made it back from Europe with half of a tattoo
And a limp that never really went away
Took his GI deferment and he spent it all on her
And now all that she ever hears him say
Are tidings of comfort and joy
Oh tidings of comfort and joy

April is a joker and September is a trap
October is like busting out of jail
She changed her name to Winter and she curled up her hair
And drove out to the last mile of the trail
And she smiled at all the strangers with a shiney crooked grin
And hung around when everything had closed
She went dancing on the sidewalks with the people who were left
And whispered to them when they held her close
Oh tidings of comfort and joy
Oh tidings of comfort and joy

One day I'll be an old man, and I'll wear a coat like that
And a scarf about like that one, only brown
I'll grow my hair as wild as I can make it grow
When I go out walking through the town
I'll mutter curses on the steep hills, and when I make the top
I'll shake my cane and laugh up at the sky
I'll pretend that I spoke Russian when I was a little boy
And think of winter with a twinkle in my eye
Oh tidings of comfort and joy
Oh tidings of comfort and joy

nancy

What's that bad blood in your water song of yours?

and the one about fishing...yeah, fishing...

I humbly request those lyrics be posted.

happy holidays

I'll post a few of my holiday-themed songs over the next week - though their connection to holidays is generally vague at best. Here's one I wrote in the middle of Coach Smith's chemistry class, right around the holidays way back in my sophomore year of high school, when I should have been taking actual notes. I didn't do so well in the class, but I'm still able to post this song nearly a decade later, and I certainly haven't used a bunsen burner lately.

ALARM BELLS
TTTO: Jingle Bells

Oh, elements, elements, molecules and moles
wouldn’t Coach be mad about the test tubes that we stole?
elements, elements, present everywhere
if you mix ‘em up just right they’ll burn right through your hair

mixing up the flasks, trying to make stuff burn
“what’s that smell?” you ask, “It makes my stomach churn”
liquids start to boil, atoms start to split
before each lab we have to ask “how dangerous is it?”

elements, elements, solid liquid gas
just remember: duck and cover when you see the flash!
elements, elements, bout as safe as guns
but I must admit that those explosions can be fun

The bell rings loud and clear to let the fun begin
this solution here will burn right through your skin
Gases in the air, acids on the floor,
and these stupid safety goggles make my nose feel sore

elements elements, “hey watch out!” you say
what the hell, I didn’t need that eyeball anyway
elements, elements, I love chemistry
maybe if I’m lucky I can still pull off a C*


* - I've no idea whether I actually pulled off a C, but I think I at least passed that semester.

pinned

she sits in the back booth drinking her coffee
thinking about you & the life she's led
she comes from a small town that's slowly dying
the farmland is barren & so is her heart
she gets drunk and goes home with boys who don't like her
but still she's a body they can own for the night

and when she wakes up she only wants coffee
but she's pinned by the weight of her dreams
til finally she slips out into the morning
and nothing she looks at is quite what it seems

she drinks alone often drowning her sorrows
but somehow the damn things have learned how to swim
she's taking speed now she wants to be thinner
she thinks that you'd love her if she were small
she tries on her new dress looks in the mirror
she hates her body and the boys tear it down

and when she wakes up she only has coffee
but still she's pinned by the weight of her dreams
finally she slips out into the morning
and nothing she looks at is quite what it seems

she drinks until morning sleeps until nightfall
and doesn't remember the hours that passed
she wrote you a letter trying to tell you
all of the things that she thinks you should know
she once had a baby he died in the bathroom
she's running from all of the things she can't face

and when she wakes up she only wants coffee
but she's pinned by the weight of her dreams
finally she slips out into the morning
and nothing she looks at is quite what it seems

Women love this song, and it's not hard to understand why--it touches on a lot of major themes that almost all women go through at one point or another. The more personal a song is for me, the more I distance myself from it--here, I use "she" instead of "I" because, otherwise, it would just be too painful to sing and to listen to.

I've never taken speed, nor had an abortion/miscarriage, but I personally know girls/women who have, so I pulled their experiences in to add depth to the song. Everything else is completely true and has happened to yours truly. An older couple once mocked this song by saying "You young people and your problems---" as if this song catalogued things that were over-the-top and melodramatic rather than realistic and pertinent.

I can't write songs about big, grand things, although I do think that my songs do explore larger themes in a smaller way. If we can't love and be loved by one other person, how can we ever be expected to have compassion for the whole of humanity? And the subtle political commentary of the girl's small town rural home being barren, and decimated by soulless, efficient factory farming...I always like when I can slip in little things like that.

That's the thing about songwriting, when you're mostly heard live--there's no time for the listener to catch, ponder and assimilate those subtleties. In one listen, all you're going to come away with from this song is the sort of whiny coffeehouse girl singer thing...but, as with most girls, there's more churning here beneath the surface than anyone realizes. Was the baby the result of a drunken date rape? A mutual sexual experience? The numbness and isolation in this song is staggering, but because it is felt by a girl who is also concerned with how she appears to boys, a lot of listeners feel no qualms about dismissing it.

And all she wants is a cup of coffee and perhaps someone to share it with. How decimated can one person be when that small pleasure will be consolation enough for all that she's endured? Unable to conceive of all her wrongs being redressed, she settles on one small, achievable goal to strive for, a focus point that will help her get through the drunken nights, the uncomfortable encounters with strangers, the hours spent caught in reverie about all that's she's had and lost...

Anyway. Um. Yeah. That's what this song is about. As I see it anyway.