Road Apples - 1991
1. Little Bones
2. Twist My Arm
3. Cordelia
4. The Luxury
5. Born In The Water
6. Long Time Running
7. Bring It All Back
8. Three Pistols
9. Fight
10.On The Verge
11.Fiddler's Green
12.The Last Of The Unplucked Gems
1.LITTLE BONES
It gets so sticky down here
Better butter your cue-finger up
It's the start of another new year
Better call the newspaper up
2.50 for a hi-ball
And a buck and a half for a beer
Happy hour, happy hour
Happy hour is here
The long days of Shockley are gone
So is football Kennedy style
Famous last words taken all wrong
Wind up on the very same pile
2.50 for a decade
And a buck and a half for a year
Happy hour, happy hour
Happy hour is here
I can cry, beg and whine
T'every Rebel I find
Just to give me a line
I could use to describe
They'd say,"Baby, eat this chicken slow
It's full of all them little bones."
So regal and decadent here
Coffin-cheaters dance on their graves
Music, all it's delicate fear
Is the only thing that don't change
2.50 for an eyeball
And a buck and a half for an ear
Happy hour, happy hour
Happy hour is here
Nothing's dead down here, just a little tired
They'd say,"Baby, eat this chicken slow
It's full of all them little bones."
2.TWIST MY ARM
Thar she blows, Jacques Cousteau
Hear her sing so sweet and low
Lull me overboard, out-cold
Gathered in and and swallowed whole
Do I want to? With all that charm?
Do I want to? Twist my arm
You just hit me where I live
I guess it looked quite primitive
What was that supposed to prove?
Throw the calf or he'll throw you
Sucked in by the victim world
Thirsty as a cultured pearl
Culled and wooed, bitten, chewed
It won't hurt if you don't move
Do I want to? With all that charm?
Do I want to? Twist my arm
Musical chairs, double dares, memorized stairs,
Shootin' off flares, springtime hares and broken-down mares
Cowered phones, big soup stones, prideless loans,
Grill-sick crows, motel moans and a big fat Jones
Martyrs don't do much for me
Though I enjoy them vicariously
After you. No! After me
No, I insist! Please, after me.
Do I want to? With all that charm?
Do I want to? Twist my arm
3.CORDELIA
Angst on the planks, spittin' from a bridge
Just to see how far down it really is
Robbing a bank, jumping from a train
Old antiques a man alone can entertain
It takes all your power
To prove that you don't care
I'm not Cordelia, I will not be there
Tin can man, dragging from a car
just to see how alive you really are
Marrying words, falling in your wake
Just to tell what you can't eliminate
Treading the boards, screaming out Macbeth
Just to see how much bad luck you really get
Jump in the ring with your hidden cape
The bull can't decide what it is that he really hate
Angst on the planks, spittin' from a bridge
Just to see how far down it really is
Robbing a bank, jumping from a train
Old antiques a man alone can entertain
Thief lingers on, on his hands and knees
Must be one more thing here, I really need
Die in your dreams, falling on your knife
A thief blinded on the job, has to steal for life
4.THE LUXURY
Zoo Lion sobers up and starts to scream and shout
A little dose of home-fire got him all smoothed out
Melancholy wine-soaked tenderness
She hated it here and she couldn't care less
Prisonyard stares and fleur-de-lis tattoos
Cannibals are saving all thier bones for soup
Eating with my fingers and sucking hulls of ships
My parasite don't deserve no better than this
The Golden Rim Motor Inn
Soft water and colour TV
So confused with the shape I'm in
Ca't enjoy the luxury
She says,"Why are you partial to that playboy con?
When you can see me naked anytime you want?"
If I had loads o' mondy to make me tame and sour
I could you to remind of my baby by the hour
Zoo Lion sobers up and starts to scream and shout
A little dose of home-fire got him all smoothed out
If this is where it all starts getting good
Then I'll be here waiting for you, like I said I would
The Golden Rim Motor Inn
Soft water and a colour TV
So confused with the shape I'm in
Can't enjoy the luxury
The Luxury
5.BORN IN THE WATER
Rolling hills all covered in suede
I'm heat-nervous and out of road
Downtown, there's a parade
But I don't think I wanna go
Smart as trees in Sault Ste.Marie
I can speak my mother tongue
Passing laws, just because
And singing songs of the English unsung
How could you do it?
How could you even try?
When you were born in the water
And you were raised up in the sky?
Front seat stamped by the window
No erasees in this game
Arbitrary as the wind blows
It's another way to lay claim
Ain't no cause for bloodthirsting
In a little town so dry
Where the angels dance on a pinhead
Just to make room for you and I
How could you do it?
How could you even try?
When you were born in the water
And you were raised up in the sky
Thoroughbred with thier great big heads
Think a mile might be too far
Highway horse laugh, but of course
When they don't know where the hell they are
Smart as trees in Sault Ste.Maire
Victorious mother tounge
Passing laws just because
Singing songs of the english unsung
Well how could you do it?
How could you even try
When you were born in the water
And you were raised up in the sky
6.LONG TIME RUNNING
Does your mother tell you things?
Long, long when i'm gone?
Who you talking to
Is she telling you I'm the one?
It's a grave mistake and I'm wide awake
Drive-In's rained out
Weather man wet-fingers th sky
He pokes it out, he pulls it in
He don't know why
It's the same mistake
It's been a long time running
It's been a long time coming
It's well worth the wait
We don't go anywhere,
Just on trips
We haven't seen a thing
We still don't know where it is
It's a safe mistake
It's been a long time running
It's been a long time coming
Well, well it's all the same mistake
Dead to rights and wide awake
I'll drop a caribou, I'll tellon you,
I'll tellon you, I'll tell on you.
You've got a boat-load o'nerve
But I would say you've been told
You work me against my friends
And you'll get left out in the cold
It's the same mistake
It's been a long time running
It's been a long time coming
It's been a long, long, long time running
It's well worth the wait
7.BRING IT ALL BACK
I'd been carving you
To see what form you'd take
You were hiding in ivory
I just wanted to free your shape
Bringing me down, it's too quiet to breath
Who wants to hear their heart beat?
It's gotta be here
In you spider-web alphabets
Did I read it all wrong?
Have I just not gotten it yet?
You got what you want. You wanted release.
Can you be appeased? Can you bring it all back to me?
Bring it all back to me
Bringing me down, the obvious turns out to be true
All that I couldn't see, how it was turning me on
I don't want to pare you down
No, I don't want to wear you down
I don't want any more than what's there
No, I don't want to pare you down
Well you got what you want. You wanted release.
Can you be appeased? Can you bring it all back to me?
Just bring Just bring it all back to me
It's all that I want
It's all that I need
It's all that I want
Bring it all back to me
Bring it, give it, bring it
8.THREE PISTOLS
Tom thompson came paddling past
I'm pretty sure it was him
And he spoke so softly in accordance
To the growing of the dim
He said,"Bring on a brand new renaissance
Cause I think I'm ready
I've been shaking all night long
But my hands are steady."
Three pistols came and three people went, on their way
Three pistols strong and three people spent
Well he found his little, lonely love
His bride of the northern woods
But, she took me to the opera house
Like he said she would
Then she sighed and she fell from the balcony
Shakespeare's bent to touch
She never had any time for me
Cause I didn't protest enough
Three pistols came and three people went, on their way
Two pistols strong and two people spent
Little girls come on Remembrance Day
Placing flowers on his grave
She waits in the shadows 'til after dark
To sweep them all away
I say, bring on the brand new renaissance
Cause I think I'm ready
I've been shaking all night long
But my hands are steady
Three pistols came and three people went, on their way
Three pistols strong and three people spent
Three pistols came and three people went on their way
One pistol strong and three people spent
9.FIGHT
We wake up different, rifle through our dreams
Another placid day, ripples at the seams
Do you think I bow out cause I think you're right?
Or cause i don't wanna fight?
So tangle-minded then so becalmed
It's all so subway-grim and then it's gone
Do you think I bow out cause I think you're right?
Or cause I don't wanna fight?
We get so weary, taking fish off hooks
It's not as effortless as it may look
Do you think I bow out cause I think you're right?
Or cause I don't wanna fight?
We lay down seething, smell our pillows burn
And drift off to the place where you'd think we'd learn
Do you think I bow out cause I think you're right?
Or cause I don't wanna fight?
I said,"I give."
10.ON THE VERGE
Here we are, now where are we?
It's like nothing I've ever seen
We got horse-throated huckster's whispered gimmicks
Rubbernecking the curious cynics
And headlong-walkers, one born every minute
Do I plug it in? Or do I stick it in it?
I don't know what came over me
I'm too dumb for words
I didn't think I'd like it here at all
But, I swear, I swear I'm on the verge
Here we are, now who are you?
The long lost Queen's of some Hoodoo?
Well we're the last of the big-time penetrators
Playin' dead to fuck the undertaker
The movie'll come out a little bit later
The Men, The Legend, The Goat, The Saytr
I don't know what came over me
I'm too dumb for words
I didn't say I'd like it here at all
But, I swear, I swear I'm on the verge
Here we are, now don't ask how
The time to leave was kinda now
Well don't cry, baby, there's no cause for grief
Deadheading's never gonna kill the Chief
It's an empty road without relief
And I'm a highway romance milking thief
I don't know what came over me
I'm too dumb for words
I didn't think I'd like it here at all
But, I swear, I swear I'm on the verge
11.FIDDLER'S GREEN
September Seventeen
For a girl I know, it's Mother's Day
Her son has gone alee
And that's where he will stay
Wind on the weathervane
Tearing blue eyes sailor-mean
As Falstaff sings a sorrowful refrain
For a boy in Fiddler's Green
His tiny knotted heart
Well I guess it never worked to good
The timber tore apart
And the water gorged the wood
You can hear the whispered prayer
For men at masts that always lean
That the same wind that moves her hair
Moves her boy through fiddler's green
He doesn't know a soul
And there's nowhere that he's really been
But he won't travel long alone
No, not in Fiddler's Green
Balloons all filled with rain
As children's eyes turn sleepy-mean
And Falstaff sings a sorrowful refrain
For a boy in Fiddler's Green
12.THE LAST OF THE UNPLUCKED GEMS
Violins and tambourines
This is what I think they mean
It's hard to say, it's sad but true
I'm kinda dumb and so are you
When the mystique varies thus
You can send a man to bury us
It's hard to say, it's sad but true
I'm kinda dumb and so are you
The last of the unplucked gems
The last of the unplucked gems
The last of the unplucked gems
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