Chuck Berry track, our version.
Up in the morning and back to school.
The teacher's are teaching the golden rule.
American history and practical math.
You're studying hard hoping to pass.
Working your fingers right down to the bone.
The guy behind you won't leave you alone.
Ring ring goes the bell.
The cook in the lunchroom's ready to sell.
You're lucky if you can find a seat.
You're fortunate if you have time to eat.
Back in the classroom open your books.
You can bet the teacher don't know how mean he looks.
Soon as three o'clock rolls around,
you finally lay your burden down.
Up the the corner and round the bend.
Right to the juke joint you go in.
Drop the coin right into the slot.
You've got to hear something really hot.
With the one you love you're making romance.
All day long you've been wanting to dance.
Feeling the music from head to toe.
Round and round and round we go.
Hail hail rock and roll, music that saved my imortal soul.
Long live rock and roll, deliver me from the days of old.
Hail hail rock and roll.

Back 2 School

Lyrics taken from an old folk song; Young and Tender Ladies.  From the lyric "Was May 20th" till "teenage dream" is all improvised in studio.  Dark cautionary advice on courtship.  Loneliness, futility, yearning...

05 Hibiscus

An idea, which may become a quest or adventure.  Listen to life itself and slow it down.

06 Buskin

This song is dedicated to my mother and mothers everywhere who sing their babies to sleep.  It is also in memory of a real Karryn who passed while I was working with drummer Bill Ray in summer of 2016, his mother.

07 Karryn

Glad

An exploration of death, time, fascism, archeology and epitaphs...
Let the night people come and sift my ashes for gold, and sniff as if I left a curse in the air.
Let the night people come and work in their guttering flame, to lift and to name, who I was and how I lived my life;
too bravely for this age.
Can you say you’re living too bravely for this age?
Let the night people come with their jackboots and whispers.  
They’ll wrap themselves in my flag and think that I can’t strike them.
I can strike them.
Let the night people come and throw themselves against the stones of my tomb.  They’ll rage and quail, against my legend, not me, cuz they’ll see, time comes for us all.
Time comes for us all, like a lover, a friend.  What have we to fear?  Times comes.
First it goes fast then it goes slow.
We don’t anything about time at all.

Demo

Night People

A bootstomper, dedicated to all the dancing ghosts

Saturday Night

Mugwumps are from a book, odd creatures, odd song

Mugwumps

This story begins youthful, hopeful, full of memories, turning like an opening door on its hinges, to characters and setting where complicated emotions play out.

Lyrics
True Story

Let's make a beautiful life together.
One like steel when it needs to be strong.
Let's make a beautiful life together.
One that bends like bamboo in the wind when the night is long.
Let's make a beautiful life together.
One that can right itself, right itself when it goes wrong.
Let's make a beautiful life together.

I remember everything.
The way you stood in the doorway with the light behind you.
I remember everything.
The way the sirens in the night called for us to stay
Within their oily arms (repeat)
I remember everything.
The way I chased you in the rose garden in the rain
caught you then, kissed you, we were never the same.
I remember everything. (repeat)

Baby come on in, act like you're gonna stay for awhile.
Baby come on in, let's pretend we know what to say, for awhile.
Baby come on in, stars are gonna stay in the sky, for a little while.
Don't be afraid.  It's just you and me together for awhile.  (repeat)

Baby come on in, let's shake hands and stall for a little while.
Baby come on in, maybe I can sing some new songs for a little while.
Baby come on in, well let me watch lean against a wall for awhile.
Don't be afraid. It's just you and me, together for awhile. (repeat)

I'm in shambles.  I'm in shambles. I'm in shambles, without you here.
(repeat)

Oh my lovely, how white your teeth, in the light of the new rising moon.
Oh my lovely, how pale your skin.  Look at the shape we're in.
Oh my lovely.  I'm not afraid.
It's just you and me together for awhile. (repeat)

I'm in shambles.  I'm in shambles. I'm in shambles, without you here.
(repeat)

True Story

I found myself on a plane to Michigan, cozied up to a lipstick plot-twist.
The kind of connection we were dabbling in
was gonna set us free oh lord well. (rpt)
Just whisper to the reverend we're traveling.  She'll write a sermon from Westcoast trip-hop.  Then we'll get worried and start unraveling.
But it'll set us free oh lord well. (rpt)

Come with me I know the way. (rpt)

Have the new guards changed?  Do you keep my faith, on the golden path?  Come with me, cause I know the way. (rpt)

Plane To Michigan

a power trio which cooks up high-energy, passionately eclectic songs
danceable rock

We are The Deacon Raleigh St. James (vox, guitar), Daniela "Dani-Rad" Landolfi Radovich (percussion, vox), & Eric "Man of Mystery" Hoaglund (bass, audio engineer)

The Deacon Raleigh St. James & Band

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