1. |
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ONE NIGHT IN A CHEAP HOTEL
(1986) Chuck Hall
Winter's not gone, spring is not here,
this isn't the cruelest time of the year
It's not really rain, it's not really snow,
it's not really a hurricane wind that blows
Every city is different, every city the same,
every crack in the sidewalk overflows with rain
Every flesh and bone being that hasn't a name
is looking for a place to go
The receptionist reading a trashy romance,
it's thirty for three nights, paid in advance
And she won't look at you, not even a glance,
you're just a forty watt ghost
Second floor on the right, room B-23,
you're in distinguished company
You've got to pull on the lock or it won't fit the key,
the room is mildewed with the cold
What's that in your throat? What's that
in your eye?
You'd like to curse but you need to cry
Somehow you know every road in your life
has brought you to this place
You make your choices, now go make your excuse
Hate yourself if you want, for all the good that'll do
There's a change of mind in a hidden
compartment in your suitcase
Behind the Gideon bible that you stole in Detroit
when you needed the grace
One night in a cheap hotel
You could have been a somebody
somewhere else
But you just had to be a pilgrim—don't all
good pilgrims pass this way?
Every pilgrim has a pirate in sight of sail
Every Jesus a Judas with a ready nail
You won't be the first crusader who found his
holy grail one night in a cheap hotel
So Washington slept here he must have been small,
there's a Kilroy cartoon someone carved on the wall
The voices on the talk show carry down the hall
and fade into a wordless noise
So you're nobody special, all the rules still apply,
you're no different than the woman in A-25
Who believes that the Pope is a Jew in disguise,
'cause she read it in the 'Midnight Voice'
The soul is an island, and no one escapes
No one gets to choose all the cards they'll play
There's no royalty in the palace today without
a past to confess
Are you strong enough to bless the truth
when it hurts like this?
One night in a cheap hotel
Take in the sights and the sound and smell
Cause this is what living is like
when the lies are all torn away
All men are equal in the blood they bleed
All men are equal in the love they need
And pilgrims have an appointment with Someone
they'll meet one night in a cheap hotel
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2. |
The Cat Lady's Dance
06:22
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THE CAT LADY'S DANCE
(c) 1986 Chuck Hall
Well nothing goes unnoticed here as we've seen
you grow old in this town
You lived in the shack behind the old mill
before it burned down
And everyone wonders how you keep
that '51 Ford on the road
And how you keep from falling when you're dancing
around in the snow
And everyone has seen the menagerie of stray cats
that you seem to meet
They must deserve sympathy by being born
on the street
But no one knows the Calico belongs in the best
part of town
And no one knows you used to sign autographs
when the ice show came around
What were the dreams of the girl
that you were in your teens
When you found your first pair of skates
beneath your Christmas tree
Were the hours before sunrise spent
practicing out on the pond
Wasted or worth every moment
when the ice show moved on
Now it was Akron or Pittsburgh or some place
you cannot recall
Where an ankle was broken
and they carried you off to applause
On a jump that you'd done
and done beautifully hundreds of times
And your walking turned into a dance
that you'll do for the rest of your life
And all of your life is a ten by eight
folded and faded photograph
The two dollar program that everyone signed
on the back
You always needed to know
you were part of the show
You see the faces of the people who laugh
Do you think they'd trade places?
Would you give them the chance?
To see the Cat-lady dance
Now they point and they laugh—and they ask you
to dance they don't call you by name
But your picture is proof of the price
you have paid for your fame
And it's all right, they'll be here for years
after you're dead and gone
And they'll die without dreams of a life
lived outside of this town
And you've still got the cats and it's more
than your company they keep
You unwanted ones must stick together
to find what you need
They'd rather listen than laugh at your stories—
they're all you have left
They're an audience crying for more—
the show's not over yet
And all of your life is a ten by eight
folded and faded photograph
The two dollar program that everyone signed
on the back
You always needed to know
you were part of the show
You see the faces of the people who laugh
Do you think they'd trade places?
Would you give them the chance?
To see the Cat-lady dance
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3. |
Purple Hearts
04:08
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PURPLE HEARTS
(c) 1986 Chuck Hall
Roll your chair on up beside me, boy
Don't go looking at me cross-eyed, boy
The waitress here won't wait on you with whiskey
on your breath
You're a new face at this breakfast bar,
but I've seen your eyes before
I've known you in another life and we went off to war
You've got the look of a dying man
who's seen too much of death
You wear your Purple Heart so proudly, boy
For crying right out loud, my boy
You know as well as I do that you can't believe the lie
You wear your hair in braids,
mine's cut closer to the skin
It's the difference in our ages
and the wars that we were in
And the wheelchair you're strapped to
is a newer brand than mine
I can't bear to hear that lie again,
can't wave the flag and cry again
They say your war was lost and mine was won
So I've been called a hero
just as you've been called a fool
It's a foolish game with words they play—
how can they be so cruel?
The noblest of causes will not give you back
your legs
No speeches ever seem to make
the nightmares go away
You say you lost a friend in Asia, boy
Well, I brought home a keepsake, boy
From a small Pacific island with a name
we couldn't say
It's a torn and faded Purple Heart I carry
like spare change
To remind me that my sacrifice like yours
was not in vain
Every war is different and every war the same
I look at what our victory bought, and I tell you,
knowing why we fought
Is nothing more than bitter consolation
The President says 'War is hell,'
but it's always someone else's hell
And it damned forever half my generation
Sometimes I get drunk like you and think
it better if we died
And were long ago forgotten
than remembered half alive
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4. |
The Dollmaker's Secret
03:23
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THE DOLLMAKER'S SECRET
(c) 1986 Chuck Hall
I've got to wash these windows,
I've got to sweep these floors
You can't tell between the lettering
and shadow anymore
The sunshine fights it's way through dust,
in old-time letters spells
'Dollmaker' on the wall,
past all the dolls upon the shelves
There's been no one here since Christmas
but the children in the town
They know I give them licorice
while they take a look around
The young girls like the dresses
women don't wear anymore
And the little boys like soldier dolls
dressed from the Civil War
And the red-haired girl in freckles, pigtails,
chocolate on her face
Wants to know why all the girl dolls' eyes
and noses are the same
So I scratched my beard, and smiled,
lit my pipe and then replied
'It's the dollmaker's secret.'
Once there was a little girl in a world of long ago
Who wore her mother's clothes up in the attic
in the cold
And played with all her baby dolls
in the mirror that she had
And I see her face in antique photographs
beside my Dad
Now I've always been a loner
and I've never had a wife
And these dolls have been my family
and have been all my life
My eyes and nose look just like hers
and the dolls' look just like mine
It's a dollmaker's secret
I've got to wash these windows,
I've got to sweep these floors
For the winter fades away
and springtime comes to life once more
And another generation comes to see what I have got
Not knowing I love ever more
the dolls they never bought
It's a dollmaker's secret
A dollmaker's secret
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5. |
Cold Rolled Steel
03:15
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COLD ROLLED STEEL
(c) 1986 Chuck Hall
The bossman wants a new job
set up on my turret lathe
I don't know why on God's green earth
I'd want to live this way
For a fin an hour I've traded my life
and it's not much of a deal
Wasting away in a factory working cold rolled steel
Years ago I was a college man,
I didn't finish my degree
And I left home for freedom's sake
and found work in this factory
Now I don't mind the working
but I'd rather beg my meals
Than go back to work on Monday
to that cold rolled steel
Well I know all about it buddy
These places are all the same
Overtime on Saturdays
and they don't even know your name
So I don't want no sympathy
You can't know how it feels
Unless you've spent six days a week
working cold rolled steel
When I die they'll bury me six feet underground
And in that place I'll find my rest
and lay my burden down
When the gospel trains stops for me
I'll ride those shining rails
Made in hell by the devil himself
out of cold rolled steel
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6. |
Hollywood
04:22
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HOLLYWOOD
(c) 1986 Chuck Hall
Oh, it feels to me just the way it did a year ago
I still love my acoustic guitar,
you still love your rock 'n' roll
Life has been good to me,
I've had the best luck I could
And I understand from a common friend
that you're just back from Hollywood
Oh well it can't be a twelve month time
since you wished me 'a real good life'
'That woman' fulfilled your suspicions
last May by becoming my wife
Now all of the dreams that I shared with you
back when all of our romance was good
It's a soap opera tale and it never fails
to remind me of Hollywood
Tell me about getting off that bus
at Hollywood and Vine
Every lie that they told is built
with your soul in mind
Oh, the bigger they dream, the harder they wake
When even the small dreams ain't right
And five'll get you ten you'll be dreaming again
Of Hollywood tonight
So how can it be that the stories I heard
were not entirely true
California is up to her eyebrows
with seers with a privileged view
The good ones go home but the bad ones drift
like a forest fire spark over wood
They're afraid of the heat they're in love
with the flame that burns brightest in Hollywood
Tell me about getting off that bus
at Hollywood and Vine
That kind of career is not what you had in mind
Oh, the harder the heart, the bigger the fool
That needs to see a name up in lights
All the dreams may be gone but the dreamers go on
To Hollywood tonight
So it feels to me just the way it did a year ago
I can't forget it was after one set
with another to go
But tonight I'll go home to Mackeral Cove
and stare at the moon with my wife
And think of a dreamer in a ten dollar room
in Hollywood tonight
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7. |
That Nat 'King' Cole
05:08
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THAT NAT 'KING'COLE
(c) 1986 Chuck Hall
That Nat King Cole could really sing-
mellow magic barroom king
'Mona Lisa' on my hi-fi set—you called me that,
I can't forget
Now that was music—weren't we in our prime-
remember that red dress of mine?
It takes six quarters and a dime to clean it once again
The kids who live downstairs from me
don't know how sweet romance can be
That one in the t-shirt never says hello-
one load down and one to go
Well I read once in 'True Romance'
that all roads lead to laundromats
But I just heard the radio play Nat
and thought of you again
The apartment I've got now is nice—
the kitchen walls sweat in July
Three floors up and two doors down
past the bathroom on the right
No open fires for chestnuts roasted—
not like the house and pool we toasted
And though my old gas stove may leak,
it's all I really want or need
The parties that go on in there
aren't like the ones we threw that year
You got the job you wanted worst—
I guess I got what I deserved
But I made it, and the crisis passed
when I decided you weren't coming back
I guess I was never really in your class
The cops come down here once a week—
you should hear the way that these kids speak!
Last night they broke up one more fight-
it's like a brewery weekend nights
I'm three flights up above my youth-
candles lighted, dry Vermouth
'Lazy, Hazy, Crazy Days of Summer'—
drowning out that downstairs drummer
That Nat King Cole, man, what a voice!
As I was folding up my corduroys
The Muzak started playing 'Nature Boy'—
my mouth grew dry, my eyes grew moist
It's strange that all these years should pass,
and I still write you from laundromats
So here's this week's contribution to the trash...
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8. |
The Boys of the Boatyard
03:49
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THE BOYS OF THE BOATYARD
(c) 1986 Chuck Hall
My diner opens each morning at 5 a.m.—that's
when the first shift of regulars always comes in
My wife serves the coffee and I cook the breakfast
before the long workday begins
And when the graveyarders walk through the door,
it all starts again
They're the boys of the boatyard, smelters and
molders—welders with shoulders of iron
And they ache in the morning,
if it's wake-up or bedtime
They've learned to live life being tired
And it's my job to feed them, to listen and need
them for more than the profit and loss
They're the hardest and softest,
the best and the worst
I'm the one they nicknamed 'the boss'
It's hard to imagine the dreams
they've seen floating away
They all see the news on the TV
and sit there betrayed
And they come home exhausted, collapsing,
their babies are crying their long way to sleep
And like their fathers before them,
they'll promise them more
Than life will allow them to keep
They're the boys of the boatyard, believers
in booze—the ones who refuse to protest
Their insides are dying,
they know when they're lied to
But they won't complain like the rest
And each morning I see them
but can't stop the bleeding
From crosses they must bear or die
And it's my greatest honor to hear Johnson
holler, 'Boss, I'll be back by and by'
My diner closes each evening at 9 p.m.— I some-
times stayed open for third shift on their way in
But next week we sell our last coffee and toast,
the boys won't be 'round anymore
They got their notice last night on the news,
there's no boats to build anymore
We're the boys of the boatyard lined up single file
Unemployment papers to sign
And our honor may hurt but the children come first
And you can't feed them all on your pride
So we laugh with each other in line,
when we sign for the handout
You won't hear a noise
And it's my greatest honor to hear Johnson holler,
'Boss, here, is one of the boys.'
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9. |
Nickles and Dimes
03:27
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NICKLES AND DIMES
(c) 1986 Chuck Hall
Around a corner, down two flights of stairs,
free sandwiches at the bar
The smell of beer and cigarettes,
an old man sleeps in the door
Collected here are winos, widows,
and others doing time
Paying for each sad mistake with nickels and dimes
Their voices carry to the ceiling, one shadow to a cell
And if broken barstools could only speak,
what stories they could tell!
Once healthy men now nearly dead,
and visionaries, blind
For the poor are left to pay their debts
with nickles and dimes
Now it may be easy to believe in God in heaven
When you're rich, without a thing to fear
But surely if this God would visit earth
You would find Him living near here
The wealthy dine on caviar, Dom Perignon and cheese
The wealthy never learn to pray,
the poor live on their knees
While the rich man counts his banknotes
a thousand at a time
The poor man counts his blessings
just like nickles and dimes
Now it may be easy to believe in God in heaven
When you're rich, without a thing to fear
But surely if this God would visit earth
You would find Him living near here
I work hard at the factory, and when I collect my pay
There's always some to pay the bills
and some to give away
And in gratitude for every gift
the grace of God supplies
I give thanks on paydays for my nickles and dimes
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10. |
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LOVE COMES TO THE SIMPLE HEART
(c) 1986 Chuck Hall
Love comes to the simple heart
in the simplest of ways
In the face of simple malice
she will simply find a way
She will find a way to love
though that way be locked and barred
Uninvited, in her wisdom
Love comes to the simple heart
Love comes to the simple heart
Not the mocking or the proud
Always slain and resurrected
Love comes to the simple heart
Love comes to the simple heart,
and though her pain remain concealed
Finding freedom in forgiveness,
no wrong against her she reveals
Bound by her determination
that retribution have no start
Seeking out a new creation
Love comes to the simple heart
Love comes to the simple heart
in the simplest of ways
In an unprotected moment-
touched by unexpected grace
And how weak our sad defenses
and how useless the facade
As through a thousand veiled offenses
Love comes to the simple heart
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