Here is our new album, SHADOWING THE SLINK & SWAY. It includes seven recent compositions, three covers, and six songs that were written back in the 70’s but only recently recorded. No Autotune, no algorithms, just one small claim: If it’s never been in-fashion it can never be out-of-fashion, and will therefore always speak for itself.

It’s now available on iTunes, Spotify, and dozens of other platforms.

Back in early 1977 John and I were still part of the very nice club scene in the Niagara Falls area. “Glow” was written that year and I really wanted to play it in some of the nightclubs that came to mind when writing it, but by the time it was finished our band had split and I was soon headed to California. This year we finally had a chance to get it together for this recording. Although I certainly didn’t fully appreciate it at the time, I now see how special it was that we young Niagara musicians could accrue hundreds, evens thousands of hours of stage time during our teens. And for the non-musicians, what a great feeling it was to be nineteen and battling a harsh winter’s night in order to walk into one of the many nice clubs to sample yet another local band while savoring the evening’s possibilities.

GLOW

Winter’s here and the roads are half plowed

Too quick a turn and your world flips around.

It’s best to find a big room with a band good and loud

And bodies that move ’til their heat surrounds you.

We should glow while we can,

Heaven’s not sending extra time to me and you.

Take me now

And I’ll love you complete,

Why not take what is free?

It’s been given to us tonight.

The silences in the things that you say,

That your closed eyes relay, make me want to believe.

Let’s leave this place for a room warm and dry,

Make your requests, I’ll be there to comply.

We’ve been witnessing the town’s decline,

Now we’re soaking up its beer and wine,

We’ll drink the money for my parking fines,

And that’s just fine with me.

I got to know now if you want it for real,

There’re things I’m wanting to share,

things I’m wanting to feel.

It’s just you and me the outside world is black,

If we take the first step there’ll be no turning back.

We should glow while we can,

Heaven’s not sending extra time to you and me.

Take me now

And I’ll love you complete,

Why not take what is free,

It’s been given to us tonight.

We drank the money for my parking fines,

And that’s just fine with me.

There came a woman.

She danced like an angel before me,

My eyes devised a glory that would pull me in close to her.

She gave me visions of home,

A man living alone,

That hollow place inside of me.

And in the folds of her silhouette I could see whatever I wanted to see.

I never was feeling so cold,

Feeling so broke-down and stoned.

I had to turn away from her.

I held my vision alone,

A man encased in stone,

The heavy feeling fell away from me.

I never was feeling so bold,

Feeling so built up and golden.

I never even heard the fall.

There came a woman.

She danced like an angel before me,

My eyes devised a glory that would pull me in close to her.

But in time I could see that I only saw what I wanted to see.

Instrumental

JAKE

Me and Jake was in the saddle waiting for our train to come a-rolling in.

And as we sat there the preacher’s words came rushing down like waves of saving grace:

“You can’t have what you need if you don’t feel like giving.

You can’t hide what you feel inside.”

Every day I think of how my life has changed since then.

Oh Lord I wish that I could live my life again.

Eighty-five years old now and I’m going to my grave,

But thankful for the lesson. The Preacher saved the day

When he said, “You can’t have what you need if you don’t feel like giving.

You can’t hide what you feel inside.”

Magazine racks wear new faces,

Carnival girls that you meet,

Star that you are, now that you have come this far,

See the grey-blue sky that falls upon defeat.

Echo the park, year-old Sunday,

Echoes your far away home.

Lame, change your name,

It’s the first move of your game,

And you’ve come our here to fight it out alone.

Time out, chance to fade the stain.

Old men dancing in the rain.

No need, no need to explain,

Old men dancing in the rain.

Star that you are, do you still know where you are.

Could it be you found this town a little late.

Time out, chance to fade the stain.

Old men dancing in the rain.

No need, no need to explain,

Old men dancing in the rain.

Cars keep good time, grab a partner.

Dance to the song of your laughter.

Star, you’re no star,

No one knows just what you are.

You’re the  hidden son that never seeks the sky.

On her way to work one morning on the road down by the lake,

A tender hearted woman found a poor half-frozen snake.

His diamond studded skin had been all frosted with the dew.

I’ll take you home she said to him and I’ll take care of you.

Take me in tender woman, take me in for heaven’s sake.

Take me in tender woman sighed the snake.

She wrapped him up so tightly in a comforter of silk,

And laid him by her fireside with some honey and some milk.

She hurried home from work that day and soon as she arrived,

She found that pretty snake she’d taken in had been revived.

You’re beautiful she whispered as she smiled and closed her eyes.

But if I hadn't brought you in by now you might’ve died

She stroked his skin so lightly and she kissed and held him tight.

Instead of saying thanks that snake gave her a vicious bite.

I saved you cried the woman and you’ve bitten me but why?

You know your bite is poisonous and now I’m gonna die.

Oh shut up! silly woman said the reptile with a grin.

You knew damn well I was a snake before you took me in.

Mia-May comes from Miami and her voice is full of grace notes.

She has a thing for major 7 chords, but she radiates skunk and patchouli.

We took a chance and we fell free with ginger-ale and LSD,  

We sang into the footlights.

Like bourbon in a chocolate sea, our last dive-bar epiphany

Of friction laced with fantasy.

The bar owner knows it’s a numbers game

And Mia’s pizzicato kisses keep the men enflamed.  

The house is full and now he knows just why they’ve stayed

One more set from the girl with the long Italian name.

”We’re gonna do good, we’re gonna do fine,

In goes the water, out comes the wine.

We’re gonna be good, we’re gonna be kind,

In goes the water, out comes the wine,

We’re gonna be good, we’re gonna be kind.”

Slink and sway sister, it’s the way it’s played Sister.

It’s you, me and a LinnDrum, that’s all. 

C’mon Sister, it’s the way it’s done Sister.

We’ll groove right through another last call.

In the way the dancers sway they pave a way for me

To stoke and tweak an inner freak untethered to a key.

Mia’s voice cracks in a way that magnifies the slink and sway.

The dancers give to we two strays this moment we can save.

A gig and a roadkill, another low desert uptown.

The songs on the set list, they’re bringing her up, then down.

You never know which far side she’ll go to.

Doghouse cities and one-night-stands,     

Carmelita sliding through my hands.

In the morning you might hear her say,

“Let me pass another day.”

She wants to flow in a river that goes where it goes.

Back in school she was the pretty girl,

A shy but pretty girl and things would fall her way.

But out here it’s a different world.

A carnival lady, a queen of these low desert towns.

That old Kangaroo, it pulls her right up, and then down.

She’ll never know the rhythms that flow where they’ll flow.

Doghouse cities and one-night-stands

Carmelita sliding through my hands.

Every morning I can hear her pray,

“Let me pass another day.”

Downtown LA, the final stop of that fifty-dollar Greyhound special, and the first thing they do is cab-it-over to Hollywood and Vine. Yeah they’ve arrived, the high school theater phenom and her sweetheart. Fresh from Erie PA, they’ve given themselves 2 years to break in. But for now they’ve braced themselves for what they need to do. Always pragmatic, the sweetheart harbors notions of pimping her out in a pinch. You can’t help but wonder how so many land right here? There are, after all, no Bogart handprints on this grimy stretch. They come out wanting to be on records or they come out wanting to be on the tube, but you’re truly more likely to catch ‘em on the screen of The Cave or The Pussycat.

But at night this entire Boulevard turns into a City of the Floating World. 

Monday comes round and David, who’s training her for the early morning coffee shift, shifts into one of his rants: “If you go down to Sunset and turn right, and you just go-go-go all the way to the water and then turn right again, you will soon see houses on the left. They don’t look like much but inside, two or three expansive stories below,  they open right up onto the beach. Now here’s the promise and here’s the validation.”  And then he teases her. “Who owns these houses? Who owns the private beachfronts? Who owns the sunsets? Not you.” 

Down the street from their room, she steps on Jackie Gleason, and then Audrey Hepburn. She’s reminded that there’s a lot to like and a lot to want out here. Still, she knows that for the most part what we all want and like are the same things, so if you don’t wanna sell your ass or live in an alley you’d better figure something out. 

For now she works the morning counter at HoJo’s from where she can observe the foot traffic on Hollywood and where for a 50-cent coffee any runaway can hang for half the morning. Men, young and old, hand her cards: producers, models’ agents, directors. Could even one of them be real? It’s hard not knowing when in the end who you know is all that matters?

This is my corner, this is my boulevard, and this is my sidewalk. And I don’t want you here. Who owns the buildings? Who owns the Sunset billboards? Who owns the hillside? They don’t know you. Who owns the HoJo’s? Who owns the Chinese Theater? Who owns the porn shops? They don’t need you here. Who owns the Lakers? Who owns the fucking Lakers? Who owns the forum? They’ve never heard of you. This is my corner, this is my boulevard, and this is my sidewalk. I don’t want you here.

I’ll find your window,

Your window, so I can see you everyday.

And I’ll shake the limbo,

My limbo, so I can look on the world you define,

Mix it with mine.

And I’ll let the winds blow,

The winds blow so we can sail on rivers that shine, rivers that climb,                  

Rivers that find what they’ll find.

So many people going round and round,

Like clowns and toys they fall up and down,

They do what they do.

Are you vacant too?

So many people lethal partners in a play,

They never even pause to listen what they say?

Hating, waiting, alternating.

Between what’s here and there, we know it’s only air,

Returning from a scene, you know there’s nothing in between,

Rivers that shine, rivers that climb, rhythms that find what they’ll find.

at THE CROSSROADS BLUES EMPORIUM

I could talk on and on and still not say a thing.

What you can understand depends on where you’ve been.

And I can write songs and songs and still not want to sing.

It can make you sigh, make you wonder why.

We could talk on and on, repeating our old lines.

We could each expand on our master plan, getting big and bigger line by line.

We could elaborate about doing great, but it wouldn’t even mean a thing.

It makes you wonder why you should even try.

The old man takes his new gold watch and eats a forty dollar steak.

He’d rather work for ten more years, but it’s not his choice to make.

It leaves him feeling cold,

Just spat out and old.

I can climb up and up and still not want to swing.

I can get calls and calls and still just let em ring.

God bless the child but are they ever gonna let him sing.

It carves you from inside to see the kid crying.

I know I talk and talk but here’s the thing:

From the walls of the lobby at The Crossroads

The blues greats look away

From the glass case near the bar

Where Van Gogh’s ear is on display.

In the kitchen, washing dishes

Robert Johnson pays his dues,

While in the Big Room on the Main Stage

Trust-fund-babies play the blues.

And they play well, authentically dressed,

Vintage Guitars impeccably distressed.

And like some Starry Night they claim it all in the end.

I could talk on and on and repeating my old lines.

This bass guitar is gonna take me far, but it’s going to take a little time.

And if it don’t, well then I guess it won’t,

It doesn’t matter anyway.

Still you stay to strive, though you wonder why.

There’s good luck and there’s bad,

But there’s a special kind of sad,

For Robert Johnson to bus tables

In a room where trust-fund babies play the blues.