“Out the Door” Album Lyrics

Words and Music by Jon Sobel © 2019 Jonathan Oren Music (BMI), Eating Light (ASCAP), Cousin Dave Music (BMI), Hope Tunes (ASCAP)

Lyrics by Jon Sobel © 2019

Whisperado‘s new album is available at CD Baby and Apple Music.

VINEGAR HILL

I’m gonna run these miles for you
Lift these weights for you
Rob this bank and fill this tank
Shaft this crank for you
I’m gonna beat this heart for you
Sell this soul for you
Break this horse and run this course
Dig this hole for you

But I’m never comin’ back, never comin’ back
Gonna leave this heart attack on Vinegar Hill
Never comin’ back, baby that’s a fact, I’m
Never goin’ back to Vinegar Hill

I’m gonna spear this deer for you
Pour this wine for you
Gut this fish and wash this dish
Wish this wish for you
I’m gonna rhyme this rhyme for you
Win this war for you
I’m gonna pave this road and pull this load
Hang this door for you

I’m gonna sweep this stage for you
Dim these lights for you
Wail this wail and tell this tale
March off to jail for you
I’m gonna steal this book for you
Kill this bug for you
Clean this knife and live this live
Blow this jug for you

whisperado out the door

PRECISELY

Never gonna read all those books up on that shelf
Never gonna learn all those songs I wrote myself
Never gonna know where the old folks rest in peace
Never gonna go to that monastery in Greece
What kind of bird is that? Is this an elm tree?
Looked up that word again, ’cause it flew from my memory

And I know I’m gonna need it again
Even if I don’t know precisely when
And I know I’m gonna run into you again
Even if I’m never gonna know precisely when

Mangoes on the trees, I remember them, do you?
Now they shiver in the breeze, doesn’t matter what we do
Dragging through the airport, getting ready for the show
A thousand people out there, not a single one I know
How long have we been here? I’m seeing double
Trying to dig us free from here, but I can’t find my shovel

And I know I’m gonna need it again…

My cat’s in the closet
Stiff as a comb now
My photos of you flash-flooded
Anyway you’re in Rome now
Dessert is sweet here
Can’t afford to eat here anyway

The power’s out again, everybody’s friendly
Can you feel the drought, my friend? Treat people gently

‘Cause you know you’re gonna need ’em again
Even if you don’t know…

NINA

My sweet Nina with the concertina, if you
Ever seen her then you know what I mean
Can’t resist her, she’s an F5 twister, if you
Ever kissed her then you know what I mean

My sweet Nina with the concertina, if you
Ever seen her then you know what I mean
My sweet chica wearin’ high-top sneakers, she don’t
Have to speak-a, she just play her machine

Nina – she’s the only one for me
Nina – she’s the moon and sun for me
She’ll never know all the things she done for me
She’s my soul sublime
When she’s got the time

My sweet Nina with the concertina, have you
Ever seen-a my mademoiselle?
Met my Nina down in Taormina with a
Cappuccino at the Grand Hotel

My sweet Nina with the concertina, like a
Ballerina, she’s all the rage
Grass turned greener, when I saw my Nina with her
Concertina playing up on that stage

Nina – she plays my rock and roll
Nina – the music of my soul

OUT THE DOOR

How did we get so far from the get-go?
Tired of this tip-toein’ round, tired of this shit show
I don’t want to shut up, I don’t want to shut down
Want to be a cut-up, want to make a great big sound
I don’t want to know what dream you’re on
Baby I’ve tumbled the hell off whatever the hell I was on

I don’t want to know anymore
How to move soft across our floor
I don’t want to sit here one more evening
Want to swing low – right out the door

Follow me outside, some kind of homicide
Maybe it’s a flood tide comin’, maybe it’s a mudslide
Put away childish things, quit bein’ so gun shy
Paid for a cannon with my coat, aimed with my one good eye
I don’t want to know what plane I’m on
I don’t really care which flight I booked
As long as I know that I’m gone

ROUND THE BEND

The fog rolls in – into your house
I hope you get home soon
You play with me like a cat with a mouse
But I’m safe in the afternoon
What’ll we do with our good fortune?
Who made the world so wide?
Take one small step off your front porch
Into this world of pride

Now it’s seven long years since we set out
Try to hold on to love, try to tease it out
Now we’re getting’ awful close – close to the end
We’re getting’ where we’re goin’ and we’re goin’ round the bend

Now we ain’t had a breeze these fourteen days
Ain’t seen a drop of rain
Seen mice runnin’ by but the cat just lays there,
Suckin’ on sugarcane
What’ll we do when we’re done countin’ all the
Spilled-on days gone by?
Gonna pitch my tent on the top of your mountain,
Gonna roam where the turkey hawks fly

We walked on the moon I know
That was quite some time ago

MASS EXTINCTION NO. 6

Pride of lions on the prowl
On a mission to disembowel
“Cry murder” sing the crows
Dirty diaper, bloody nose
Frogs and starfish, turtles and bees
Rhinos, whales and chimpanzees
Orangutans, anemones
And more than these

You can’t stop, you can’t fix

Mass Extinction Number Six
Mass Extinction Number Six

Pack of wolves running scared
Truckful of loggers, nothing spared
Double rainbow, troubled times
Missing persons, and awkward rhymes
O Great Neptune come to me
Carry away my enemy
O Typhoon come set us free
Catastrophe

Brand new building two miles tall
Five years rising, nine-day fall
Rock dove picnic, Norway rats
Teacup Yorkies, window cats
Bronx coyotes coming down
Staten Island deer in town
Baby penguins in Central Park
But it’s getting dark

I DON’T WANT TO DO IT ANYMORE

I don’t want to do it anymore
Can’t I just say screw it, this ain’t what I’m looking for
Factory, come back to me, I liked those old machines
Pushcart trips and Velcro strips and all those ways and means
Folk songs on the radio sung out by human beings
We still had the world we had before

The world we had before we had before us
If you couldn’t play the horn you joined the chorus
If you couldn’t sing a note you hopped a shiny Navy boat
Or ran to pave the moon or save the forest
We still had the world we had before
Now I don’t want to do it anymore

I don’t want to hear it anymore
Whenever I come near it my philosophy gets sore
I could fix my Dodge up with a Coke can and a wrench
Break for lunch on sunny days with a shade tree and a bench
Build a room below the stairs and never mind the stench
We still had the world we had before

I don’t want to do it anymore
Can’t you see I blew it babe, I’m shutting down the store
No one’s buying anyway, the merchandise is tired
The staff was no good anyway, and everybody’s fired
I don’t know what happened to the mofo you admired
When we still had the world we had before

PRETTY PLEASE

Got a beat so sweet – So tight it’s outta sight
Gonna dance this dance
Don’t have to know how, just gotta start now

It’s a natural scene – It’s cool and it’s clean
Even that little bitty baby knows just how this goes
Everywhere you look the stew’s startin’ to cook
Don’t have to know how, just gotta start now

So crank it up on the hi–fi stereo
Hear the Midnight Special in a measure of Fennario
Proud Mary still rolls through the cemeterio
Gonna bang on a drum – Pretty please, Pretty Peggy–o
Gonna bang on a gong – Pretty please, Pretty Peggy–o

Just gotta keep time, come up with a rhyme
Put a few on the floor, like a knock on the door
And the door opens wide, go on outside
Don’t have to know how, just gotta start now

Look at that, you can do it – I knew it
Like bowling a strike, like riding a bike
Like riding a horse, you’re your own damn boss
Don’t have to know how, just gotta start now

STONE DEAF

Stone deaf, snow blind, still out lookin’ for a shoeshine
Ice cold, flameproof, still up dancin’ on a tin roof
Friday come wash over me, summertime slow down for me
I think I’d really rather miss my bus
Stay here until the right one comes for us

I can’t see so well these days, but I sure can feel the breeze
That smells of ancient Roman ways, blood and birds and bees
Castle walls and cannonballs burned deep into my brain
I never left that grassy moment no one could explain, so I’m

Stone deaf…

I’ve sailed the sea and I’ve kissed the moon and I’ve scaled the dunes at dusk
Smelled the blue volcano as it spat its ashen musk
Then down into the valley sunk in silent sunset wonder
And always in the distance there’s a coaly taste of thunder, but I’m

Stone deaf…

Smiling faces, familiar places, I got nowhere else to be
Don’t need no conversation, don’t need a revelation
I already know what’s ailin’ me

I can’t remember where I was, I don’t know where I am
It’s all a blur today, my friend, reality’s a sham
I think I’m gonna wait here on Whatever Avenue
A hundred trucks keep barrelin’ by, but I don’t mind if they do,
‘Cause I’m

Stone deaf…

GHOST OF THE GIRL

Well I stepped off the Airbus in Athens last year
And I boarded a boat in Piraeus
Bound for the islands of octopus cheer
But Poseidon was keen to waylay us
So I set a new course then and followed the Norse
To the wet lands of Brunswick and Fargo
But it’s a fool who ignores the advice of his horse
In a hurricane bound for Key Largo

Now my own backyard is a jungle of tears
There’s no place like home for a panic
There are goblins and wolves and of course Langoliers
Monsters depressive and manic
The crabby old tree I tried so hard to climb
Hides the ghost of the girl that I wanted
The day that I reached her I ran out of time
And now the whole garden is haunted

Well I walked to the slip and I sighted a ship
That was headed for parts Caribbean
But was it a city with thousands of eyes
Or a giant-sized pot just to pee in?
We sailed to the sky in a hot-air balloon
Over towns even older than Adam
The witches were legion, they blotted the moon
While Satan was splitting the atom

I traveled the world like I wanted
And now the whole garden is haunted

WINTER BLUES

Baby I’m shakin’ like a leaf
You left me New Year’s Eve
Did you lose your mind
Or maybe I lost mine
Way up on the roof
I guess I told the truth

But I ain’t got time for the winter blues
I won’t be cryin’ over you
Hothouse flowers in the deep freeze
Blowin’ their own sweet summer breeze
Chalkin’ it up to just one of those dreams we are prone to
Wakin’ me up from one of those dreams where I loved you

I guess I got promises to keep
The mountain’s high but it ain’t that steep
We were gonna get there, me and you
One for all or ripped in two
Set the scene and took our bow
But it doesn’t matter now

And I ain’t got time for the winter blues…

After all, the seasons even out
And kids are free to scream and shout
Climb a tree, smoke some weed
They don’t know yet what they need
The trip’s already underway
The ground is hard, the sky is grey

And I ain’t got time for the winter blues…

FORBIDDEN

Guess I know what really happened
Anyway it’s true enough
Found it all up in the treehouse
Right there with all the other stuff
I saw your favorite ukelele
Snugglin’ with someone’s tambourine
And then a composition notebook
Open to a page I wish I’d never seen what I saw

There were the chords that everybody uses when they
Want an easy shortcut to emotional connection
These are the changes of “Don’t Stop Believin’,”
“With or Without You,” even Bruce’s “Goin’ Down”
He’s goin’ down

Don’t know how this could have happened
Seven years and never crossing swords
But that sweetgum tree hid a secret
Four strings and four forbidden chords
I saw the dress you made in high school
The copper necklace of the queen
A fateful scribble in a notebook
Open to a page I wish I’d never seen what I saw

Everything is turned around
Backwards, wrong and upside-down
I don’t know what song I’m in
Now I know where you have been

So I’ve been workin’ on the railroad
While you were polishing a turd
I wish I’d never seen that notebook
Open to a page I wish I’d never heard what I heard