John Hiatt Album

Close one there
choking in clean underwear
bleeding tongue
eight ball pounding in my lungs
ship to shore
I can't see the coastline anymore
I shouldn't be here
I thought I made that loud and clear
But the master of disaster
gets tangled in his telecaster
he can't play it any faster
when he plays the blues
when he had the heart to ask her
and every note just shook the plaster
now he's just a mean old bastard
when he plays the blues
China town
chasing that old dragon down
Madam Wong's
sidewalks of white
while the LA sun beat out the night
pounding brain
my last transmission down the drain
And the master of disaster
gets tangled in his telecaster
he can't play it any faster
when he plays the blues
when he had the heart to ask her
and every note just shook the plaster
now he's just a mean old bastard
when he plays the blues
There's a debt I owe
I'll never pay before I go
so I sing the blues
hand me down my walking shoes
you're in my heart
though we may be miles apart
there's my point
I'll see you in another joint
when the master of disaster
gets tangled in his telecaster
he can't play it any faster
when he plays the blues
when he had the heart to ask her
and every note just shook the plaster
now he's just a mean old bastard
when he plays the blues

Caught like a deer in my own headlights
Frozen on this road tonight
I had a fix on the brightest star
Now I'm not sure where you are
North is south and east is west
Where's the love that I knew best
Shifting in this icy wind
Howlin' down the Cumberland
You're in this valley that I love
Cold and far as the stars above
Do I have to wait 'til spring is here?
Just to hold you warm and near
Dead of winter, dead of night
Not much time to make it right
I know where that lonesome sound begins
Howlin' down the Cumberland
Just a creature in the dark
To burn the sky and hear the night
with love reborn by morning light
But nature doesn't heed the call
Nature just commands that's all
Now my love's a cutting wind
Howlin' down the Cumberland
Now my love's a cutting wind
Howlin' down the Cumberland

My Thunderbird, my Thunderbird
Put your head on my shoulder
Don't say a word
We'll cut across town in my Thunderbird
There's a burial ground
Beneath a cattle herd
Mr. Henry Ford's building me a Thunderbird
My Thunderbird, my Thunderbird
Put your head on my shoulder
Don't say a word
We'll cut across the country in my Thunderbird
We're from Pennsylvania
Welsh men of words
My daddy drove a Desoto
I drive a Thunderbird
My Thunderbird, my Thunderbird
She's the voice of the future
Tomorrow's taken wing on my Thunderbird
My Thunderbird, my Thunderbird
Put your head on my shoulder
Don't say a word
We'll cut across town in my Thunderbird
Got electric windows
Tilt away wheel
Slide across the bucket seat
For that sexy leather feel of
My Thunderbird, my Thunderbird
Put your head on my shoulder
Don't say a word
We'll cut across town in my Thunderbird
From the old Volkswagen
Back to the Model T
A lot of men died
Just so you could ride with me in
My Thunderbird, my Thunderbird
She drives like a dream
Baby rest assured
It don't get any better than a Thunderbird
My daddy was a salesman
My brother was too
I would sell anything
Just to try to stay with you
But not my Thunderbird
No not my Thunderbird
Willy Loman's saying something
I can't hear a word
I'm going too fast in my Thunderbird
They make 'em that way
Yeah they make 'em that way
Well they make 'em that way
Yeah they make 'em that way
Well they make 'em that way

I've been too long with my nose in a book
I hope you sing just as good as you look
Come on over baby, I got a song for you
A little jump of something I call
The wintertime blues
I wanna hear those mockingbird wings
I want gravy on everything
Lovin' in the kitchen
What have we got to lose
Just a nasty case of
These ol' wintertime blues
Cold as snot with a big frozen smile
Ain't foolin' nobody after a while
Time to let the cat out
I've got a real short fuse
I'm just about to blow up
These ol' wintertime blues
There's no spring
Spring's a long gone thing
There won't ever be a spring no more
At least that's the way it feels when your
Skin is cracked and peeled
And you've been livin' under
sixty pounds of blanket
And the snow's drifting up to your window
And you're out of firewood
And the wolf is howling at your door
Three hours of day light
and all of them gray
The suicide prevention group has all run away
I'm running out of groceries
I ain't got no rubber shoes
Bring the bacon baby
I got the wintertime blues
I could cut a hole in the floor
Catch you a fish by a quarter to four
But I'm stuck up this mountain
Where I got a bird's eye view
Of couple more months of these
ol' wintertime blues
And it's a one, two
My lips are turning blue
Come on over baby
What have we got to lose
Just a nasty case of
These ol' wintertime blues
And it's three, four
I'm stiff as Al Gore
Come on over baby
What have we got to lose
Just a nasty case of these ol'
wintertime blues
Well, it's the same old drill
For Punxsutawney Phil
If he sees his own shadow
I'm shootin' to kill
Come on over baby
I stand accused
There's a man going crazy up here
With the wintertime blues

We made a pact
Lying there on our backs
Swearing to every star
That the sky did hold
Promising our love was true
Promising to see it through
Then we headed due Southwest
Across the Muscle Shoals
We slid down a riverbank
In the pouring rain giving thanks
For the strength just to carry on
Through the fog and the cold
There at the water's edge
She tugged my arm
And I nodded my head
Just one more step
And that river took a hold
I'm coming over too
To cross that mighty river that's before us
To the new western world
Mountains high and plain unfurled
Desert stretching out
to touch the Californias
We said we'd never look back
We never have and that's a fact
That Mississippi washed us clean
Down to the bone
The journey's been long my friend
Hell, you never know what state you're in
Yeah, but the unknown
It's always the unknown
When my love crosses over
I'm coming over too
To cross that mighty river that's before us
To the new western world
Mountains high and plain unfurled
Desert stretching out
to touch the Californias
I lost track of you a while
But you were waiting for me with a smile
Made me feel like a little child
With a brand new view
Let's do it all over babe
It'd just be another trip we made
When my love crosses over
I'm coming too

In the forest of no gravity
Where birds mock reality
We laid out some bread crumbs
Yeah but somebody ate 'em
Always thought we'd make it here
But here keeps movin'
How much blood
How many tears
It's never been proven
Love's not where we thought we left it
Who took the last of love and kept it
Caged love in tried to protect it
Love's not where we thought we left it
The apostles were jealous
of Mary Magdalene and Jesus
Said why do you love her more than us
Jesus turned back in disgust
Said why do I love her more than you
Just ask yourself what can I do
To gain my lord's affection
Love's not where you thought you left it
Who took the last of love and kept it
Caged love in tried to protect it
Love's not where we thought we left it
When men become more ladylike
I'll see you in the candlelight
When women come to be like men
We'll be ashamed to fight again
No jealous God's the only one
Father, mother, ghost and son
Love's unorthodox
Changes all of nature's clocks
To time remaining
Just twenty-four hours
For lovers in training
Bitter, salty, sweet and sour
Love's not where we thought we left it
Who took the last of love and kept it
Love's not where we thought we left it
Who took the last of love and kept it
Love's not where we thought we left it

Come out of a fireball
Notes burning and the letters scrawled
I ain't ever goin' back no more
Bare light blub and a hotplate
Was there that I finally met my fate
And I ain't ever goin' back no more
She danced the room and she made it fine
I sang a song about a crooked line
And I ain't ever goin' back no more
She's my first love and she's my last
Don't ask me how it ever came to pass
'Cause I ain't ever goin' back no more
I ain't going back no more
Wouldn't even try to find that door
And I ain't ever goin' back no more
I don't care what the past has in store
I ain't ever goin' back no more
A pint of gin and a long bus trip
Somebody said you just get over it
I ain't ever goin' back no more
I see her face at every shitty bar
I have to play to pay for this guitar
I ain't ever goin' back no more
I'm singing every song for her tonight
So bartender would you hit the lights
'Cause I ain't ever goin' back no more
A little something to remember me
It's been so long Lord she musn't see
I ain't ever goin' back no more
I ain't ever goin' back
I ain't goin' back no more
Wouldn't even try to find that door
I ain't ever goin' back no more
I don't care what the past has in store
I ain't ever goin' back no more
I ain't ever goin' back no more
Dust settles in a darkened room
Whiskey steals away the sense of doom
I ain't ever goin' back no more
We made love and we made hate
Never could seem to get it straight
I ain't ever goin' back no more baby
You're branded on my soul and in my mind
I keep running up and down this old fence line
I ain't ever goin' back no more
Only one thing in my life is true
Honey I will remember you
I ain't ever goin' back no more
I ain't ever goin' back no more
Wouldn't even try to find that door
I ain't ever goin' back no more
I don't care what the past has in store
I ain't ever goin' back no more
I ain't ever goin' back no more

Well he packed up his suitcase
'Cause the deal gone down
She was slipping on her stockings
Lord it made the sweetest sound
There was a baby in the reeds
Along the river outside of town
As he wound his pocket watch
To set time spinnin' 'em all around
Wasn't long they'd be forgetting
This old rainy Texas day
Little fella wasn't meant
For this old world anyway
Gambling and whoring
Hiding from plain view
Tell me which one of us rounders
Would you trust this poor child to
You just roll on cold river
We've got business to attend to
In Chicago town
In Chicago town
Well they rolled out of Austin
On some kind of cattle train
She'd been with him for a year
Didn't know his second name
He worked the small towns hustling nine ball
She hooked the truck stops too
They were trying to make Chicago
Before the winter come blowing through
Some trucker sprang a leak
In California they supposed
Started working Arizona
Lord she missed the bloody rose
They rambled through the southwest
Making money and making time
But they never could find no help
Not a doctor, not that kind
You just roll on cold river
Wash little Moses down
We've got business to attend to
In Chicago town
In Chicago town
Some women love their babies
Some women won't have one
Some Texas woman found him
And we're still on the run
The kind of life we're living
He'd only slow us down
Ain't good for nothing anyway
Just rambling town to town
You just roll on cold river
Wash little Moses down
We've got business to attend to
In Chicago town
In Chicago town
Well he unpacked his suitcase
She pulled her stockings down
Dreaming up a pool hall
And shooting up a round
She thought about tomorrow
When the money rolled around
That night they slept like babies
In Chicago town

We were coming down the old turnpike
Horse hooves pounding, sledgehammer night
You can tell 'em anything you like
I was there with you baby
Silver and diamonds and a skin full of tears
The road narrowed then it disappeared
Maybe you figured you might
Wind up some place like here
Acting like you never cared for me baby
Now you shake me off
Like the dust your boots are wearing
The leather's soft but I'm cold and fast
Makes me cough
'Til I feel my lungs are tearing
I'll never rest 'til I find you at last
Find you at last
The ground we covered's cracked and spit with rain
Be all right if this God-forsaken terrain
Just dried up and blew away baby
Maybe my memory's just not right
But we've been baptized by fire and light
Eaten by the earth
Swallowed up by the night
I don't care where you think
You're gonna stay baby
Now you shake me off
Like the dust your boots are wearing
The leather's soft but I'm hard and fast
Makes me cough
'Til I feel my lungs are tearing
I'll never rest 'til I find you at last
Find you at last
Find you at last
Find you at last baby
Find you at last
I've been searching for an answer
What a waste of time
Should've picked your trail up sooner
But I couldn't stop the pain
That was breaking up my mind
So I found some open country
I forgot the past
I don't care if you don't want me
'Cause nothing matters any more baby
'Til I find you at last
Tonight you're sleeing on a cold dirt floor
And in my dreams I'm crashing through your door
But you don't recognize me anymore
Do you baby
'Til I find you at least
Find you at last
Find you at last baby
Find you at last
Find you at last
'Til I find you at last
Find you at last

He's the old school
He don't say when he's hurting
He'll just hide away 'til it's over
And tears are dry
He's the old school
and you can't see him cry
He was young once just like you
A heart wide open to love that is true
He thought he found it
Now she's gone
And he's the old school of
Love from now on
He's just a student
Like us all
Learned a lesson
By taking a fall
There's nothing new in this love game
He's the old school
He don't say when he's hurting
He'll just hide away 'til it's over
And tears are dry
He's the old school
And you can't see him cry
He's the old school
And you can't see him cry

Back on the corner
I'm singing the blues
I can see my reflection
in the shine of your shoes
Like Momma used to say
No news is good news
And I'm back on the corner again
Back on the corner
Got my seeing-eye dog
He's blind as justice
And hungry as a hog
I feel like a prince
But I look like a frog
And I'm back on the corner again
Back on the corner
Pitching pennies and dimes
Hell, I don't even know
How I got here this time
Singing for my supper at 12th Street and Vine
Back on the corner again
Used to take seven pills
Just to get up in the morning
From seven different doctors
With seven different warnings
I'd call 'em up to say I'm coming apart
They'd say call us back when the fireworks start
Well I lost my address
I lost my wife
I lost my children
I lost my knife
But if you trifle with me
It's my life against your life
Back on the corner again
Back on the corner
Something's sticking in my craw
How come everything I do
Is up against the law
You can't arrest a man, can you
For trying to break his own fall
Back on the corner again
Back on the corner
Got a pidgeon for a friend
He said he'd come to see me
But he did not say when
One of these days
He's gonna fly back home and then
Back on the corner again
Every long, drawn step it took to get me here
Was full of best intentions
Bright hopes and good cheer
With dreams made out of silk
Lined with silver and gold
Too beautiful to mention
Too heavy to ever hold
Well, I'm back on the corner
With the pimps and the whores
Least I know what they're standing here for
She smiles, tips me a dollar,
and I play her one more
Back on the corner again
Back on the corner again
Back on the corner again