Christmas Special: (Just Like An) Astronaut (In Space on Christmas)

I heard a cover of "Space Oddity" and thought, that would make a good Christmas song.

I feel marooned 

As far away as the moon

I don't know how I got myself in this mess

Out of my window

I see the earth's bluish glow

I'm like an astronaut in space on Christmas

On my space phone

I try to call home

Pleading pull me from this seclusion

Help me Houston

I float effortlessly

Suspended in zero-G 

As if there were no center with us

Just like an astronaut in space on Christmas

Alone and unloved

Though they say I have the Right Stuff

I feel a sadness that I cannot dísmiss

In my tin playpen

Abandoned son of John Glenn

I'm like an astronaut in space on Christmas

Can I reverse

Come back to earth 

Free myself from inside this capsule?

Help me NASA

Like a misanthrope

Peering through his telescope

At all this Christmas celebration business

I'm like an astronaut in space on Christmas.

R.I.P Rosie

Haji, Rosie of Faster Pussycat! Kill! Kill!, has passed on.  "Soak it up Miss Sponge, I'm-a gonna squeezing you dry!"

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-23666502

Some Mad Maggies, embedded for your pleasure.  The brindle pit bull at the :26 mark is Odetta.

Happy birthday James!  I love yuh, Big Dummy.

Christmas Special: O Tannenbaum

Beneath the tree, the dark roots shove
With star and sun and fire above
The golden sparks of its machinery
Flash and shine within the greenery

O tannenbaum, O tannenbaum
O glorious green fuse
Our food and shelter, seed and juice
Our mistress and our muse

We mark its branches with a wreath
With blood-red berries underneath
And there's the plant entwined like lace
That tells us when we may embrace

O tannenbaum O tannenbaum
Remain forever green
A beacon in our darkest days
Our begetter and our queen

And the great Father in his boots
Pulls it up right by the roots
He sets the mighty log alight
Which burns for twelve days and twelve nights

O tannenbaum O tannenbaum
Spirit of woods and earth
As you're consumed with fire
We view our own rebirth

Nick Lowe's getting on the Christmas Special train: http://nicklowe.com/

Christmas Special 08: The Advent Calendar

Well, each day has a secret
If you know how to find it
Each secret opens up a door
Each with a gift behind it

Each gift is like a mouth
Each mouth has its own word
And every word a saint
And every saint a bird

For every day is like a new book
Open it up slowly!
Each book is a story in stained glass
All lit up and holy

Each day's a secret storeroom
In which all things belong:
Cathedral, atlas, Noah's ark
Museum, city, song





Not forgetting Jimmy's curious habit of not opening any Advent windows for several days, then opening them all at once

Christmas Special 07: When It Snows in San Francisco

Some call it Baghdad by the Bay
Some the Barbary Coast
When it snows in San Francisco
Her beauty shines the most
The Victorians form quite elegant shapes
With a quiet, bluish glow
When it snows in San Francisco
San Francisco in the snow

Over on Castro and Market
There's quite a lively scene
Contestants dressed as skaters vie
To be named Ice Queen
Dorothy Hamils and Peggy Flemings
Compete for "Best of Show"
When it snows in San Francisco
San Francisco in the snow

Cars go flying off-street
As they try to navigate Gough Street
Or fly quick as an arrow
Slipping down Divisidero

The food trucks tweet that they will serve
The finest cocoa from Europe
A few will even serve up locally-sourced
Snow and maple syrup
Guys with beards and boots and vests
Who look like Henry Thoreau
Line up in San Francisco
San Francisco in the snow

Christmas Special: Christmas Eve in Texas, 1954

You have to imagine Firestone singing this in his Beefheart-ish blues voice:


Christmas Eve in Texas
Nineteen fifty-four
The crowd called out for Johnny
Lined up way outside the door
Who could guess that Johnny
Would not be alive
New Year's Day in Houston, Texas
Nineteen fifty-five

Big Mama said to Johnny,
"Watch how you have fun
Don't drink and slap a lady
And you be careful with that gun
There is one card, Johnny
That can beat an Ace."
Christmas Eve in Houston, Texas
Wrong night, wrong place

He said, "I've pledged my love, now
The time has come to spend it."
She said, "Fame's a hound dog
There's no way you can befriend it."
His finger on the trigger
Getting set to pull it
He said, "Mama, now don't you worry
There's just one bullet."

Johnny watched the clock
Both hands stuck at twelve
He aimed at Big Mama
Then aimed the gun right at himself
The crowd was calling Johnny
But there was no encore
That Christmas Eve in  Houston, Texas
Nineteen fifty-four

Christmas Special 05: The Longest Night of the Year

A love song to Santy Claus, which as far as I know makes it unique in the Christmas cannon:


This night's both dark and bright
This longest night of the year
The shortest day is too long
Only night brings you near

I hear bells ringing
Up in the sky
I'm too excited
To fall asleep when you're so nearby

Any moment you'll be here
The longest night of the year


I see your shadow
Cast on the moon
I look up and know
You'll be shining on me soon

And like magic you'll appear
The longest night of the year

Christmas Special: No Returns

Gifts lined up in a row
Each one with a bow
Corners all just so

I haven't any bling for you
All that I can bring for you
Is the song I sing for you

And when you open up 
My little song
What if I got
The size and color wrong?

Love, this is not show biz
My song comes "as is"
No returns, as is.

Christmas Special: Boxing Day

They say the most important thing's

A positive attitude

So we'll smile uneasily while

You show your gratitude:

Thank you for the twenty bucks you tipped us

Thank you!

Thank you for the bottle that you slipped us 

Thank you!

Never mind the many times you clipped us

Thank you!

Thank you for your presents on this Boxing Day

We don 't mind how often you've neglected us

We don't mind!

We don't mind that you have disrespected us

We don't mind!

The petty insults to which you have subjected us

We don't mind!

Thank you for your presents on this Boxing Day

A special day is set aside,

The feast day of St. Stephen

For charity that otherwise

You really don't believe in

Thank you for this one day when you serve us

Thank you!

When you pretend you really don't deserve us

Thank you!

Even though it only makes us nervous

Thank you!

Thank you for your presents on this Boxing Day

Schamus delivered the 2013 Saint John's commencement speech: http://www.stjohnscollege.edu/about/AN/speeches/gradspeech_2013.pdf

Christmas Special 02: The Snowman (when he melts)

 A soul blues, like "Neighbor, Neighbor" or "My Babe":


What happens to a snowman when he melts?
He gets turned into something else
Mister Snowman melts and dies 
Nothing left bit two coal eyes
Please don't make a poor old snowman melt

What happens to a snowman when he thaws?
You can say goodbye, he's a lost cause
He will turn into a softie
No more being cooler than Frosty
Please don't make a poor old snowman thaw

Winter is the only season
For a frozen heart
Springtime blows it into pieces
When growth and greenery start

What happens when you melt a cold, cold man
Who never felt a thing since time began?
He will turn right onto water
Crying over some man's daughter
Please don't try to melt a cold, cold man

Christmas Special 01: Santa's Comin' Tonight

I'd like to do a Christmas show this year of all original songs, so I'm trying to get an early start on the songwriting. My first is a 70s Nashville weeper. More to follow.



Little Bobby told me after grace over our meal
The big kid next door said to him that Santa Claus ain't real
I saw his little worried face and had to make things right
I said, "Your momma loves your daddy and Santa's comin' tonight.

Christmas Day will be the best day ever at our house this year
Food and gifts and togetherness and all that yuletide cheer
I know you've heard your mom and papa having little fights
But Momma loves your daddy and Santa's comin' tonight."

Well, the truth is that sometimes you've got to tell your children lies
Tell them that they can't believe what they see with their own eyes
Kids just want to know they'll have both a dad and mom
That they're livin' with a nuclear family and not a nuclear bomb

My boy's all the world to me, I can't think about his face
When he learns the world's not such a happy, magic place
So I'll say what I have to, tell him black is white
That his momma loves his daddy, and Santa's comin' tonight.

(I lost you and then I lost) George Jones

Tonight I heard the news

And poured some drugstore booze

Into a jar with a picture of Fred Flintstone

I guess I should hold back

But my mood is extra black

Cause I lost you and then I lost George Jones

I feel the sadness coming on

As I listen to his songs

It's a pain that travels deep inside my bones

Just when things seemed seemed alright

The news came in tonight

That I lost you and then I lost George Jones

I know I've played around

I know I've been a drunk

And there are even worse things that I've done

But look at old George Jones

Well, who'd have ever thunk

That old outlaw would live to 81?

I'm spinning those great LPs 

And pitying poor little me

Drunk again and singing all alone

I'm slipping into the abyss

Say, what kind of world is this

Where I've lost you and now I've lost George Jones?

Shiva is

a 17 year old blind girl in Dadar.

My old nemesis as the Lemonade Seller: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/07/magazine/the-fearless-risk-loving-winemaker.html

I can't imagine what the overlap between Roxy fans and lovers of trad jazz could be.  I can only assume that Bryan Ferry made "The Jazz Age" for me personally.  Thanks Bryan. I may need to get a new maroon smoking jacket (full-length, this time.)

Shouting in a Bucket Blues

Ah, this is sad