Have A Wonderful Miserable Life.I've just completed another album of songs. Only my second this year...I'm slowing down a bit. It's called "Have A Wonderful Miserable Life" and features 13 new songs and 2 older ones re-recorded. As usual, it's available for downloading free or with a donation at my site: www.GeneBurnett.com
Donations are strictly optional. I'm always happy to get a tip in my digital tip jar but it's by no means necessary. Feel free to share anything you download with anyone you think might like my music. All I ask is that you let them know about my site and that they can make a donation if they feel like doing so. (All of my songs are also available on iTunes and CD Baby where they might be easier and faster to download, but they'll cost you a buck.)
Once again, I'm proud and happy with my work on this latest project. Here are the song titles, along with a lyric sample from each song. I'm also linking each song title to that individual song, in case you want to listen to just that song. Please find the "Musical Recordings" page on my site to listen to or download the entire album.
This song is another one about the mixed blessing that is life...
God says to Adam--Stay away from this tree
Unless you'd care to fathom--What it's like to be like me
Adam broke the rules--God gave us all the blues
And as he closed the garden gates--He told us what to to
Have a wonderful miserable life--Have a wonderful miserable life
Tell your stories--Sing your songs--Before long you'll be gone
Have a wonderful miserable life
A song about surrender and love...
You have broken my will to change you
Along with my need to be free
With your beautiful curves
And your delicate nerves
You have taken the fight out of me
You have taken the fight out of me
A song about the mixed blessing that is human nature...
I'm passionately rational--Determined to relax
Formally casual--Rigidly lax
I'm a garden I'm a jungle--I'm a beauty I'm a beast
I'm a touchdown I'm a fumble--A warrior for peace
I'm a free slave--I'm a free slave--I'm a free slave
I am free
I'm a free slave--I'm a free slave--I'm a free slave
I am free
A song with multiple meanings...mostly about being in a happily touring band.
If you come in--We'll get you high
If you can spin--You can fly
We've been on tour since the birth of time
We're taking this world--One joint at a time
A song about holding people responsible for their actions.
I told you before
One more chance and no more
And now you're back
Crying at my door
You say you didn't mean
The things you said
It was just a case
Of the wine going to your head
But it wasn't the wine talkin'
It wasn't the wine walkin'
It wasn't the wine rockin'
And sleeping with my so called friends
It wasn't the wine lyin'
It wasn't the wine tryin'
To break every rule
That you couldn't bend
It wasn't the wine
This is a song I wrote back in 1996 or so...A country-ish plea for reconciliation. I wrote it in a weird tuning that's too much trouble to attempt during most of my shows, so I decided to work out and record a version in standard tuning that would be easier to play.
Every word you say is crystal clear
All these things you want that you can not find here
You have closed your heart and made up your mind
All you came to say really is goodbye
And I shake my head and ask you not to go
Have you heard a word I've said
You ask I answer I don't know
'Cause I may not be a fool
But I'm doing what a fool does
You keep telling it like it is
I keep hearing it like it was
A song about some of the people I want to be...
I wanna be Mick Jagger in 1972
Strut around like a rooster--Fuck anything that moves
I want to rock--I want to roll--I want to sing the blues
I wanna be Mick Jagger in 1972
I wanna be Keith Richards and play whatever I wanna
Even if I have to look like a honey-glazed iguana
He's the master of the riff--He ain't no prima donna
I wanna be Keith Richards and play whatever I wanna
I live in a town with literally hundreds of deer who roam around fearlessly with impunity. Some people hate them, some people tolerate them, and some people love them. When I play this song in public, I ask people to sing along with the bridge. If they're "pro-deer" they hold their hands up to their heads like antlers while they sing. If they're "anti-deer" they pantomime shooting the deer while they sing along. All in fun though. Everyone's usually laughing...
You chased off all the wolves and the mountain lions
Thanks! But if you shoot at us--You'll have to pay a fine
We walk right down the sidewalk--We have lost our feer
Get out of our way--We're pretty little city deer
We're pretty city deer--You know who we are
Your gardens and your parks--Are our salad bars
We're pretty city deer--We don't have to hide
You cannot harm a hair--On our pretty city deer backsides
Bridge:
Neener--Neener--Neener
Neener--Neener--Neener
Neener--Neener--Neener
Neener--Neener--Neener
This is a song about something that happens to everybody sooner or later. You open your fridge looking for something to eat and something don't smell right in there...
Maybe it's some broccoli that went bad
Maybe it's that fish that we never had
It smells like something underneath a bridge
There's something funky--In the fridge
There's something funky--In the fridge
Something funky--In the fridge
We can smell it--We can't see it
As soon as we I.D. it
It's out of here--Whatever it is
There's something funky--In the fridge
This is a song not everyone will agree with me about. I don't think any drugs should be illegal. I think people should be able to decide for themselves what they want to do with their lives, as long as they don't interfere with the ability of others to do the same thing. We already have laws against driving while intoxicated, child abuse, burglary, robbery, etc... I say legalize possession and prosecute the real crimes, the kind that violate the rights of others. I also expand my definition of "drugs" quite a bit in this song. Again, this song my not be for everyone, but I wanted to get it off my chest.
I'm soft on drugs--'Cause life is hard enough
I'm soft on drugs--'Cause there are some that I love
I'm soft on drugs--'Cause everyone's on something that they can't get off
I'm soft on drugs
Alcohol cigarettes and TV
Politics and sugar and caffeine
Weed and meth and heroine too
Psychedelics and singing the blues
I'm soft on drugs
Pain killers time filler and guns
Pharmaceutical mind chillers getting work done
Romance novels porn and sports
God and coke and foreign ports
I'm soft on drugs
Don't mess with my high--I won't mess with yours
Don't mess with my high
Don't mess with my high--I won't mess with yours
Don't mess with my high
This song is from the point of view of someone who sees failure in relationship as inevitable...
I looked at you--And fell in love
You felt it too--Open and shut
I told myself--This will be rough
And I'm gonna be sad--When I fuck this up
I know why it's called a crush
You hit me like a pickup truck
I am good--But not enough
And I'm gonna be sad--When I fuck this up
This song is another one about personal responsibility and knowing when enough is enough...
If you get to hammered
You will lose your glamour
Get thrown in the slammer
Do don't get too hammered
Just get hammered enough
If you get too baked
You will turn into a flake
Make some dumb mistakes
So don't get too baked
Just get baked enough
You know
When enough is enough
You know
If you don't brush it off
You know
When enough is enough
Another love song for my wife Samarra. This makes over 50 or so...
Come to my senses--Let me adore you
Before something happens that takes you away
Come to my senses--Let me absorb you
So I can say I took you in all the way
Life is so fragile--Even more so than we think
Death is so agile and patient and it never blinks
This is another older song that I decided to re-record because the original version was in a weird tuning that was too awkward to get into in the middle of a show. It's about PTSD, the high rate of suicide among vets, particularly Vietnam vets, and the true cost of war. It was inspired by my friendship with local poet T-Poe Varnado.
He finally lost his war--Turned his back and closed the door
Built a wall around his core--'Til he couldn't find it anymore
He tried to medicate--But the memories just stayed
Vietnam never went away--Back in the world living everyday
He got out his old gun--He said, "My fighting days are done."
"I had hope, now I have none. I don't want to see another sun."
Too many good young men--Died trying to save that land
But so many more than them--Died at their own hands
If there was a wall--With the names of them all
It would be longer than the wall in Washington D.C.
If there was a wall--With the names of them all
That would be a wall--We all should see
If there was a wall...
This song is about the impermanence of everything and the power of creativity...
Well the monks sit around in a circle
And pour colored sand on the ground
They make a beautiful picture
Than they scatter that sand all around
And the point of this demonstration
As far as I can see
Is that everything comes to nothing
So be here while you can be
And make something beautiful
And then let it go
Make something beautiful
Even if no one ever knows
Thanks for your support!
GB
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