1. |
The Wrong Heroes
04:07
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When you love the wrong thing.
And of course you chase the thing you love.
You say “No! It’s no disaster!
It’s just my heart beating faster.”
But one of these days you’re going have choose between obsession…
And life itself.
‘Cuz you’ve got The Wrong Heroes.
You’ve got the wrong pictures plastered to your wall.
You’ve got The Wrong Heroes.
And they’re ‘bout to fall: Smashed & Small.
Chorus:
Wrong! You've got The Wrong Heroes, baby.
Wrong! Wrong as wrong can be.
You've got The Wrong Heroes.
When you kneel before the wrong altar, baby.
How to alter that altar ‘fore it’s too late.
You must draw the line
And jump back behind it…
Before you make that terrible mistake.
When you’ve got The Wrong Heroes…
When you’ve got the wrong ju-ju hangin’ down yr walls.
You’ve got The Wrong Heroes, and they’re ‘bout to fall.
And when they do? You’ll mean nothing at all.
Chorus
When you’re barking up the wrong tree…(clearly!)
But you’re certain as can be it’s the right one...
You’ll meet a wise woman or a wise old man.
Put your cards on the table and don’t you disguise them.
‘Cause you got The Wrong Hero.
You've got the wrong uniform waiting down the hall.
You've got The Wrong Heroes—and they’re 'bout to fall.
So escape out now... If you have to crawl.
When you love the wrong thing, open your eyes and get free.
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2. |
Something Had To Come
03:21
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Something Had To Come.
Something had to slow us down.
Or we'd just have kept on and on.
'Til we burned it all to the ground.
Most of us believing...
The Earth is ours to do with as we please.
But it doesn't take a college degree to see...
It's gasping for bubbles.
Sayin' its prayers.
Driven to its knees.
So something had to give.
And the awful truth is...People had to die.
'Cause the Prez-idiot said: "We have it totally under control."
Why?
For him life's about money.
Which CAN buy a slimy kind of love--
Not the kind polar bears on rafts of ice bay-o from to say--
"Oh, save us good people and you just might...
Save yourselves."
Yeah, something had to change.
O, we had to isolate.
As in the mirror so strange...
Several different people soon took shape.
Good, bad, beautiful and ugly.
O yes and we're hypocrites, too.
'Til we decide about our little life raft:
Which is more important: humans or the Earth?
We gotta choose between the two!
repeat first verse.
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3. |
Hidin' Out at the Lake
04:21
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Hidin' Out at the Lake
With the wicked winds of this wounded world...
Whistlin 'bout as loud as I can take.
No friends or family but that...
Isn't a disaster.
Reach out to the ones you can
Best when you do it with laughter.
Chorus:
Rest up because this strangest winter's
only begun.
It's 'gonna get terminally heavy
So don't forget--when you can--
Have a whole lot of fun...
Hidin' Out at the Lake.
It's a small cabin at the end of a bumpy drive
but we're still alive.
And we stay away, way, way from the fake.
Everywhere you look something else is closed down in town.
So spin your baby on the kitchen dance floor
'N seal the deal with a kiss and now...
Chorus
Bridge:
Lay down with your love...
After you've gotten your best work done.
In the smooth and in the rough...
The Lion and the Lamb meet The Bull in the china shop.
Chorus
Hidin' Out at the Lake.
Masks and gloves to shop--
Folks lookin' like a bank robber
With a desperate move to make.
But be cool people, don't panic.
We got the real heroes of this country on the front lines...
Not the captain of the Titanic.
Bridge
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4. |
Lili
04:33
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Lili, the lilac bloomed in the night.
Smell it now, before the rain.
Listen Lili, that's the hoot owl in the misty dawn.
Can you hear it? There it is again.
Lili, it's just Spring-time and...
I so love you.
Lili, the Dogwood's in flower.
That means the winter's over.
The cold holds no power over us...any longer.
And we'll hide out best we can
From the rest of this world.
No, it won't find us.
Not if we don't listen to the news.
We'll leave all that behind us...
It's ours to choose...
Lili, the geese and goslings are nibbling the lawn--
As if nothing was wrong
(Darling, this is your song...)
Lili, it's still just Spring-time...
And I so love you.
I love you.
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5. |
On The Front Line
04:50
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They're On The Front Line of the battlefield
Without a gun in hand, O but they won't yield.
Tho Commander & Chief starves them of supplies...
What these heros won't endure to keep us alive.
Chorus:
And as they sicken and fall--who'll take their place?
Hardly any left at all aren't already caught up in the race.
How could anyone possibly keep up with this ridiculous pace?
Don't ask. Don't Tell. 'Bout this living hell.
Cause they're On The Front Line of the fight.
They don't see day--nah, it's endless night.
'Cause the arrogant who thought they could carry on their lives
Brought the virus to the vulnerable who could not survive.
Chorus
A nurse I know...she’s got "Covid toe."
Means she’s putting on one helluva'. fight.
Will she win? God only knows.
She’ll have results come the morning light.
[Chorus]
'Cause she’s on the front line of the battle field.
Without a gun hand, ah but she won’t yield.
On The Front Line of the fight.
'Cause in her heart she knows…she knows what’s right.
But it’s not just doctors and nurses and EMTS risking their lives for us.
It’s cooks, cashiers, janitors, and those filling garbage trucks
Dawn straight 'til dusk.
It’s bus-drivers, firemen, mail carriers and minors
Fillin’ super market shelves.
It’s factory workers, pickers in fields and orchards, and truckers
Drivin’ twelve to twelve.
It’s social workers trying to keep families safe sleeping
Six to a room.
It’s community leaders seeking hope for entire neighborhoods
Feelin' doomed.
It's our sisters and brothers keeping our confused Fathers and Mothers Safe in one of fifty states.
While America’s hundreds of millions wait…
Tho the hour is so very late….
On the Front Line.
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6. |
Love Is Waiting
05:07
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We were taught to work
Already knew how to play.
We were taught love our neighbor
'Til hate got it the way.
But I won't hear another word that power-mad-man got to say.
'Cause Love is the light that shines day and night.
We've got to...live in that light again.
Chorus
'Cause hell is a zone of hatred...
A place love is forever unknown.
So when you fire hating love will be waiting--
Waiting to light your way home.
Love is waiting. Love is waiting, yes it is.
Some call divine Love "God," but there's a problem here, see?
Whose name for God is the true God?
And millions have over this colossal subtlety.
We're in this skin a minute, baby...
So what's the skinny gonna' be?
Embrace eternal war? "What is it good for?"
Or say: "Devil get thee behind me!"
Chorus
But it's not a drug called "Love."
It's not "Hollywood" Love.
It's not "Porn Star" Love.
This Love is no battlefield, no--
It teaches us to yield.
We get out of the way.
Feelin' how another feels--
Love is the teacher--teachin' us how heal.
Because I'm tellin' you both the scientist and the preacher...
They got the same thing to say to today.
So Love is the only answer.
Yes, Love is the only way.
'Cause hell is a zone of hatred...
That place love is forever unknown.
So when you fire hating Love will be waiting, baby--
Waiting to shine its light so bright
Even your dark heart... gonna' find its way home.
'Cause Love is Waiting.
Love Is Waiting.
[Tag: 'Cause Love is the Light that shines Day and Night.]
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7. |
Maybe We Needed Him
04:06
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Maybe We Needed Him to remind us what we’ve got.
Maybe We Needed Him to Remember what we’re not.
Cer-tain-lee he woke…the lot of us up!
I say we needed him to bring us to this test.
To this reckoning between what’s worst in us and what's best.
And each side will have said: "Destroy this viper at our breast."
But who’ll be reviled by history? O come now, let us guess.
Maybe We Needed his poisoning to truly get well.
To resort in desperation to our liberty bell.
Cracked, it would burst if one such as he
So much as touched the frailty of its shell.
For now a plague rages over the land
Ushered forth by this aberration in the White house.
But Is our Constitution near enough at hand?
Or will it take The Exorcist to finally…hurl him out?
I say we needed him…
Damn right we needed him…
Needed to feel his ill wind
Lift the flags of the forgotten.
For we must not forget about them again.
And the cornerstone of a democracy is an actual education.
To starve hatred’s fire from within
With Profound Compassion.
I say we needed him.
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8. |
All In (But Only Then)
05:10
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I knew an actor...
Wouldn't take off his coat...
'Til the third week of rehearsal.
Figured by then...
They couldn't yank him from the role.
He'd appear in shirt-sleeves and we would know.
Then but only then...
It would begin.
He'd start to let it out and let it go.
Yes then, but only then...
He'd go All In.
He'd go All In...
He'd go All In.
He married a singer in The Before.
Six months without a gig she said, "No, no more."
They can't pay for a drink these two.
They're loved the whole city over.
And when they pass the club--
It's piano rolled out on a corner.
Yes, then, but only then
She'll accept the invitation
To remove her mask and sing one song.
And then, but only then...
People stop in their tracks to listen.
And the applause pours out.
And then it pours on.
And before it dies away.
Before the cries for "More!" are done.
Yes, before The Plague returns...
They're gone.
I was born in a country that took off its coat...
Before the third century of its existence.
We were unstoppable or so we thought
And filled with such arrogance
We put up no resistance.
And then, but not til then
A mirror was held up to
Our sense of entitlement.
Yes then, but only then,
We learned the hard way
That we are no different.
And so we die like dogs.
By the thousands.
Because we're supposed to be cogs
In a giant wheel--called "the economy"--
And it is a machine.
Nothing like a human being.
Indeed, are we humans at all?!
I knew an actor...
Wouldn't take off his coat...
'Til the third week of rehearsal.
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9. |
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Goodbye John.
Won't be more where you come from.
Pretty well knew this...all along.
So we were glued to your person.
Goodbye John.
Knew this day would come.
But not in...
The Time of Cholera.
'Cause your song was filled with such joy
And sorrow so joyful we laughed while crying.
'N maybe that's why--you were called...
To cheer all these folks dying--
All these folks trying...to cry their last tear.
All these folks trying...to get to heaven, yeah.
When we had it all along...in your song--
When it was flippin' and a'flyin...
Like a short order cook's eggs a'fryin.
Goodbye John.
Gonna' be the radio now, son...
That you reign from
In both clouds and sun.
'Cause your song was filled with such joy
And such sorrow so joyful we laughed while crying.
And maybe that's why--you were called...
To cheer all these folks dying.
In this time of Cholera...and beyond.
Goodbye...
Goodbye John.
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Tad Wise Woodstock, New York
Tad Wise started writing songs at ten, while raking Bob Dylan’s leaves. He was discovered by John Hall in 2000 who promptly
produced Wise’s first CD. Twenty years later Wise returned. First with "For The Record," with Tony Levin & Jerry Marotta. Then with "Mind's Eye." In 2023 he'll release
"The TakeAway," starting with the title track...right now.
... more
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