Lord I Need You

This one comes from Sheila's favorites playlist. She's a big Matt Maher fan along with groups like Casting Crowns and Third Day. Here's the studio version of "Lord I Need You" with Matt Maher.

The Band Played Waltzing Matilda

ANZAC veterans of WWI Battle of Gallipoli. 

Eric Bogle is a Scotsman who decided to continue his folk-singing career in Australia after he struggled in the British folk scene for a while. He assimilated into Aussie culture and writes a lot of songs about his adopted country, its history and people. One of the most poignant is this song about soldiers returning from Australia's WWI experience in Turkey at the vicious battle of Gallipoli. Bogle weaves the old Aussie tramp song "Waltzing Matilda" into this story about the tragedy of returning veterans of the carnage at Gallipoli. I first heard this song sung by Peter Paul and Mary. Then I head it by the author of the song. Here's the original version by Bogle.

He wrote another song about the Australian WWI experience in Turkey called "It's As If He Knows."  It's about the fate of some 136,000 cavalry and supply horses the Australian Army took to Gallipoli. It was heart-breaking and I can't listen to the song anymore. It's too disturbing. I have a very soft spot for horses. Bogle will break your heart.

Tom

The Place Where I Worship

1975 Lone Star Camp Band - Jack, Bill, Tom & Bow

I learned this song at Lone Star Camp when Elder Burns was Youth Director at the Texas Conference of Seventh day Adventists. It's the perfect song to sing by a campfire with a guitar and a bunch of friends.  The place where I worship truly is the wide open spaces - whenever I can get to them. You are welcome there alone or with the one you love.

And who better to sing it than Roy Rogers and Dale Evans with the Sons of the Pioneers. This version is a medley with another favorite end of campfire song, Happy Trails. It's the kind of song that you need in your repertoire if you play guitar and camp. You just need this song.

You have click on the Youtube notice to link over to Youtube to watch this.

There are other versions you can look up on Youtube, but I'll stick with Roy and Dale.If this link doesn't work for you try clicking on this one.

Tom

I'm All Shook Up, How About You?

I got hooked on this song when I worked for a while at a place I had all my life hoped never to have to work at - Brandom's Manufacturing, a maker of kitchen cabinets in Keene, Texas. I had worked my way through school at every other job that was to be had in Keene, including as a janitor at the nursing home and that one was a pretty grim job let me tell you.

But I found myself back home and between jobs, with a wife and kids and old enough to be sassy and not terribly subservient. I already had my Bachelor's degree, but I'd abandoned the Great Advent Movement that is school teaching in SDA church schools. I didn't leave the church, just teaching. After that, I'd done a brief and brutal run at nuclear power plant construction and had been laid off. Then, I found a good job as a recreation therapist....sort of. We were doing a startup treatment center for emotionally disturbed kids and the job was still a few months away. I was also between cars at the time, so I needed something I could walk to.

So I took a job at minimum wage in the framing department at Brandoms. I was putting together oak frames for cabinet boxes. It was boring to say the least and I couldn't get any speed up (we had a quota). My foreman was the mother of a kid who used to beat me up in elementary school and she had very little in the way of a sense of humor. We were banned from having radios and/or those new Walkman things. So the guy next to me and I decided we'd make our own music.

I dug around for some suitable lyrics that were singable. As it turned out "The King of Rock n' Roll" proved to be just the ticket. The right speed, easy to sing and easy to learn the lyrics. We learned a bunch of his songs my friend and I. I taped the lyrics to my framing table and sang as I worked, my buddy joining in from next door. Our favorite was "All Shook Up!"

Well it wasn't long before the foreman came stalking in to demand that we stop. We protested that there was no company rule against singing - just against radios. She sputtered a bit, then went off to talk to her supervisor. He told her there was no rule against singing so long as we didn't sing dirty words. She returned frustrated. You could see it in her eyes. So she tried another tactic.

This time she went around to everybody who could remotely have heard us singing over the screech of saws and drills and asked if our singing was "bothering" anyone. Everybody said it didn't. Many said, they liked it. Some sang along. Man she hated me, especially after she checked out our framing output to see if the singing of Elvis tunes was slowing down our production. Au contraire'. Our output had improved more than a little.

So here's one of our favorite "songs to frame cabinets by." I even worked in a little Elvis style leg jerk on the "Ooooh, I'm all shook up!" line. 

Like Elvis, we was very very awesomely cool! We also sang "Burnin' Love".  When we got to the "I'm a hunka hunka hunka burnin' love" part, Mrs. B. used to have to go down to the water fountain, it offended her sensibilities so.

Tom

Cripple Creek Done Right

Cripple Creek is a standard bluegrass tune from way back. And this is one of my favorite versions, not by a country boy from North Carolina, but from an irreverant Scottish comedian who also happens to play frailing or clawhammer banjo.

Earl Scruggs who was not a comedian who plays Scruggs Style bluegrass banjo does a definitive version with Lester Flatt that you can listen to to see the difference and I'll post a link to his version at the end, but for now, I'll post Billy's version because it looks like he's having so danged much fun playing it.

You'll recognize Billy from parts he's played in a bunch of movies of late, including "Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events" with Jim Carrey. Billy's a very funny guy, but it's better if you catch him where there are some censors available to tone him down just a bit. He was also one of the voice actors in Disney's Brave with his rich Scottish brogue and played a part in the third of Peter Jackson's Hobbit movies "The Battle of Five Armies."

He's actually Sir William Connolly CBE, knighted by the Queen and everything. He's an odd little man, but very talented.

Here's Billy Connolly with Cripple Creek:

And you can find Earl Scrugg's version at this link.  I play a very bad version of Cripple Creek on my homemade banjo but I shall spare you that particular torture. Stringbean, a famous Grand Old Opry comedian does a clawhammer version similar to Billy's, but at much higher speed. In fact, if you play banjo, Cripple Creek is probably one of the first tunes they teach you.

Tom

Nothing Soothes the Soul Like Jesus

Steve Borth & small befuddled child

This song is by a guy I replaced at Valley Grande Academy. Steve Borth was a senior at Valley in 1971. I came along and was a senior in 1972.  Steve played guitar. I played guitar badly. Steve was the boy's dorm janitor. I was the boy's dorm janitor. Steve was in the choir. The choir director felt sorry for me and let me in the choir. In summer Steve wore a beard. I wore a beard in summer. Steve wore glasses. I wore glasses. We were often mistaken for each other around Adventist circles. He toured with the Texas Adventist Youth in Action Team. I worked at summer camp. At camp meeting, I used to get asked when I was going to sing next. At Lone Star Camp, Steve would get asked when canoeing class was going to start. Steve wrote some really great songs and sang them well. I wrote some really awful songs and sang them badly. In our old age, little kids are fascinated by our facial hair (see pictures above).

Tom with small befuddled child

Steve has, after years of personal mission work, restarted his
musical career, re-releasing an old album and working on some new music. This song is one of my favorites of his. It's very mellow, but I have to pitch it up a key or so to keep from bottoming out. My choir teacher, Bob LeBard called me a baritone with the lilt of a second bass. He stood me between two strong basses in order to keep me in tune.  It's funny that our lives ran so parallel. Steve worked in little mission efforts with homeless guys and veterans and such. I worked for 40 years in the nonprofit sector with abused and mentally ill kids, disabled folk, and was VP for the Tyler Homeless coalition. Steve's like my brother from another mother. It's probably good that God spread us out a bit. You get more good done that way.

But in heaven, I hope to get a chance to jam with Steve sometime. It's something I regret never having gotten to do.  Here is "Nothing Soothes the Soul Like Jesus":

Sabbath afternoon nap music if I ever heard it.  Thanks for the music Steve.

Tom King

Yuppies in the Skies

Tom Paxton among the early Yuppies

This is another great Tom Paxton song from the 80s. Paxton takes off on "Ghost Riders in the Sky" in a parody of the Yuppie culture. A lot of Paxton's songs are topical and have a fairly short shelf life. If you remember the big Yuppie culture though, this one's still funny.

Tom wrote another one about the coming plague of lawyers called "One Million Lawyers". His prediction has since come true. He wrote one about the planet Pluto's demotion to dwarf planet. The song is funny. Some of his stuff is poignant like "Hobo's Lullaby". And he does do some kids song like "Daddy's Takin' Us to the Zoo Tomorrow."

Here's Tom Paxton with "Yuppies in the Skies".

Tom Paxton has a website at http://www.tompaxton.com/

Check it out.

Tom