Lyrics and Chords
From Upcoming EP “Historical Fiction”:
Avenue C Shells
Don’t Let It All Get You Down
Home
Hello
Baker’s Dozen
My Love, My Cigarette
Other Songs:
My Dear
Starlight, Starbright
To Know The Truth
Wake Up
Sisyphus
Don’t Let It All Get You Down (print version)
Words and music by James Newlin
There was love when you were young
You shared all everything for a lifetime
My luck just keeps running out
Won’t my angel just throw me a break now
One day the curtain closed so quick
You blinked and it was done
My luck just keeps running out
Won’t my angel just throw me a break now
You woke up with a promise
The ones you loved weren’t so near
The nervous feeling you get at night
Don’t let it all get you down (x 2)
There was the morning you woke up
All around was an irritating blur
My luck just keeps running out
Won’t my angel just throw me a break now
I let the years irresponsibly pass by
And now there’s a clock on my life
My luck just keeps running out
Won’t my angel just throw me a break now
Chorus
You were waiting for the close
Your dreams had all but disappeared
My luck just keeps running out
Won’t my angel just throw me a break now
And then he came right to me
Making comfort so clear
That little feeling I had at night
He said I’m gunna die here
You went to sleep with the promise
The ones you love are all near
That nervous feeling you had at night
You never let it get you down (x 4)
My Love, My Cigarette (print version (piano) ) (print version)
Words and music by James Newlin
Verse 1
What do you think when alone
Do you dream about how you like to be alone
And shaping it up to call it your own
But you’re locked in fear
They don’t want you to go anywhere
You better not divert your mind or have a care
The world was set up without having you there now this
This change is near
Prechorus
Fire is burning between
Fingertips but what does it mean
What does it mean?
Well do you know?
Chorus
My life my love my cigarette
I know it’s time
For you to go lone
Though I don’t ever want to
Verse 2
She set off out on her own
Telling him now that she’s on her own
And leaving her mark on that life for one now that
That mind’s appeared
They couldn’t tell her to go here or there
She wouldn’t have heard them or even cared
Remember that night with that flicker stare
That’s how we’re here
Starlight, Starbright (print version)
Words and music by Erin Rodgers
I wish I may, I wish I might…
Verse 1
When I first met you it was clear to see that
You lived like a piece of poetry
That I’d been missing in my little library
Verse 2
All I wanted was to write you down
So I could keep a copy lying round
To read so many times the pages turn to brown
Chorus
Starlight, Starbright,
First star that I see
Tonight in my dreams and I’ll know,
I’ll know it’s you
Verse 3
When I look back in time its clear to see
That you lived like a piece of poetry
I keep your verses stored inside my memory
Verse 4
Now you will always have a hold on me
A low and lovely distant melody
The kind I use to try to sing myself to sleep
Chorus (x2)
Interlude
(Instrumental) (x2)
The beauty of a dream is it
Lets me optimistically
Revel in uncertainty and hope you wrote that rhyme for me
Chorus – soft
Chorus – loud
Outro – x 4
I wish I may I wish I
Might I wish I may I wish I
Might
Avenue C Shells © 2008 (print version)
Music by James Newlin and Erin Rodgers; Words by Erin Rodgers
Walk the streets past the buildings and parking lots
Full of benzes and beamers and shopping carts
For haves and have nots
Walk the streets past the crumbling urban rot
Blocks and blocks of black hardened chewing gum spots
Like tar pit rain drops
Put my ear to this shell of a city and listen for the past
But all I hear are empty years echo back
Walk the streets to the pier when the tide is low
Watch the water escaping to Mexico
I’d like to go
Walk the pier to the end to our meeting place
On the jetty the wind blows the sand in my face
I sit and wait
Chorus
Solo
Put my ear to this shell of a city and listen for the past
And oh, I hear your voice echo back
To Know The Truth (print version)
Music by James Newlin; Words by Erin Rodgers
Intro
Verse 1
Help me find out
Why it stays loud
Over time found
Years won’t drown out
Help me know why
We have to lie
Call it heaven
Never say die
Oooh
Prechourus
Help me to find out the truth about a lot of things
I need the answers to finally show
Help me to find out the truth about what you can know on your own
Chorus
And I know it’s real
Though I can’t understand it
at times it seems so distant
Then it comes together and I see
It takes just a thought and a smile then I’m certain
Verse
Oooh
Prechourus
Chorus
Prechorus
Chorus x 2
My Dear (print version)
Words and music by James Newlin
Intro Verse
What is his name again?
The one they condemn to sin
Verse 1
The one who was my only and lonesome friend
I’ll forgive you till the end!
For what they’ve done
They don’t think what they do
Is destroying heaven too
Verse 2
The one who was my only and lonesome friend
I’ll forgive you till the end!
For what they’ve done
Verse to Prechorus
He’s the one that’s called
The thief of souls and all from good
Prechorus
But he is so cool; hypnotizing
Why can’t you carry me to sleep again
Chorus
My dear
My dear
My dear
My dear
Where have you come from to hide from the sun
Verse 3
The one who was my only and lonesome friend
I’ll forgive you till the end!
For what they’ve done
They don’t think what they do
Is destroying heaven too
Verse to Prechorus
Prechorus
Chorus
Outro
Home (print version)
Words and music by Erin Rodgers
In my mind I’ve made a collage
Of all that I know about you
I guess my synapses have filled all the gaps in
With things that I hope will come true
I’ve taken liberties here, I guess
Imagining you as you watch me undress and we’ll
Talk about when we get older
Map the stars in the freckles on your shoulders
So I can get home
So I can get home
To you
In my notebooks I’ve written names
Yours and mine and ours
Concentration collapses, I watch the time lapse
As I think about you for hours
Like the way you’ll say my name out loud
And things you’ll find out when no one is around and we’ll
Talk about when we get older
Map the stars in the freckles on your shoulders
So I can get home
(talk about when we get older/map the stars in the freckles on your shoulders)
So I can get home
(talk about when we get older/map the stars in the freckles on your shoulders)
To you
(instrumental)
and we’ll
Talk about when we get older
Map the stars in the freckles on your shoulders
So I can get home
(talk about when we get older/map the stars in the freckles on your shoulders)
So I can get home
(talk about when we get older/map the stars in the freckles on your shoulders)
So I can get home
(talk about when we get older/map the stars in the freckles on your shoulders)
So I can get home
(talk about when we get older/map the stars in the freckles on your shoulders)
To you
Baker’s Dozen © 2009 (print version)
Words and music by Erin Rodgers
I remember the stories my grandma would tell
Of angels and demons and heaven and hell
And how my eternity rested
On how much time I invested in prayer
And pretending to care
I’ve thrown salt over my shoulder and
I can’t find the fountain I’m still getting older
I know, I know the devil’s in the details
I’m tired of listening to wives’ tales
That gets me nowhere but crossed eyes and crossed paths
And white hair and black cats and I don’t want that
Today I am stepping on all of the cracks
And thinking of all of the mothers with broken backs
If I can’t judge a book by its cover and
I can’t judge a man by his brother then why
Was I given eyes
I’ve thrown salt over my shoulder and
I can’t find the fountain I’m still getting older
So this time, this time I’ll use intuition
I’m tired of superstition
That gets me nowhere but weird dreams and buildings with
no 13th floor and I can’t count on that
So this time, this time I’ll use intuition
I’m tired of superstition
That gets me nowhere but weird dreams and buildings with
no 13th floor and I can’t count on that
Anymore
Hello (print version)
Words and music by Erin Rodgers
All of my thoughts
Are addressed to him
Unwritten letters
I’ll never send
Each one a chapter
In our unwritten book
I don’t like where it’s going
But I can’t put it down, I have to look
Its one of those Victorian gothic romances
Where everything ends in tragedy
The soulmates meet and they think that they know it
But love’s not enough, though it ought to be
Where he says hello but he really means
I can’t get you out of my head
And she says hello but she really means
I want to wake up in your bed
Where he says hello but he really means
I can’t get you out of my head
And she says hello but she really means
I want to wake up in your bed
And I’d never be cold or lonely again
But instead
He says hello
And she says hello
And off they go…
Never to know
What could have been love
What could have been love
What could have been love
….
What could be love, so
Hello
Darling You Need To Wake Up © 2009 (print version)
Words and music by James Newlin
All week I
Cannot go outside
I can see the light
But I don’t how it feels
The office view
That you paid the most for
Reason is
Why we’re all fucked up
And you don’t know what’s right
And you cannot tell me what’s wrong
And I can see right through
Your veil of insecurities
Cause I can’t I plead
Cause I can’t fight
Time to stay up
For half the night
For who knows what’s wrong and right
I don’t think I’m gunna get outta bed just right
Wake up
I don’t think that I can
Now that I can go outside I don’t care
Now that I can see the light it’s always been there
And what can you do what can you think
For the poor sad sucker that’s never had a date
And she complains to me so regular
Of never getting laid or fed or having a drink
But who gives a damn anyway
Cause I’m finally sleeping well
Chorus
Sisyphus © 2009 (print version)
Music by Erin Rodgers and James Newlin; Lyrics by Erin Rodgers
I’ve always got a new plan
To get my life on track
But after several miles
I always find I’m back
At the starting line
I’m tired of pushing this rock
Tired of pushing this bolder
Instead of getting somewhere
I’m only getting older
And there’s no moss growing on my rolling stone
Been the same damn place since I left home
Instead of getting somewhere
I’m only starting over
It’s driving on a highway
With nothing but green lights
And then you hit a detour
And follow all the signs
Back to your door
Chorus
…I’m only starting over
Instumental
Chorus x 2
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