Get all 46 Joe Solo releases available on Bandcamp and save 25%.
Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Farewell Hatfield Main, Sledgehammer Songs, Twenty From Twenty, Answer Machine/See You When I Get There, These Are My People, Fight The Good Fight Club Revisited, Upstairs At Park Street, Collected, and 38 more.
1. |
Rose & Crown
06:45
|
|||
Meet me down at the Rose & Crown on friday night at 8
I'll drop 2 quid in the jukebox there just like I did back in the day
When 65 was Dylan; and 21 was Johnny Cash
Oh and 17 was Springsteen...or was it maybe "White Man" by The Clash?
Ah well it's probably DJ no-one now with his utter lack of soul
And I'll just sit there mumbling something about the death of rock and roll
Let's forget we ever knew each other
And get out of this town
Instead it's friday night at 8o'clock
Down at the Rose & Crown
Meet me down at the Rose & Crown on friday night at 8
The college kids meet up there now, I bet I'll watch them while I wait
The way they walk, the way they talk you'd think they owned the world
And I know that I'm gonna wanna punch the boys and get off with all the girls
Ah, but they're flesh and blood reminders that you and me, we've had our time
And so tonight we're gonna party like it's 1989
Meet me down at the Rose & Crown on friday night at 8
I put your first 2 beers behind the bar I shoulda known that you'd be late
Some drunken guy just staggered in, I saw him glare at me and go
Like some leering, sneering version of a face I used to know
Ah, but that look he gave I recognise..both mad and sad..yet neither
Just some crumb of bitter comfort knowing that I'd come to nothing either
Meet me down at the Rose & Crown on friday night at 8
I guess it's near last orders now and I'm still waiting here my mate
There's 2 young girls sat giggling there while I admire them from afar
Because I know they're only laughing at that sad-sack by the bar
Ah, but the thing about getting older is you forget how to have fun
Tonight I've spent the last 3 hours sat here wishing I was young
Let's forget we ever knew each other
And get out of this town
Instead it's friday night at 8o'clock
Down at the Rose & Crown
WORDS AND MUSIC
BY
JOE SOLO
|
||||
2. |
Cracks In Your Heart
04:21
|
|||
3. |
Nothing's Perfect
01:53
|
|||
There's no such thing as a perfect life.
No perfect home. No perfect wife.
No perfect job. No perfect car.
No perfect grasp of who we are.
No perfect night. No perfect day.
No perfect place to hide away.
No perfect sea. No perfect sky.
No perfect truth. No perfect lie.
No perfect boy. No perfect girl.
No,we don't live in a perfect world.
There ain't no perfect song to sing.
There ain't no perfect anything.
No perfect body, perfect mind,
No perfect calm, no perfect kind,
No perfect peace, no perfect rest.
There's no perfection....just your best.
WORDS AND MUSIC
BY
JOE SOLO
|
||||
4. |
A Northern Seaside Town
05:01
|
|||
It's summer in a seaside town
At sunset on the pier.
Awayday heydays been and gone
Are all remembered here.
Men in flat caps and braces
As they stroll along the shore,
Or the coffee house at Macy's
Back in 1954.
The faces on these photographs here
No-one can recall,
They're just cigarette-stained epitaphs
On crumbling cafe walls,
And they're "Three for 50p" she smiles
"Or five'll be a pound!"
It's summer in a northern seaside town.
It's summer in a seaside town
All panto matinees,
Where washed-up soap-stars stand in line
To relive better days.
Amusement arcade neon sunbeams
Dance along the sand,
To the muffled calls from bingo halls
Where two fat ladies stand
And gaze in glazed nostalgia
At some tacky souvenirs,
They've faded in that window there
For twenty-seven years.
And some old Joe in the corner
Sings away without a sound.
It's summer in a northern seaside town.
It's summer in a seaside town
All shutters on The Strand.
Dreams dance down these silent streets
Like empty cola cans.
And ghosts of lovers hand-in-hand
Are out there in the mist,
Still writing their names in the sand
Like the first night that they kissed,
And the old ones keep returning
As if drawn back in a dream,
To the one place in the world
Where they are always seventeen.
Then a grey November rain falls
Like a curtain coming down,
On summer in a northern seaside town.
WORDS AND MUSIC
BY
JOE SOLO
|
||||
5. |
It's Lonely Out Here Now
03:45
|
|||
6. |
Hemingway & Me
05:24
|
|||
7. |
||||
You can keep your million dollar prize,
Cos it ain't worth winning.
When it comes all cloaked in compromise,
Hell you were ****** from the beginning.
Don't you know?
Now you don't want to talk about it,
Or even think out loud,
You're so right and stupid and proud.
Now you say it's high time I grew up.
Why can't I see it's all around me?
And you never met anyone ever said they'd got enough.
Well then I sure am glag you found me.
There's a lie flying high in your clear blue sky,
And I was born to be a cloud,
You're so right and stupid and proud.
WORDS AND MUSIC
BY
JOE SOLO
|
||||
8. |
Tony
07:40
|
|||
Tony sold me my first brand-new, second-hand guitar.
And I'd bounce around my bedroom like some smalltown superstar.
Tony bought himself a drum kit that he never learned to play.
But he'd still wake up the neighbourhood sat clubbing it all day.
So we tore our leather jackets and we spray-painted our jeans.
We had big plans in a smalltown,
We had rock'n'roll dreams.
We didn't have no bass guitar but we got over that
Getting Sean to pick the bottom four strings of a beat-up Strat.
Then when Sean left Claire took over and I swear we drove her mad,
True I never knew the licks from Teenage Kicks could sound so bad.
But we played Thursdays At The Regal to the Kings and to the Queens,
We had big plans in a smalltown,
We had rock'n'roll dreams.
Sean he joined the army, Claire went off for her degree,
Me and Tony we had dead-ends shifting shit from A to B.
And I'd just stand there next to Terry slowly getting off my face,
"After 15 pints of lager Joe, the world's a different place.
Sure this bar is full of sad old men, but it's not all it seems.
Cos there ain't a man here didn't once have
Rock'n'roll dreams."
My mind was racing way too fast I couldn't hang about
Sat in Nelly's getting pissed and stoned all talk of getting out.
I never said goodbye to Tony but I knew he'd understand.
So I packed off for the city lights and
Got myself a band.
Now 20 years have been and gone and left without a trace,
And those power chords belong another time, another place.
It was great to hear from Tony when he phoned the other day,
Saying: "I still love those old songs Joe, the ones we used to play.
But there's luxury apartments where The Regal used to be,
And I haven't seen a punk round here since 1993.
The old gang hang around now in the pool room at The Plough."
He said: "Remember Sean and Claire, Joe? Wonder what they're doing now.
It's cover bands or nothing here, the pubs have all got themes!
Remember Joe? Remember all those rock'n'roll dreams?"
Oh yeah, I remember Tony. I remember all too well.
And I've been a million miles old friend aw the tales that I could tell.
And while this battered heart's still beating, I can dream enough for 2,
So this one's for the old days Tone,
And it's going out to you.
WORDS AND MUSIC
BY
JOE SOLO
|
||||
9. |
The Ox On Stocksley Road
03:37
|
|||
If I hadn't have lost my wallet
I'd have never have got Kev's note
That said to meet him in the pool room
At The Ox on Stocksley Road.
If I hadn't have changed my jacket,
I'd have never have lost my keys
And I'd have caught the last train into town
And not the bus outside The Bees.
You'd never seen rain like it,
I could hardly see the shops,
Through the water on the window
And that's why I missed my stop.
If I hadn't have thought of Shorty
As I trudged back up the street,
I'd have never have played that game
Avoiding cracks beneath my feet.
If I hadn't have changed my jacket,
I'd have never have been wet through,
But huddled staring at the floor
I walked right into you.
Now Kev and them still talk about
The night United went above
Arsenal with that 0-0 draw
But me, I fell in love.
I don't believe in Star Signs
Or that Da Vinci Code
But who'd have thought that fate would wait
Outside The Ox on Stocksley Road.
WORDS AND MUSIC
BY
JOE SOLO
|
||||
10. |
Me & Billy The Kid
03:47
|
|||
Me & Billy The Kid we've got nothing in common
Him being an outlaw, and me being a fool
Strumming my sad songs for somebody somewhere
He knew of freedom, me only rules.
I'd love to stand beside him with my back to the border
Odds stacked against us, but making a stand
Me with my six string slung over my shoulder
And him with his six guns there in his hands
Me & Billy The Kid we've got nothing in common
He lived his whole life in twenty one years
Me I got old, a whole world on my shoulders
He bit the dust but I tasted the tears.
Now I'll never stand beside him with my back to the border
I'll find my own way of making a stand
Not shot in the back in some New Mexican sunset
I'll take my chances in a rock 'n' roll band.
WORDS AND MUSIC
BY
JOE SOLO
26/7/07
|
||||
11. |
||||
12. |
Loneliness Is Blue
02:28
|
|||
Monday's streetlights flicker out
But there's only me about
To share it with the night
And the cold grey morning light
Roses are red
That's partly true
Night is dark
And loneliness is blue
Been drinking to forget
But it ain't happened yet
I'm so sick of all of this
And I'm not sure what I miss
Roses are red
That's partly true
Night is dark
And loneliness is blue
WORDS AND MUSIC
BY JOE SOLO
14/10/07
|
||||
13. |
The Autocue
02:12
|
|||
14. |
Ms Seventeen
07:00
|
|||
15. |
Goodbye Corner Cafe
01:58
|
|||
We saw dancing horses whirling
Swirling in the spray.
As a silver morning sunrise
Set September on the bay
The tide of time is turning
And it's flowing straight to hell
Goodbye Corner Cafe
Fare thee well.
Somewhere in the air out there
I swear a mermaid sings
As one of us is leaving this place
Bound for better things.
My eye's on the horizon
As a new day casts it's spell
Goodbye Corner Cafe
Fare thee well.
WORDS AND MUSIC
BY
JOE SOLO
|
||||
16. |
Radio Interference
02:20
|
|||
17. |
Too Many Ghosts
03:17
|
|||
18. |
||||
19. |
Like Sinatra Sings
02:47
|
|||
20. |
Here We Go Again
05:40
|
|||
No hotel rooms or mini-bars
Just sleeping bags in backs of cars
On a mattress of guitars
We're DIY-ing
Another town, another show
Another fast lane going slow
There's roadworks everywhere we go
We're DIY-ing
Here we go again...
Give fliers out all afternoon
And still play to an empty room
Something's gotta happen soon
We're DIY-ing
And one day when we sign that deal
I'll buy a service station meal
To fill the emptiness I feel
We're DIY-ing
Here we go again....
We're given lending up for lent
The T-Shirt money's all been spent
We'll have to dip into the rent
We're DIY-ing
When I grow up to be a star
I'm gonna re-string this guitar
And order something from the bar
We're DIY-ing
Here we go again....
We drop our gear down in a heap
And pray the Lord our dole to keep
We do the soundcheck in our sleep
We're DIY-ing
The promoter's looking scared
By what he's seen and what he's heard
He calls us over, wants a word
We're DIY-ing
"We're agent run, boys, understand?
The bills no longer in my hands
We don't book independent bands
No DIY-ing"
Before we go I turn and say:
"You'll reap the whirlwind here one day
Where the new groups gonna play?
Is music dying?"
He says: "You losers never see
You must befriend the NME!"
I say: "That says it all to me
We're DIY-ing"
Here we go again......
|
Joe Solo Scarborough, UK
Joe Solo is an award-winning musician, writer, poet, activist, broadcaster and washing machine engineer from
Scarborough.
Live he has an ever growing reputation as both a performer and raconteur, being thought-provoking, comical and punch-the-air political often in the same breath.
He is not an artist you forget in a hurry.
... more
Streaming and Download help
Joe Solo recommends:
If you like Joe Solo, you may also like:
Bandcamp Daily your guide to the world of Bandcamp