Produced by Joe Ricker

Recorded at The Thread Collective, Easthampton, MA

Engineered by Andrew Atkin

Rhythm guitar and vocals – Dennis Caraher

Guitar – Joe Ricker

Slide guitar (Three Chords and the Truth) – John Caban

Lead guitar (Chicken Etouffe) – Tristan Chambers

Percussion – Bill Klock

Bass – Nate Jacques

Vocal (Empty) – Shana Ricker

Backup vocals – Shana Ricker, Joe Ricker

Backup vocals (Blue Cadillac) – Nicholas Chehade, Avra Fox, Emma Mack)

Mastering – Andrew Atkin

All songs written by Dennis Caraher

LYRICS

NEW YORK

I remember where I was

The moment I fell in love

With New York

RCA, black and white

I found the way, I saw the light:

New York

I fell into a scene and I never let go

Every night I’d dream of a girl who was so

New York

I was raised obscure and shy

My mother’s faith, my daddy’s lie

In Ohio

Smoke stack sky gray

I never lacked of  I can’t take

Ohio

Sixteen, the city dawned on a Greyhound bus

Worked a warehouse in the Bronx and at night I made love

To New York

I turned my collar to the wind and

Footsteps followed a young Dylan

Brooklyn Bridge, three a.m.

A boy in bliss is who I am

In New York

Met a girl we got married

On the Staten Island Ferry

In New York

Honeymooned at a Brooklyn Bar

From there I never looked too far

to New York

I did my best to make life hard

She went West, she took the heart

of New York     

“Don’t Look Back” is all I knew

But in Toledo, that’s all I do

To New York

Bathed in blue of TV light

I want you to hold me tight

New York

I turned my collar to the wind and

Footsteps followed a young Dylan

Brooklyn Bridge, three a.m.

Oh I want that boy in bliss again

In New York

JAMIE AND THE ROCKET SHIP

Jamie loved the rocket ship he got when he was five.

It was his father’s final gift before his father died.

Early he would say goodnight and go up to his room,

Earthly blue out of sight as he sailed beyond the moon.

Beyond the moons of Jupiter, beyond the cooling stars

Moving through the universe into his father’s arms.

Exploring skies of endless night of mystery and fear

He held onto his father tight and whispered in his ear,

“Don’t forget about me.”

Jamie watched the rocket ship when he was thirty-five

And saw the teacher’s famous trip explode across the sky.

Stumbling by his drinking friends, daylight hurt his eyes,

Suddenly a child again and he began to cry.

He cried as though his father were falling from the sky,

He cried for all who fall to earth and never learn to fly.

So many tears he couldn’t see, still he didn’t care,

So many years since he believed but still he said a prayer,

“Don’t forget about me.”

He met a girl, it changed his world,

He came in from the dark.

Streetlights bright will take the night

But they also take the stars.

Jamie bought a rocket ship when his son was five

But one among a hundred gifts and quickly put aside

Jamie kissed his son goodnight, drove back to his room,

But drifted into coming lights and sailed beyond the moon.

“Don’t forget about me.”

JOHN PAUL GEORGE RINGO AND ME

February, Saturday in ’64

My father had died the  year before

I was ridin’ with my brother in his beat up Dodge

I was thirteen and mad at my mother and God

“I’ll cry if I want”, sang Leslie Gore

I didn’t want to cry anymore

DJ said, “I got a record to play

You heard it here first: KIOA

It gonna be hit by this British Band

This is it: ‘I Want to Hold Your Hand’”.

Now Catechism taught me that God exists,

But God I never thought you could be like this.

John Paul George Ringo and me

Singin’ so loud feelin’ so free

The world was new and it was mine

Love me do ‘cause I feel fine

And free

I got me a six-string, a cardboard case

Went lookin’ for a little bit of  guitar grace.

I never got the world to hear my tunes

But I met a lotta girls and I married a few

They’d say, “When you gonna grow up?”

I’d say “Never. I mean it’s Strawberry Fields forever.”

Well of course I saw that it was not

When Paul got cautious and John got shot.

George found the Lord and we lost touch

And me and Ringo drank a little too much.

The road was long and winding,

I hated that song

Everything was winding up way too wrong.

I needed to belong to

John Paul George Ringo and me

Singin’ so loud feelin’ so free.

Still the boys made me feel alive

Yeah me and The Beats,   the Fab Five

Lucky for me I came to understand

I didn’t need to be the Nowhere Man

But I don’t regret anything I did

I gotta great story with a beautiful kid.

She’s sixteen she can drive my car

We turn it up and we tear it apart

It’s John Paul George Ringo and us

Singin’ so loud  it’s allt too much.

The world is new and it is mine

Love me do ‘cause I feel fine

And free

The Kingdom of Summer

Late afternoon

Twenty-first of June

Light in the trees, reflected from the water

A lake, a breeze, father and daughter

They walk the shore

She’s maybe four

The light of his life reflected in the water

To this girl, the king is her father

They build a boat, stick and string and leaves

They watch it float to the wide open sea

To the border of the

Kingdom of Summer

They stop to eat

The queen has packed a treat

They find a frog hiding, holding him softly

They decide to knight him, “We dub thee, Sir Froggie”

He bows to them both

Vows with an oath

“Your Kingdom I’ll defend, fear not my liege”

Then their forever friend, hops into the weeds.

She climbs a tree, she can see the palace

Then she leaps onto her steed and they begin to gallop

To the border of the

Kingdom of Summer

Blue Cadillac

I grew up in the back of a blue Cadillac

My daddy had a job checkin’ railroad tracks

We all went along, Momma, baby brother Mack

Growin’ up together in a blue Cadillac

Daddy worked all day walkin’ the line

From Albuquerque Santa Fe Anaheim

Sometimes we’d sleep underneath the stars

Or in the back seat of the Cadillac car

Grew up in the back of a blue Cadillac

(bridge) – Mama took care to help us read and write

Said our prayers before we said goodnight

Mama would drive let daddy sleep through

Drivin’ the night in a Cadillac Blue

chorus

Never seemed to me unusual

Another way to be wouldn’t do at all

Never had a house, neighborhood

Never had a doubt, life was pretty good

Blues, Gospel, radio

signals lost on the way and so

Mack and me learned to play guitar

Back seat harmony Cadillac car

I gotta job, wife, house, a kid

I can’t have a life doin’ like I did

But sometimes we take a ride, baby in back

Growin’ up together in Blue Cadillac

chorus

Chicken Etouffée 

My daddy had a sister down a Mississippi way

I’d visit as a kid,  wished I’d stayed

I miss her buttermilk biscuits, fishin’ by the bay

I miss her cookin’ in the kitchen chicken étouffée

Never been so happy, never worked so hard

I want to go back to runnin’ in the yard

catch a couple chickens, not their day

end up in the skillet –  étouffée

Cookin’ in the kitchen chicken étouffée

Cookin’ in the kitchen chicken étouffée

Wished I lived in yesterday

Cookin’ in the kitchen chicken étouffée

Okra, onions, ready to fry

Rollin’ out the dough for pecan pie

She had that look: “Get outa my way

I’m cookin’ in the kitchen chicken étouffée”

Every Saturday night, right on cue

everybody came by with their dancin’ shoes

Guitar and fiddle starting to play

As God is my witness, I learned to pray

Cookin’ in the kitchen chicken étouffée

Cookin’ in the kitchen chicken étouffée

Wished I lived in yesterday

Cookin’ in the kitchen chicken étouffée

I’s fifteen, there was a girl

she showed me another world

I taste her lips like yesterday

We was cookin’ in the kitchen chicken étouffée

I’m grown up I live in the city

But today I know I am quitting

Drive my car down to the bay

Cookin’ in the kitchen chicken étouffée

Blue Cadillac

I grew up in the back of a blue Cadillac

My daddy had a job checkin’ railroad tracks

We all went along, Momma, baby brother Mack

Growin’ up together in a blue Cadillac

Daddy worked all day walkin’ the line

From Albuquerque Santa Fe Anaheim

Sometimes we’d sleep underneath the stars

Or in the back seat of the Cadillac car

Mama took care to help us read and write

Said our prayers before we said goodnight

Mama would drive let daddy sleep through

Drivin’ the night in a Cadillac Blue

Never seemed to me unusual

Another way to be wouldn’t do at all

Never had a house, neighborhood

Never had a doubt, life was pretty good

I  don’t know why it never got old

Just learn to go with the rhythm of the road

Mack and me learned to play guitar

Back seat harmony Cadillac car

I gotta job, wife, house, a kid

I can’t have a life doin’ like I did

But sometimes we take a ride, baby in back

Growin’ up together in Blue Cadillac

Love Me Do

(Andy White 1930-2015)

It was sixty-two

The Beatles were new

London studio “Love Me Do”

Not the Best for Pete

Ringo not upbeat

Andy White stepped in, took his seat

Playin’

Love Me Do

He was completely it

the beat was sick

we all got up, we couldn’t resist

That heat that heart

That beat that harp

over the seas,  up the charts

Love Me Do

We are completely it

and the beat don’t quit

don’t resist just dance to it

Empty

I fell in love on a summer’s night

I knew at once it wasn’t right

I had a child, I had a wife

but with a smile she made my life

empty

The streets were littered with falling stars

The night glittered with neon cars

and when I kissed her the world was ours

and we were delivered from who we are

empty

In a few days we left that town

With a fuel guage that would never run down

to empty

It was a summer night

it wasn’t love but it felt so right

I was reckless, I was wild

he never mentioned a wife and child

The world was no concern to us

we kissed and kisses burned up up and then

we spoke in verse we walked in rhyme

we broke the curse that said time will end

it will never end

In a few days we left that town

With a fuel guage that would never run down

to empty

I awoke to a distant dawn

in a winter coat, shades drawn

radio played a Christian song

cars broke, stars are gone

empty

How long it’s been, I forget

when we went for cigarettes

Everything’s gone, nothin’s left

even the gun beside the bed is

empty

What Might Have Been

Jesus Christ probably thought twice

about the plans for our salvation

On the Galilee Sea he saw the fallacy to be

the plan was a pretty half baked one

And though the purpose eluded him

he could not refuse

to return to Jerusalem

as King of the Jews

And as he suffered and died for sins

he must have wondered what might have been

What if he paused and never picked up the cross

Would that loss have been a bad one?

He resists and says “I can’t do this”

kisses Mary Magdalene

And when they were married

no water to wine

the dead stayed buried

he left that behind

And the world would abide with sin

Oh what might have been

He worked with his father and they built boats

ate figs with their wives in the shade

and with his sons and daughters, milked the goats

This is how lives are saved

What might have been

Jesus Christ probably thought twice

about the way his faith was shaken

and in a moment of doubt he cried out

“Why am I forsaken?”

And as he did with his crown of thorns

A thousand lives were never born

They would not wait for him to rise again

Oh what might have been

Three chords and the Truth

Three chords and the truth

used to be the gospel

Maybe two would do

For a Hank  apostle

There’s no need for more

It’s been working fine for forever.

but these days  of course

A little more is always better

C – get divorced

G – walk the floor

C – drink some more

D –  find the lord

Three chords and the truth

all you need to tell a story

Nothin more will do

for good ol’ Grand Ol Opry glory

C – mama’s love

G -daddy’s truck

C- got no luck

D –  drink too much

Three chords and the truth

all you need to tell a story

Nothin more will do

for good ol’ Grand Ol Opry glory

Nothin more will do

Three chords and the truth

TO TUNE A GUITAR

The way to tune a guitar: hold it loose and easily.

Every flat or sharp tells you where it needs to be.

Strings should sing like stars, serenade us like the moon

and that’s the way a guitar is tuned.

To listen to a song: come inside, be right here.

So soon we will be gone and all we see will disappear,

but waves of sound go on, eternity’s a singing bird

and that’s the way a song is heard.

Carnivals of constellations rise above the earth.

They have heard all that’s occurred from the universe’s birth.

From ancient adorations to Jerusalem’s despair,

From coffee conversation to Buddha’s final prayer.

The way to fall in love: let it go, fall apart.

You’ve sheltered long enough, your  weary, wondrous broken heart.

Nothing need be done, just be beneath the morning sun

and that’s the way love will come.

A Lot Like Lincoln

I know you’ve recently awakened to mistakes you been makin’

so a break you are takin’ ‘cause you’ve taken just enough

I know you’re tired of the mire of desire uninspired

but don’t  be a liar and say you’re not in love

We should stay united, I’m your man

A house divided cannot stand

Oh baby I got a plan

I’ve been doin’ a lot of drinkin’ and I been thinkin’

I’m a lot like Lincoln, I know it sounds bizarre

I’m thinkin’ Northern Mississippi, Lincoln and Ulysses

sippin’ on whiskey, smokin’ on cigars

They’re talkin’ ‘bout liberty, talkin’ ‘bout their Civil War

So many similarities it’s hard to ignore

Would you like to know more?

I’m a lot I’m a lot I’m a la la la la

I’m a lot I’m a lot I’m a la la la la

I’m a lot I’m a lot I’m a la la la la

I’m a lot I’m a lot I’m a la la la la

I’m wise and unique and a guy of distinction

I’m a lot I’m a lot I’m a lot like Lincoln

He was a pretty cool cat, could wear that fool hat

I could do that, remember that beret?

You didn’t like it a bit, said it didn’t fit

but you gotta admit, I stood out like Abe

And you’re right I’m not tall and I didn’t study law

You’re always findin’ flaws no matter how small

You don’t get it at all

No I ain’t forgot, that he got shot

Thanks a lot. You want to take that back

Oh my God, you’re like Mary Todd

you’re depressed, you’re odd, you’re always wearin’ black

Oh I know that you’re annoyed but don’t say see ya later

I’ll be that Illinois boy, I’ll be the great debater

I’ll help you make the choice, that you’ll want to stay here

I’m this union’s saviour

Chorus

Four score and seven weeks ago

I saw you on the dance floor we did a little blow

Somethin’ about your kiss, about your eyes

No doubt about this, you made the South rise

There’ll be a proclamation for your emancipation

Your lawyer is impatient to see us divorced

But let’s be diplomatic and not so dramatic

I’m thinkin’ Appomattox and you lay down your sword

I am dedicated to a union that remains

We are consecrated, did not love in vain

Let’s begin reconstruction, clear up this mess

To the sweet seduction of the Gettysburg Address!

Baby take off your dress.

Chorus