HARD ROAD

Oh, you are so
the way I thought you would be.
Ya come down like night fall,
rise in the afternoon sun.
Dry winds blow through casino doors
past the roosters and the turkeys in Reno.
Straight down six floors
from the ninety cent breakfast in Vegas.

You are a hard road,
and I am a seeker.
How long, old friend,
can you hold out?
I can make it to the end.

Once I lived in the streets so deep
that my ankles and my legs were frozen.
Then a Gulf Coast breeze blew by
like smoke on the wind.
I followed that smoke, just a man and a ghost
out drifting through the west.
Didn't need no map
to tell which way I was going.

REFRAIN

THE SUN & MOON & STARS

The sun and moon and stars
make the wind blow.
Took me twenty years
to understand.
Lost to me is how the lives
of friends go.
Like autumn leaves
in Oklahoma wind.

REFRAIN

It made me strong,
to be on my own.
It never did me no harm,
to live alone.
But, now and then
in the color of the evening,
in a bar room,
with the fan turning,
I come to miss a few.

This afternoon was cloudy
and the rains came.
Third day of my first stay,
San Miguel.
Seems lately as I'm doubling
as storm bait,
been followed like a shadow
since the Dells.

REFRAIN (It made me...)

Dear friendships and relations
see what I have done.
I gathered all my fingers in one place.
They breathe a breath
that's deathly stale
since they tooled a song for me.
Guess mechanics never really set the pace.

REFRAIN

1977 video of Sun & Moon & Stars
Flash 8+ 23.9M

THE BEAST

To bring the beast back to life
you pull the stake from his heart.
He wakes up vicious and mean
waits for the killing to start.
Like a bird of prey
in leather and steel,
he sets a vigil to stalk
those who would make him a meal.

How many souls did you chain tonight,
to how many walls that hide the sky?
How many hopes were razed because of you?

He rides his metal and wheels
straight through the heart of the night.
Grinding his temper to hone
the sharpest blade he can find.
He cuts with merciless skill
the toughest feeling inside,
leaves it bare to the air
because there's no place to hide.

REFRAIN (How many...)

Survivors number a few,
but seldom do come around.
They wear the scars on their face
from doing battle in town.
You might suspect they would steal
to someplace where it's safe.
Instead they go see the beast
to throw some scrap in the cage.

NO TOMORROW

Crime don't pay well enough,
nor will he.
Time won't wait for anyone,
much less you and me.
Be brave little one, if you please.
Ride hard at your best speed
like there was no tomorrow.

The day will come along
away downstream
when you embrace another love
to share your dreams.
Glad to be good, again you are
fighting upstream.
Like you were meant to be,
like there was no tomorrow.

Crime don't pay well enough,
nor will he.
Time won't wait for anyone,
much less you and me.
Be brave, little one, come to see
that you were meant to be
like the ponies on the beach,
rocking playfully
like there was no tomorrow.

FRANKENSTEIN
(written by Gary Burgess)

I got stitches all over my body.
My feet are too big for my head.
I don't know why they put me here with the living,
I sure wish that I was dead.

My brain is always running and ticking.
My arms and legs tremble to my feet.
I try to walk straight and tall and narrow
it's just a stagger with a beat.

They call me Frankenstein.
That's not even my name
I don't know my name. ...Frankenstein...
I don't know who I am.
I don't know what I've done.

I told him, "Victor, you got to build me a woman
who will see me for myself"
It's so lonely living here without someone to love.
I gotta look out for myself

I seem to scare everyone in the village.
They said I killed someone's little girl.
I remember a child with flowers by the river.
Everything is such a blur.

I'm an innocent man.

I'VE HAD ENOUGH

I've had enough
of words amd games.
I don't think I know you,
I can't forget your name.
Your eyes are clear,
the way is strange.
The light's in the hallway
if you forget your way.

You were here to be only
what you wanted anyway.
You were sad to be sorry,
you were sorry everyday.
You were here to be loved,
but love's trickled away
from your eyes.

I tell myself
I'm least of all to blame.
For these words of my choosing,
for my rules that make the game.
But, my eyes are clear,
I can see the way is strange.
Through the dark of the hallway
that echoes back your name.

I was here to be only
what I wanted anyway.
I was sad to be sorry,
I was sorry everyday.
I was here to be loved,
but love's trickled away
from my eyes.

MIRROR, MIRROR

Mirror, mirror on the wall,
looking out as I look in,
can you see me at all?
Keep talking, I'll pretend.

Mirror, mirror on the wall,
I'm right here by your side.
My kingdom for a song,
my tears will pay the price.

I know it's so hard
for you to look at me.
You and me,
we'll laugh again.

As you believed in me,
mirror, mirror on the wall.
so you shall ever be,
fairest of them all.

JUST BECAUSE

This year at Christmas time
if you could hold my letter
you'd have my heart between your paws.

This year at Christmas time
no one will love you better,
It's just that way just because.

One year at Christmas time
took our childhood.
Things were changed from that day on.

That year at Christmas time
came down like Hell, little one.
Like the child, now it's gone.

This year at Christmas time
if you could hold my letter,
You'd find my heart right next to yours.

This year at Christmas time
no one will love you better.
It's just that way just because.

WOMAN OF THE PHOENIX

I've listened
to the words you lovers speak,
the sounds of the lovers' song.
And I've dreamed
all the dreams that the wayward son dreams
in a thousand places gone.
Dallas was my late night out
Ratcliff served to roust me out.
Houston lay like Clevelamd
with the color removed.

All I ever wanted
was to wander and to woo
a woman of the phoenix,
a welcome Waterloo.

I've seen the sun
blaze the breasts of the country side.
I've seen her huddled in a winter freeze.
And I've run 'cross paths of a thousand lives
among the cactus and white birch trees.

Avlock ran a waterfront bar,
Vito was the king of thieves,
and Michael was a rock and roll hood
from the Odessa plains.
All of them were my kind,
wild amd damned near free,
but a woman of the phoenix
is the medicine for me.

GIRL WHO NEVER SAW A MOUNTAIN

On that train,
almost December,
steel wheels
'round and 'round.
A twister and her big sister,
Chicago, Sierra bound.

The girl who never saw a mountain.

'Cross the plains
like a rangefire,
lakes like inland seas.
Freezing fields of powder
full moon flying through the trees.

Up the grade
snow starts falling,
dieseling far from town.
On your way into tomorrow
fondly you will recall...

TROUBLETOWN

I hear you're looking for me.
Seen you 'round this Troubletown.
Hear 'em racking nine ball
all night from my room upstairs.

I hear you're looking for me.
Trouble down in Troubletown.
Don't mean nothing to me
to loose from you that heavy roll of bills.

So if you're looking for me
come on down to Troubletown.
Between the creme and the unclean,
where it's shady, it's almost daylight, now.

The following songs are published
by Bug Music & Black Coffee Music
both administered by Bug Music:


The Beast ©1982 Vince Bell
(from the music by Bob Sturtevant)
Hard Road @1994 Vince Bell
Sun & Moon & Stars ©1977 Vince Bell
l've Had Enough ©1989 Vince Bell
Woman of the Phoenix ©l990 Vince Bell



The following songs are published
by TVB Publishing,
administered by Bug Music:


Troubletown ©l994 Vince Bell
Mirror, Mirror ©l994 Vince Bell
Girl Who Never Saw a Mountain ©1994 Vince Bell
Just Because ©l994 Vince Bell
No Tomorrow ©l994 Vince Bell
Frankenstein (by Gary Burgess)
©1994 Vince Bell

PRODUCED BY BOB NEUWIRTH
Watermelon Records, 1994

Musicians
Vince Bell - vocal, guitar
Geoff Muldaur - mandolin, banjo, guitars
Fritz Richmond - washtub bass
Bill Rich - bass
David Mansfield - violin
Mickey Raphael - harmonica
Stephen Bruton - guitars, mandolin
John Cale - piano
Jim Justice - violin
Paul Logan - bass
Victoria Williams - guest vocalist
Lyle Lovett - guest vocalist

Low Down Studio, San Francisco, CA
Engineer: Greg Freeman

Lovenotes Studio, New York, NY
Engineer: Johnny Byrne

The Hit Shack, Austin, TX
Engineer: Jay Hudson

Conway Studios, Los Angeles, CA
Engineer: Nathaniel Kunkel
Assistant Engineer: Gil Morales
Direction: Billy Williams

Mastered by Chris Bellman at Bernie
Grundman Mastering, Hollywood, CA

Static Control: J. Steven Soles

Recorded and mixed by Tom Doty at:
Hyde Street Studio, San Francisco, CA
Engineers: Tom Doty and Larry Schallit
Assistant Engineers: Mike Westbrook
                 and David Nottingham