I Am NPR Bumper Music
Half Happening
Huey Lewis Receptacle
Paint Peeling
Double AAs
Remove the Stars to Storage for Safekeeping
Killarney Rose
Huey Lewis in a Box
Will Shortz' Bitch
Next Best Letdown
Maspeth Haze
Do Not Resuscitate

I Am NPR Bumper Music

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Half Happening

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The great landmarks of this city are irredeemable dives full of crippled divorcés trying to reclaim their lives

Each night they show because they want to know what's happening
They crawl in here on their knees each night to see what's happening

They promote barstool theories with uninspired banter -- you field their small-talk queries and return thesaurus answers

But you want to see what's happening
You want to believe there's something happening; it's half happening

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Huey Lewis Receptacle

download .mp3 (3:39)
The jukebox is always on and I'm a Huey Lewis receptacle, lonely from alcohol and totally impressionable
I feel something -- maybe I should call it a night
But my friends say "say something" to you
Friends give you terrible advice

So I cornered you while you were dancing around the pinball machine
It's a sports blooper moment, it's reality TV
The jukebox is always on, it's always on in my mind and I hear Phil Collins -- I hear his voices in my head all the time and Phil says to me:

"You feel love, you think you say
And all the other ones fade away
You feel love, you think you say
But every single one of them fades away"

The TV is always on and it's a NASCAR kind of dive and I'm watching car crashes around me replayed over and over in slow time
I feel something -- maybe I should call you tonight
I want to say something and I hope to God it comes out right and God says to me -- God says to me:

"You feel love, you think you say
And all the other ones fade away
You feel love, you think you say
But every single one of them fades away"

But when is it alright to say I want you in my life? When is it OK to say what you need?
When is it alright to sacrifice?
When is it OK to say what you mean?

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Paint Peeling

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I suppose you could call it my bright idea
To walk all the way back home across the bridge; I take responsibility for it

But what a rare opportunity to discover up close
The sturdy engineering of the Queensboro; I take full responsibility for all of it

And I'll help you call in sick -- I promise I'll deliver -- if you hold my hand while I vomit in the East River

I suppose I'll be missing work again
And I miss my family and friends
And when we're both famous we can laugh
But tonight let's just focus on making it back home

Discover up close where we're structurally deficient because paint peeling makes a sound if you listen

And we missed last call at the bridge and tunnel club and if I were Paul Simon I would write a song about it but everything I sing feels like a cliché and now you're questioning your acting career

The city looks pretty but it's so far away from here

So we climb up to the platform to the elevated train and pass out waiting, let our dreams float away -- float away drunkenly out of reach
Near every plan that's up in the air

Dreams float of reach
Near every plan that's up in the air
And the city looks pretty
But it's so far away from here

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Double AAs

download .mp3 (2:42)
Saw you across the track
Making it down my way
Pawning off used Metrocards out by JFK

Saw you across the car, across the way
Begging for spare change on an A train into town

Look around and case the joint
Here's a case in point: you were selling candy bars on a crosstown L train

That is out of left field -- four for a dollar what a deal, you were hawking double As on the 4 train uptown

I recognized you
Telling tall tales and spreading terrible truths
And performing stupendous magic tricks all the way back downtown

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Remove the Stars to Storage for Safekeeping

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Hey, bartender, you have every right
To close early on a Tuesday night
Hey, bartender, that's your god-given right
To close this place tonight

But is there time to make a toast to unclaimed fortunes still around or at least fake a hope that we could retake this town?
Maybe we can remap the streets while the citizenry is sleeping -- we'll be careful to remove the stars over the city to storage for safekeeping

Bartender, how much cash did we blow through? I'm afraid to check and see
But I'm sure we did our duty single-handedly buttressing this flagging economy

They talk about "consumer confidence"
I'm confident we could consume everything hanging out 'til 4 a.m. doing shots and hardly sleeping -- they really removed the stars of this city to storage for safekeeping

They say you can go for months and never have to leave this town and they say life is back to normal, so then why are my celebrity sightings down?

They have some nerve to take entertainment away from me and you -- you know they've got to serve, they've got to do their part, because it can't mean the death of irony, too
You turn over and yell "please shut up, jackass, I was already sleeping"
But, sweetie, don't you see? They put the stars of this city in storage for safekeeping

But I'll tell you what -- I love it when you tell me to shut up -- I'll tell you what -- I missed that so much

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Killarney Rose

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Joe's chickenhawk chatter cuts through the corned beef miasma of the Killarney Rose
Listen to the clatter of the pastrami platter
Good thing Joe's just a ferry ride home

Joey reads things -- he's big on intrigue -- wild unsubstantiated geopolitical intrigue
Joey senses things -- we sense that he's suffering a bad, bad case of Al Qaeda fatigue

Probably 'cause of Joe we get kicked out of the Rose -- he goes on and on about stuff he can't control
He points out at the harbor in the night at the containers on the ships floating by and he says,
"I bet no one checked those ships' cargo"

He always says -- on nights like this he says,
"It takes just one dirty bomb and then we'll meet again at any bar owned by Sammy Hagar"

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Huey Lewis in a Box

download .mp3 (5:26)
When is it alright to say I want you in my life?
When is it OK to say what you need?
When is it alright to sacrifice?
When is it OK to say what you mean?

Your friends say you're insane
Mine call it suicide
But your friends and mine tend to give us fucked-up advice

The TV is always on when we sit around at home, but that said, there are lessons to be learned from each Behind the Music episode

Huey Lewis in a Box, Huey reaches out to me
And he says, "Son, score a hit on the right side of 30"

Just because you got laid off doesn't mean you don't love me
Even though inside you're thinking it might finally be time to leave
But when Tom Petty sings his songs, Tom Petty teaches me
And he says, "Son, you don't have to live like a refugee"

Or I could pack up the Dopp, get the fuck out of Dodge, and follow your U-Haul anywhere
I feel turned on -- but I could feel this lonely anywhere

And I'm not holding back, I swear I'm not holding back right now

You're in love, you think you say
As the city just fades away

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Will Shortz' Bitch

download .mp3 (4:23)
Killing time last night
Waiting in line to get my fix
The crowd as usual had nothing to say
Except for "I've done that" and "I think this"

But I liked the way I looked in the bathroom mirror because it captured my good side

And I stared at myself thinking just how smart it was to blow through all that cash trying to feel halfway high

The Sunday Times -- well, fuckin' A -- Magazine made me cry today
And I as usual had nothing to say holding my pen to the crossword page

What's a 21-letter phrase for a minor glitch?
Fuckin' A, the neighbors are at it again
You can just call me "Will Shortz' Bitch"

So I go down to the corner store
To get my weekly Quick Pick
Great things happen I am sure to those who deserve it

The clerk there who's always working recognizes me and I explain to him how I'm gonna win the lottery

"Yes, Boss," he says, "yes, please, yes my friend -- you look lucky to me"

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Next Best Letdown

download .mp3 (3:20)
If the bar runs out of glassware, trust that they'll pull out the plastic cups
And the moral vacuum established in here demands that you suck it up
But if I sound halfway interesting and act as if I care
It doesn't mean I'm so self-aware

I don't want your phone number right now but I do
If you expect this to fail well then I might not disappoint you
So brace yourself for how this might sound
You gotta steel yourself for the next best letdown

Good evening ladies and gentlemen
Can you help me out here tonight?
Because charity begins on this subway ride

Charity happens on snowy winter nights
Somewhere along the lines of It's a Wonderful Life

And I don't really want to call you again but I do
And I don't want to hang out with your friends but I do

Brace yourself because I'm coming downtown
Steel yourself for the next best letdown

So take down the kitchen calendar
Help me count the days in a year
I never remember an anniversary but we've got a doozy right here

If I take the length of our relationship and divide it by two
It just means that I'll take half my life to get over you

And I don't want to keep going over it in my mind but I do
And I don't want to think it was a total waste of time but I do
You lost faith and I shut down
We were always waiting for the next best letdown

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Maspeth Haze

download .mp3 (4:21)
Oh my god I wish I could have seen that boy's green face hanging out the window and speeding down the expressway
I didn't think at the time I was all that drunk
But when he vomited in the car I sure sobered up

We took his ass all the way back home
And made him wash off the window with his mother's garden hose and a big red moon set that night at half-past five
It slid right behind the Statue of Liberty; I saw it from the driver's side

You feel exuberant
We play along
You say you're losing it
But that's just bizarre

You are a saint for driving my ass home so late
On the way I watched dawn break
It broke over New England first and then it settled into the Maspeth haze

I watched dawn break -- it broke all over the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway
Do you remember those tanks with the red and white checks that you used to see so much?
Well until recently they were the biggest things that I had ever seen get blown up

We either exuberant
Or just plain wrong
Automatically stupid
Or intentionally flawed
But you know as soon as I get home I'm waking up

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Do Not Resuscitate

download .mp3 (5:26)
The terminal we picked for a last supper in looks like a remnant from a movie set
Maybe Stanley Kubrick's 2001 -- a Pan-American irrelevance
And the girls and guys who are waiting here to fly all have tattoos on their chests
They invested cash, their hard-earned pay, for permanent disclaimers that state "Do Not Resuscitate"

There's a soundtrack on with 60s songs pre-selected and Simon and Garfunkel's "America" is resurrected!
It somehow slipped past security undetected
And as the pent-up feeling in my heart turns electric, you shrug and smile and say, "Do not resuscitate"

(Play games with the faces)
You say that the man in the gabardine suit is a spy -- and he clearly is a spy!
And his bow tie is really a camera
So I hand over another twenty -- let's do shots to blow off steam
And by the way, can I have your dictionary when you leave?

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