Song of the Week, June 26, 2006 - Home

[PotatoPicker]

Folks - lets kick off the Song of the Week threads with one of my all-time favorites - Home. take a look, take a lsiten, tell us what you like or hate or remember or anythign else that makes this song resonate with you.

Home
from the album American Jukebox Fables

That night the walls were speaking
the pipes inside them, creaking,
told the secret that was rising in the halls
And you lay beside me sleeping
with the dreams that you were keeping
the smoke was in the stairwell outside the wall

We had moved in just November
the first night, remember,
we lit a candle
laid a mattress on the floor
and we toasted to our savings,
to adulthood,
to behaving,
to this house with drafty windows
creaking doors

(chorus)
Home
is the woman across the table
Home
is dreaming in my sheets
Home
Home
This house is just an address
You're my home

So we stood like statues staring
while the sirens came in blaring
the Johnsons brought us coffee
for the cold
And somewhere I heard some singing
it was my radio alarm clock ringing
with a wakeup call singing to my soul
(chorus)

I can't believe I'm thanking Jesus
as I watch my roof come down
but I can put back all the pieces
as long as you're around
(chorus)

Copyright Ellis Paul Publishing SESAC

This is one of my 3 or 4 favorite Ellis songs, and has been since the first time I heard him sing it, along with the story of writing the song for his wife as a wedding present. I thought I’d write her a song as a wedding present – but I write songs for a living so that didn’t seem like much of a present. So I decided to write her a song on the piano to make it special…. I’m not very good at it, so I only used the white keys.” It was a great story, but it also drove home the point that this song has nothing to do with the house they shared.

I can recall stories he had shared in years past about the drafty old house he lived in in Maine, and how much he loved (and in some ways, did not love) it….. The beginning of the song evokes such feelings of optimism about the house, and about moving forward. I remember all too well the hundreed year old apartment building which was the first home I ever bought, and those similar feelings.

I think the words of the bridge are especially strong, and are the best part of the song. “I can’t believe I'm thanking Jesus as I watch my roof come down, but I can put back all the pieces as long as you're around .” It might have been simpler – and infinitely more boring and trite – to tell his wife how much he loved her directly. The additional perspective he gives in the bridge makes the point in a much stronger way.

And Ellis, glad we could bring the coffee

[bonuela]

"This house is just an address you're my home"

That line gives me chills everytime I hear it. Even now, just reading it. The idea that a partner can be your home is a beautiful, romantic concept. It reminds me of a Duncan Sheik song that I love. The title escapes me right now, but the theme is the same.

[PeteM]

This song is one of those that brings me back to a proper perspective on things......it's not about the possessions you gather but the people at your side along the way. I tend to get lost in the day to day, so this song is a gentle reminder of the bigger picture.

[Sue Ellen]

Jeff, I am sooo glad you FINALLY did this song. I knew you would have great insights.

I too love this song, it is so tender and warm and beautiful. But, in the end I am quite the cynic, so I look at this song like I look at Lothlorian: a beautiful and wonderous fairy tale. A nice fantasy, but not a real thing.

Sue Ellen

[paddyinthepub]

okay, I'll jump in here to say that it's maybe one I don't know all that well. I've seen others posting lately mentioning the song title HOME and I was scratching my head as to why the song title rang no bells fro me. I believe Ellis did the song on piano at MidTown Scholar for us last February. I'll have to go back and give it a good listen now. Wait, is this song on a CD? If it is, maybe I've skipped over it one too many times.

My observations therefore are from a novice on the song and comments are mostly about lyrics as I read them here and now.


Home
from the album American Jukebox Fables

That night the walls were speaking
the pipes inside them, creaking,
told the secret that was rising in the halls
And you lay beside me sleeping
with the dreams that you were keeping
the smoke was in the stairwell outside the wall

first verse, house has a life, walls are speaking, pipes
are creaking, telling Ellis a secret, possibly saving his/their life.
Also, the fire has a life, in the way the film BACKDRAFT gave fire life.
She is sleeping next to him, dreaming of a shared life with him. But she's keeping them to herself, maybe. She longs for more time together. He travels alot. She's kind enough to say go, do what you must. But in her dreams, that she keeps to herself, they have a more normal home life.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -


(2nd verse)

We had moved in just November
the first night, remember,
we lit a candle
laid a mattress on the floor
and we toasted to our savings,
to adulthood,
to behaving,
to this house with drafty windows
creaking doors

Life is so fleeting, just yesterday it seems we were moving
into this place. Many things on fire here....The house, the love
between the two, the candle, the memories. It was safe fire. The candle next to the mattress on the first night, bit of a telling you to be careful.
You're liable to start a fire. The "toasting" to growing up, making it, to moving on from youth to a place that feels like home. Toasting the quite old house, drafty( again BACKDRAFT comes to mind) and creaking doors.
Ever had had buyer's remorse? It happens to most, I think. But you get over it and grow to accept the things it doesn't have. Ok, so it's a little drafty, we'll weatherstrip 'em. It's noisy, we'll fix that too. We need each other, not a Home that is perfect. Ellis raises a glass wisely here.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Here at the chorus I am reminded of the importance of HOME. In a
''There's no place like HOME'' kind of way. I think since Ellis has travelled
so exstensively over the years, HOME has meaning. You feel it here.
THe line about the address, well, watch any account of storm victims or natural disaster in this country where people are interviewed. They have just lost their home, their stuff, their history. And what do they have to say? We can rebuild. The important stuff is my family, and Thank God, they are still alive and safe and well. Ellis gets it, the chorus nails it.


(chorus)
Home
is the woman across the table
Home
is dreaming in my sheets
Home
Home
This house is just an address
You're my home
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Were in shock, motionless. Helpless.
Ah, but community! neighbors with coffee, the fire dept.
It's a wake up call alright to what is important in life.

The radio interrupts his slumber and dreaming. It is time to wake up!!!
Smell the coffee!!! She is what is important!!!

Ellis has you wondering if this really happened to his house or did he dream it. In that way it works for others too, I think. Kind of a take stock
of what is and is not important to you.


So we stood like statues staring
while the sirens came in blaring
the Johnsons brought us coffee
for the cold
And somewhere I heard some singing
it was my radio alarm clock ringing
with a wakeup call singing to my soul
(chorus)

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -


Amazing how religious one gets when faced with such events.
Were gonna make it just fine, honey.



I can't believe I'm thanking Jesus
as I watch my roof come down
but I can put back all the pieces
as long as you're around
(chorus)



Ok, I like the song, too.

[wendy]

Can't add too much to what's already been posted except what Ellis himself has had to say: That house (the old one in Edgecomb) was the first home he'd owned and, despite it's faults, was well-loved. When they had to move away, he needed to find a way to separate himself from the house, so he "burned it down" in the song.
(He tells this story much better than I did.)

[PotatoPicker]

Jeff, I am sooo glad you FINALLY did this song. I knew you would have great insights.

I too love this song, it is so tender and warm and beautiful. But, in the end I am quite the cynic, so I look at this song like I look at Lothlorian: a beautiful and wonderous fairy tale. A nice fantasy, but not a real thing.

Sue Ellen

Sue Ellen - maybe I choose to live in a fairy tale world but I believe in all of this.... And I truly believe that anyone who wants to believe in it can, and if you believe in it then that is the way the world will look to you.

One of my all-time favorite songs is Harry Chapin's "There Only Was One Choice", and it contains the following lines which I love:

With every new day's dawning my kid climbs in my bed
And tells the cynics of the board room your language is dead

It's a matter of perspective I guess, but I just don't believe the langauge of the cynics anymore. My choice, and your mileage may differ, but I hope you can find what you choose, and choose what you want....

[KarenZ]

I read somewhere that an ephiphany is "a sudden realization of a significant truth, usually arising out of a commonplace event". Seeing his house burn down has prompted this guy to have an epiphany....a spiritual awakening. When it happens, everything falls into place....a life meaning becomes clear....there's a discovery of something you value or believe in. A spiritual awakening often gives new meaning to our lives...and new hope for the future. In this instance, having lived through seeing his house in ashes, he realizes that having the person he loves in his life means more to him than the material things that they shared. With his awakening, what was lost is recovered...and he gains much more in return. Life takes on new meaning.

A beautiful beautiful song.

KarenZ

[paddyinthepub]

I have said it before - out on the old forum - and I'll say it again here today. I miss Spaulding Gray.

I bring this up here and now to plug one of his monolouges I have on CD. Maybe not plug, but you know what I mean. It's just Spaulding being Spaulding as he relays the story of trying to find the ''perfect thirty thousand dollar house''. He thinks it would be great to have a place up in the Catskill Mts. in order to free his mind to write.

It does not go well. Which is/was the comedic genius of Spaulding Gray.
If you ever get the chance to listen to this, it runs about 75 min. and is best heard nonstop from start to finish. It's a hoot. His pieces play like a movie for me.