Loser's Rodeo is currently number 2 on Norwegian Country Radio.

I wrote Loser's Rodeo with my friend Rick Paul. Check out Rick's new Christmas CD at Rhapsody or Napster.

I don't have any songs that start with X or Z so we're going to finish our trip through the alphabet with Your Turn to Fall. I co-wrote it with Ronnie Jeffrey. Listen the the MP3 by clicking here.

Since this is the last installment of the series, let's get into some detail about this one.

The central line in the song is "Your face is familiar, But I can't recall your name girl." This line came from a button my sister gave me back in the day that said "The face is familiar, but I can't recall my name," which was fun to wear to the wild parties of my misspent youth. Every other line in the song is built on that line and that idea. The "All my friends have become strangers" line is, of course, borrowed from the title of the excellent Larry McMurtry book.

By the time we wrote this song, Ronnie and I had pretty much decided to write mostly blues and blues rock- we both love the blues, but it's easier to get songs on records if they are country. Once we stopped trying to write to get recorded, we started doing some really good stuff.

As with many writers, it is not uncommon for several of my songs to be different perspectives on the same person or event. Even though they are completely different songs, this one and Beer Buzz are about the same girl. In fact, in some strange way, I am really telling the same story twice.

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We're on the homestretch with only W and Y to go (I have no songs that start with X or Z).

I'm going to do a two-fer for the W's.

The first one is When You're Sitting at the Bar. I co-wrote it with Ronnie Jeffrry. Listen the the MP3 by clicking here.

The idea for this song came to me as I drove to work one morning, in the form of the first four lines of the chorus. Then came the first verse, which lead to the related truck driver reference in the second half of the chorus. But my favorite part of the song is the bridge, which was written last. Ronnie's music is powerful, with a country/funky vibe that we have tried to duplicate, but never with the same success. This song has been recorded by Angela Peterson. Of all of the songs I have ever written or co-written, this the one that I believe ought to be a huge hit for someone.

The second one is Watson Lake. Listen the the MP3 by clicking here.

Watson Lake is part of my "Watson Trilogy," which also includes Watson Opportunity and Old Bill Watson. This song grew out of a very old song of mine called Gordon Avenue- I rewrote it in as a Call of the Wild sort of thing and moved it from Virginia (where Gordon Avenue was) to Canada. I've actually never been to Watson Lake, but I liked the name for obvious reasons. I also wrote two different melodies for this one- a slower, sadder one that I later abandoned in favor of this mid-tempo version.

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I don't have a single song that begins with U so on to the one song I have that begins with V.

This week's song is Virgil and the Beancat. I co-wrote it with Rick Paul. Listen the the MP3 by clicking here.

This is a song about our old and beloved pets, Virgil (the dog) and Beanie (the cat). One time at our old house, Beanie, who was a totally inside cat and must have already been 15 or so by that time, darted out the back door and ran straight into the swimming pool. She swam to the steps and ran even faster back into the house. The entire ordeal lasted about 15 seconds.

Around the same time, Beanie would walk around the house meowing for no apparent reason and Virgil ran away for a few hours to parts unknown.

This song was the result.

The word she wants to say is, of course, meow. The reference to his having been there once or twice refers to the time he ran away. When I first saw Beanie at the pound, she was with another cat, her brother. By the time I went back to adopt her, her brother had already been adopted. I always wished I'd adopted him too so they could stay together. Thus, the brother line.

It's sort of a goofy song, but because I miss Virgil and Beanie so much, it has a special place in my heart.

Lots of music topics and a podcast at Newsome.Org.

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This week's song is The Leaving Kind. I co-wrote it with Frank Calvagna. The demo quality is not great, but the music and Frank's vocals are wonderful. Frank and I have co-written 5-6 songs and he never fails to take what I come up with and make it a lot better.

Like a lot of songwriters much of my early stuff involved the downward spiral of self-destruction and loss. In fact, my love for alternative country music probably has something to do with my appreciation and understanding of that theme.

Click here to hear the MP3.

This week's song is easy. Straight into Goodbye, another one I co-wrote with Ronnie Jeffrey, is one of the rockingest (perhaps I just created a word) songs I have ever done. Click here to hear the MP3.

The first two lines of the Chorus came to me first. The the first verse followed almost immediately. As with most of my songs that turn out good, it was written pretty quickly.

I think Ronnie's vocals on this demo absolutely rock.

This one has been recorded by Angela Peterson, but for some unexplainable reason the CD is no longer available on her web site.

This week's song is Raccoons and Foxes. You can hear the MP3 by clicking here.

This is one that I co-wrote with Ronnie Jeffrey shortly after my mom's death in 1998. In fact, I wrote the words at my mom's empty house a couple of days after her funeral. I wrote both the words and music to My Mother's House that same week.

I'll do this one verse by verse.

Verse 1
We lived on top of Nock's Hill. Down the hill was a creek where we used to catch crawfish. We called it Nock's Creek, but its actual name is Thompson's Creek. My dad died in 1968, the year after my sister graduated from high school.

Verse 2
When I wrote this song, mom's house was packed up and the movers were scheduled to come later that week to move mom's stuff out. Mom had this great back porch. There were woods all around the back of her house and she'd put dog food and scraps out for the animals every night. She put the food right beside the back door and raccoons and foxes (and lots of possums) would come and eat. It was really neat.

Chorus
Chatham Hill is the cemetary where my mom and dad are buried. There are some photos of the headstones on my Flickr page.

Verse 3
While I was staying at the house after the funeral, I put the feed out every night. It made me sad to think about how much mom loved those animals and how they would miss being fed every night. Late at night, you could sit very still in a chair and watch the animals. If you stood up or moved at all, the animals, especially the very nervous foxes, would run away.

Verse 4
The raccoons (metaphor for the "bandits" that steal what you love) and foxes (metaphor for the things you love) line is leading up to the Bridge, which is the central and most important part of the song.

I talk more about music, particularly music by other people, at Newsome.Org.

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This week's song is Queen of the Blue Ridge (1979). You can hear the MP3 by clicking here.

It's a southern rock song I wrote with Ronnie Jeffrey. It's more or less a true story about a girl I met in Boone, NC while in college (while we went to Blowing Rock, we didn't actually meet there). After that winter, I saw her a few times at the beach where we both worked during the summer, but we never really hung out again.

The first line in the bridge is a tribute to the old Ralph Stanley bluegrass classic. This girl went to Appalachian State, whose sports teams are called the Mountaineers.

If you're into music, there's a lot more music related content at Newsome.Org.

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