Music

They Want Me Here

bass guitar - john abbey
vocal and guitar - robbie fulks
ukulele - robbie gjersoe
accordion - john williams

When I write barroom songs I'm usually picturing a place like Lee's Liquor Lounge or Marie's Riptide: an old man's bar. In fact I think there are two kinds of bars -- old man bars, and old man bars thinly disguised as something more upbeat. Though country rounder songs are full of drunks swimming in harsh self-examination, I find that in life they are a little like office-workers or political radicals, smothering doubt and downheartedness with compulsory team spirit.

Lyrics

Oh the daylight goes out
The big door swings shut
And a long-ago song starts to play
And the cares and the crimes
Of this weary old world
Go easefully drifting away

There’s a spot near the tap that they’ve held me
And they smile as they see me appear
And it’s not for the charm
Nor the coins in my palms
They want me here
They want me here

Let a man scale the stars
And his story’s his own
But a sad man is always the same
From his youthful height hurled
Now he’s lost to the world
And they won’t have him back where he came

I’ve offered my life for a country
A woman, a child, a career
And for all that I gave
Just a push to the grave
They want me here
They want me here

Old John’s in his cups
And his thoughts turn to her
Who left him in ‘75
It’s a tale we know well
And it weaves a warm spell
And he tells it as though she’s alive

Jimmy’s home too is wrecked
But he swears it’s his luck
To be rid of that bitch and her boys
And the bartender smiles
As he wipes clean the glass
And he turns his tired face from the noise

All the bright-eyed ambitions among us
Lie still ‘neath the press of the years
Them that’s left me I’ll use
In the company I choose
Oh, they want me here
They want me here

Well the daylight goes out
Now the sun has sunk low
And the dreams of the children entwine
With the howl of the jets
And the shouts from the bar
And the songs of a happier time

So here’s to the friends gone before us
And here’s to a few close and dear
They’re the finest I know
And they won’t let me go
Oh, they want me here
They want me here

Guitar Chords/Tab

Guitar chords/tab are not available for this song