Jim Carroll’s Lyrics for Boz Scaggs

Other Roads

Sony/Columbia, 1988

LYRICS INDEX

° What’s Number One
° I Don’t Hear You
° Crimes of Passion

What’s Number One

Words by Jim Carroll and Boz Scaggs
Music by Marcus Miller

Those were high times back in Delhi
I was left for dead
Everybody beat it to L.A.
So the papers read
But I said, “No, this is not where I get dropped off
Keep the dough I’m here to blow the top off it” Sixty-eight back in Chicago
Watched my friends all fall
Now they’re waiting down in old Key Largo
For their man to call
All laid back
Sitting in the redwood sauna
Hanging slack
Like some dazed iguana I’d choose the bruised up moon
Over the sun
I’d lose
I guess I’m confused
What’s number one
What’s number one? I’m a fine one to be talking
Dig the mastermind
You see even if you hold the key
The door’s locked from behind but I left
I was playing out a lone part
I was deaf To whispers of my own heart I’d choose the bruised up moon
Over the sun
I’d lose
I guess I’m confused
What’s number one
What’s number one? Like a miner seeks that main gold vein
I’ll search on cutting through against the grain
Keeps me sane I’d choose the bruised up moon
Over the sun
I’d lose
I guess I’m confused
What’s number one
What’s number one?

© 1988 Presidio Music (ASCAP)/MCA Music Publishing, A Division of MCA Inc. and
Sunset Burgundy Inc. (Rights of Sunset Burgundy Inc. administered by MCA Music Publish, A
Division of MCA Inc.)/Dr. Benway Music (ASCAP)

I Don’t Hear You

Words by Jim Carroll
Music by Dann Huff and David Huff

The blue light flashes
Billy feels its motion
He says, “Should I go and set it free?”
Black-eyed Suzie
Picks up on the notion
She says, “Put it in the lonely tree”
He says, “Baby, we best sharpen our imagination.”
He says, “It seems like the rest
don’t comprehend the situation.” I don’t hear you
All the words that come and go
Don’t say what I’m after
I don’t hear you
Scream it through a microphone
Whisper in a deadly tone…
Don’t hear you not you Jane’s a dancer
In quiet desperation
She says: “What I give I give for free”
Her twin sister
Feels the same sensation
But says, “You must buy it all from me…”
She says, “oh, I feel best
When the rest is all uncertain.”
She says, “Thoughts in my breast
Just hang there like a burning curtain” I don’t hear you
You don’t matter, you don’t care
I don’t call that living
I don’t hear you
What you say don’t reach inside
It is like you’re gagged and tied
I don’t hear you He said, “Go with the flow
Though the currents can bring danger”
“You didn’t know
You were dancing with a desperate stranger” I don’t hear you
I’ve been dealing With deaf ears
I don’t need no laughter
I don’t hear you
It ain’t hard to analyze
I know what you’re really after
I can’t hear you

Crimes of Passion

Words by Jim Carroll
Music by Dann Huff

She’s an all-night all-night rental
She’s a rental Oriental
Suki-Lee…
Oh, her eyes, yes her eyes…
You better pass her by
Suki-Lee… Each night she crosses
Different borders
Each night she’s someone’s
Refugee Crimes of passion
You’ll pay the price
If you do it once
Why not do it twice? She only works while the
Parrot’s squawking
In the light of the TV talking
Suki-Lee…
She undresses in the light of the TV
In the light of the TV squawking
Suki-Lee…
She hears the preachers quoting from
Solomon’s psalms
She hears the news of
Terrorist bombs
Crimes of passion You’ll pay yes
you’ll pay the price
If you do it once
Go on do it twice? Cracks in the mirror
Bombs in the moonlight
Those whims of vice
Just how much terror
Can one kiss entice? Crimes of passion
You will pay the price
If you do it once
Why not do it twice? Crimes of passion
Such whims of vice
Just how much terror
Can one kiss entice?
Crimes of passion