So this weekend, my lovely wife Tanya shot a few awesome videos of me doing a few of my favorite tunes in front of our sparkly fireplace. Hope you enjoy them!

We’re bound to do more of this sort of thing, so if you’d like to keep up, please subscribe to my new YouTube account, JohnVoorheesSings.

This song was originally released in 1996 on The Swing. Whenever I play it, I introduce it thusly:

“This is a song about someone who can’t find anything in life to be good at, so he learns to be good at being bad at things.”

That sums it up pretty well.

I was once the sorest of sore losers
Faced defeat with anger and with shame
Then one day I woke to my good senses
Thankfully I’ve never been the same
I’ve learned to smile with wild abandon
When I shake the consolation hand
I can say “Good game!” with heartfelt pleasure
As if losing was the very thing I’d planned

I’m the king of all good sports
It’s a victory of sorts to say that
I’m a magnificent loser
And I can take embarrassment with glee
I’m a magnificent loser
And now everybody wants to play with me
Play with me
Everybody wants to play with me

Before I came to my conversion
Life was never like I thought it should
Couldn’t bear the smallest of small failures
And on top of that, I wasn’t very good
Now that I’ve learned to be a loser
I have no fear of better men
I can look the victor in the eyeball
And ask him ” Do you want to play again?”

I’m the king of all good sports
It’s a victory of sorts to say that
I’m a magnificent loser
And no one has more grace in their defeat
I’m a magnificent loser
I guess I’ve got a knack for getting beat
Getting beat
I guess I’ve got a knack for getting beat

If he makes you happier, of course you have to go
On that point I know we both agree
I can think of nothing that would bring a warmer glow
Than to think of you as happier than me
Happier than me

So when life brings its disappointments
No one will know I feel a thing
I’ll just keep laughing like a madman
I’ll throw my shoulders back and then I’ll sing

I’m the king of all good sports
It’s a victory of sorts to say that
I’m a magnificent loser
And I can take embarrassment with glee
I’m a magnificent loser
And now everybody wants to play with me
A magnificent loser
And I can take my downfalls with a grin
I’m a magnificent loster
And I don’t know what I’d do if I should win
I won’t win
But I don’t know what I’d do
I don’t know what I’d do if I should win

April Snow originally appeared on Asking For Trouble (2000), and it’s a pretty straightforward description of my mindset as a Vermont winter stretched on and on. But you don’t have to live in a cold climate to appreciate the sentiment at work here. It’s a song about anything you desperately want, and you know it’s coming, probably pretty soon, but it’s still not here and it hasn’t been here for a long time. It’s an unanswered prayer for patience.

Peeking through the blinds again
Another Monday morning dressed in white and gray
It’s preying on my mind again
It’s not supposed to still be this way
But the time is coming ’round again
When green grass is gonna push on through
And it should’ve happened weeks ago now
But who am I to tell this planet what to do?

We are born again in Springtime
Mother Nature rolls the stone away
But not today
And I can hear you say
“Oh no! Not another April snow!”

So I put on my boots again
And I’m headed out the door
There’s not enough snow to shovel this morning
There’s just enough to make me wonder what it’s here for
Is it a reminder to the world
To take things as they fall?
Will we all love the spring so much better now
Or maybe there’s just no good reason at all
No, not at all

I have reveled in the winter
I was making snow angels on the lawn
And now, I’m just waiting for it all to go
We are born again in Springtime
Mother Nature rolls the stone away
But not today
And I can hear you say
“Oh no! Not another April snow!”
An April snow

And who can you complain to
Except your passing friends and say
“Looks like another winner of a day, huh, Jane?”
And “When d’ya think this mother of ‘em all is gonna end?”
Cuz the time is coming ’round again
When green grass is gonna push on through
And it should’ve happened weeks ago now
But who am I to tell this planet what to do?

I have reveled in the winter
I was making snow angels on the lawn
And now, I’m just waiting for it all to go
We are born again in Springtime
Mother Nature rolls the stone away
But not today
And I can hear you say
“Oh no! Not another April snow!”
And you can hear me say
“Not another April snow!”
And it won’t let go

This is the first track on the “Walls” segment of Windows and Walls (1994) and boy, is it ever a shutdown. There’s the potential for a real relationship here, but our narrator will not let himself get dragged in. After all, he has to pick up the dry cleaning or something, right? Gee, look at the time.

I am not trying to avoid you
But I know it looks that way
I am not trying to cut off
What you’re trying to say
Don’t get discouraged, we’ll talk on another day
Okay?
It’s just that the rain is coming down
The rain is coming down
And I wanna go inside where it’s warm and dry

I don’t disparage you motives
I know your heart is good
You’ll make it out of the woods real soon
Knock on wood
Am I not paying attention as well as I could?
I should
It’s just that the pain is coming down
The pain is coming down
I can barely stand up when I feel you cry

I feel the pull of the life I have built
Out of comfort and cowardice, stiffness and guilt
And it stops me from staying too long

Your situation is bad
And I’m glad you reached out to me
Previous plans just prevent me
From being the key
Maybe you’ll find someone else
Who can set your soul free
We’ll see
But I feel my world is coming down
World is coming down
And it keeps me from making heartfelt try

Cuz I don’t believe in the future or past
Like a normal man
I just keep stretching the present
As far as I can
And when you say yesterday
Might as well be The Sudan
(Or Japan or Iran)
And I feel the time is coming down
Time is coming down
And tomorrow’s a good way to say goodbye

And I feel the pull of the life I have built
Out of comfort and cowardice, stiffness and guilt
And it stops me from staying too long
And it stops me from staying too long

This is not just an excuse
But I know it will sound that way
It’s hard enough for me to fight my way back
Through the gray
Don’t get discouraged, we’ll talk on another day
Okay?
It’s just that the rain is coming down
The rain is coming down
And I wanna go inside where it’s warm and dry

This Windows and Walls (1994) track sounds eerily like a leftover from Jim Croce. The narrator is hoping against hope that his lover might change her mind. After all, she hasn’t left yet, has she? He might be right, who knows? The song only lasts so long, but the story continues somewhere.

If you feel that you must go
Then how can I slow you down?
If the answer must be no
How can I make you come around?
Even though you’re sitting with me
It’s like you’re already gone
You’re on the highway zipping through Dallas
And the words I say too far away
If you feel that you must go
Then I’m just wasting both our times
I didn’t really want to know
But now I know there’s no denying
I might as well just kiss you goodbye
And wish you good luck and so and so
And you might as well get on the road
If you must go

If there’s nothing to decide
Then what am I supposed to do?
Yes it’s true, you never lied
That’s what I love so much about you
But I wish I had another chance
Before you start your life again
And if you don’t want to hear this
Then why’s your car still in our yard?
If there’s nothing to decide
Why should I even state my case?
All I can say is that I tried
And if I failed there’s no disgrace
I might as well just kiss you goodbye
And wish you good luck and so and so
And you might as well get on the road
If you must go

If you really go tonight
I hope you don’t forget my name
I hope you call, I hope you write
I know you won’t, cuz you’re still the same
I might as well just kiss you goodbye
And wish you good luck and so and so
And you might as well get on the road
If you must go

This song originally appeared on Windows and Walls (1994). The idea of being taken aback and powerfully moved by the sight of someone you will never meet or speak to is not an original one. In particular, I tend to think of a moment in Citizen Kane when Everett Sloane talks about a woman carrying a white parasol that he saw on a distant ferry. That’s definitely the sentiment I’m trying to capture here.

Saw her by the riverside
Looking like a blushing bride and glowing
Eyes as clear as mid-July
Lips still damp from a kiss goodbye, glowing
She was a lover who was never mine
But I can’t forget the way she shined
Moon and the stars and the sun combined
She was glowing, she was glowing

Walking by the riverside
As though created by the tide, glowing
Dressed in document and song
Smile surpassing right and wrong, glowing
Other thoughts were banished by the curve of her hand
And the perfect footprints in the dampened sand
There was nothing left to contemplate or to understand
She was glowing, she was glowing

And when I left the riverside
My heart she still occupied, glowing
She told her life in serenade
With every movement that she made, glowingShe was a lover who was never mine
But I can’t forget the way she shined
Moon and the stars and the sun combined
She was glowing, she was glowing

We jump ahead to 1996 and this energetic track from The Swing. Mel Torme swears that he wrote his Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting On An Open Fire) in the middle of summer, but I couldn’t muster that level of imagination here. Rain Dance was definitely written after a 3-week drought in Vermont (1995, I think). There’s something deeply wrong when the Green Mountains are starting to turn brown, and there really was an excitement in the air as the storm clouds gathered. I didn’t see anyone actually dancing on the lawn, but you know those New Englanders. They’re so stoic.

Oh, and the line about how the sound of thunder is “better than a mandolin” is a reference to Bruce Hornsby’s beautiful song, Mandolin Rain. Hornsby, of course, is also responsible for the song Heartbreak Town, which plays over the opening credits of the awesome animated film, Twice Upon A Time. Viva Ralph the All-Purpose Animal.

Better get the children inside
Better close the windows tight
They’re saying on the radio
There’s gonna be a thunderstorm tonight

It’s been too dry too long now
The grass has all turned brown
See that cumulonimbus forming
Gonna wash some life into this town

You can almost hear the garden saying ‘Thank you’
You can almost feel relief beneath the ground
Hear the rock’n'roll men hummin’
That the thunderstorm is comin’
I been so dry, I wish that I could drown
Wish that I could drown

Everybody’s made of water
Everybody smells the rain
Listen for the sound of thunder
Make us feel like animals again

Better than the sweetest music
Better than a mandolin
Better get the big umbrella
Look at all the goosebumps on my skin

You can almost see the flowers doing warmups
You can almost see the trees stretch out their limbs
Doesn’t matter what you’re doin’
You know the storm is brewin’
You can feel it in the whistle of the wind
Whistle of the wind

You say you wanna go outside
Say you wanna take a ride
Well be advised the skies are looking gray
You don’t wanna be exposed
When this kind of weather shows
But I might just go dancing on the lawn today

Are you ready for the rain now?
Are you ready for the rain now?

Better get the children inside
Better close the windows tight
They’re saying on the radio
They’re gonna wash the gullies out tonight
There’s gonna be a storm

And you can almost hear the garden saying ‘Thank you’
You can almost feel relief beneath the ground
Doesn’t matter what you’re doin’
You know the storm is brewin’
I been so dry, I wish that I could drown

So bring it down now

This track was originally part of Picture Perfect Fool (1992), and it’s the dark reflection of On The Street Where You Live from My Fair Lady. Instead of being exhilarated by proximity to his true love’s house, our narrator is walking that street long after the fire has died. He is overwhelmed by memories, theories, and old resentment and is finally lucky enough to be able to put it all behind him at the end. How romantic.

On another day, for another reason
I walked our street all alone
At a different time, with a different outlook
Your image was held aloft by questions
Why are you like you are?
How did we make it that far?
And my mind burned like a star on another day

On another road I set my soul to wanderin’
Fighting the impulse to head for home
I see through different eyes, it’s like a new dimension
Here are the phantoms I’d forsaken
I was blind to pretend
We would never meet again
Or that we’d meet as friends on another day

Slowly orbiting the jetsam
I try in vain to picture the whole
It’s hard to miss what you can hardly imagine
But I feel a vacancy deep in my soul

On another day I dusted off the history
Turned pages past all reckoning
Took another breath, smiled another heartache
Let memory wash over my solitude
Waves on an unfocused shore
‘Til I could reflect no more
And I softly shut the door on another day

So stay tuned, cuz here come the tunes! And please feel free to listen to all the other cool stuff up at my Bandcamp site.

If you want to make sure you find out about shows in your area, you can keep up with my Facebook page or Twitter or drop me a line and I’ll put you on the email list. I WILL be doing this again soon!