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#52- The Road That's Free (1984)
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Wild 1880's snake oil salesman talks about his adventures. An allegory for the unrestrained free market.
folk funny political sixties novelty gentle prolific idiosyncratic lehrer jefferson airplane ochs paxton steve goodman
Artist picture
Tom Paxton meets Jefferson Airplane. Extremely prolific singer songwriter with a wide range of styles from bizarre novelty tunes and surrealistic poetic songs t
With more than 300 songs and counting and for more than 30 years, I have written in a variety of acoustic styles from novelty tunes to love songs to historical ballads to poetic surrealistic songs to retro-acoustic pop. From bizarre to traditional from funny to poignant, whatever style the song is in, the melodies are usually memorable and the lyrics unpredictable. This site will eventually contain rough often first take demos of my entire song catalogue. Many of the earliest songs when I first started writing will of course be shaky. So expect the songs to get better as time goes on. Feel free to come back and browse often as I will constantly be adding songs, one by one in chronological order, starting in 1974. If you are looking for some unusual songs to cover from a little known but unique artist, you have come to the right place. Just e-mail me. If you find a song here that intrigues you, but you don't like a line or two, or you think it needs a bridge, drop me an e-mail and maybe you can earn writer's credit if it gets that song to be recorded or performed.... otherwise just enjoy. You can become a Rob Lincoln fan at no cost to you. I promise that if you keep coming back there will be some real surprises along the way. While mostly acoustic, some original material will veer into folk rock and even 60's pop, but the garage rock and loudest material will also be found in full band arrangement at soundclick.com/abrasiveflowers Eventually some of these 300+ tunes may be rerecorded and make it on to CD, including a novelty CD that would be suitable for Dr. Demento or an historical ballad CD or a political song CD--but until then, this is the only site you can hear most of these songs. (A few of my songs CAN be found on songramp.com/RobLincoln and myspace.com/lessickandlincoln)
Song Info
Charts
Peak #661
Peak in subgenre #89
Author
Rob Lincoln
Rights
1984
Uploaded
May 06, 2007
Track Files
MP3
MP3 3.5 MB 128 kbps 3:48
Story behind the song
I always have fun with this strange tune. It kind of takes place in an alternate universe out west circa 1870-1880. I have a couple tunes coming up with that peculiar setting. This one, however, is also another allegorical story, not so subtly poking fun at free market capitalism gone amuck. This fine entrepreneur sometimes need to sell his snake oil to feed his chimpanzee. Mp3 Club listeners have rated this a 4.1 out of 5. Comments have included: "Wild lyrics and harmonies" "I like this one and the arrangement"
Lyrics
Gonna sell my snake oil right by the side of the road Gotta make a living gotta feed my family (chimpanzee) On the road that's free On the road that's free For just $5 I'll sell you a hair growing lotion For twelve more dollars you can get the remedy On the road that's free On the road that's free I'm gonna sell you some genuine tobaccy Oh it's a fine weed you'll live till 93 On the road that's free On the road that's free Step right up, see the bearded lady She's been dead 10 years but she's still good company On the road that's free On the road that's free It's a dog eat dog world out there I tell you Speaking of dogs I can sell you some exotic meat On the free street It's a free street On the road that's free On the road that's free
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