Wine, Women and Song
Recorded
Release history
Credits
- Written by Huffman/Lin/Nelson, © Song-Based Songs (ASCAP)
Alternate versions
Lyrics
Wine, women and song:1
I tried them all, it did not take me long
to figure I’d unlocked the door to happiness
I figured wrong (with a capital R)
All the baggage I brought wouldn’t fit in a mid-size car
That’s why I’m walking on eggshells down the Via Dolorosa2
(hasn’t got me any closer so far)Shacked up with a poet—no, it wasn’t my department
Now I study the poetry of the studio apartment
Changing the catbox, baking the bread…
I shoulda been paying the bills instead
of paying homage to an image
drawn from somebody else’s headSong, women and wine:
You can’t fool all the people all the time
But if you’re trying, if you’re looking, if you’re lucky
You can always fool a few, and feel fine
Is the line between shame and dread:
one grips the lungs, one brains the head?
But either one can crush you
Anyone can crush youOnce I dated an actor, she was working on a play
by opening night, we had nothing left to say to each other
We hit the wall, it was not resilient
She said that she was hungrier than I was brilliant
and who the hell was I to disagree?
Didn’t you used to be someone
who meant something to me?
Somebody who meant something to me?
Someone who meant something to me…Wine, women and song:
I tried them all, it did not take me long
To figure I’d unlocked the door to happiness
I figured wrong
Quotes
JJL: Sean asked me to accompany him on a few occasions during the hiatus period (hey, tomato/tomato) for a couple piano/voice appearances; a few times we played some Randy Newman songs. I remember thinking he’d like this one. The guitar bit is a personal favorite, even though it features the only recorded trill I’ve ever played (or will likely ever play). LBL really started with the recording of the demo for this song.10A
SCN: “Wine, Women & Song” was the one that made me think there was a good reason to be Harvey Danger again—I’d been having occasional peace- and music-making get-togethers with both Aaron and Jeff through the wilderness years of our break-up (no, not hiatus), 2001–2003, with often exciting, but rarely galvanic results; “WWS,” born on the black Henry A. Miller rental piano in my apartment living room, felt like a whole new thing for us, something we never could’ve done before, and something I suddenly, vividly wanted to do a lot more, hence my prodding of Jeff to play more piano than guitar; hence the dominant sound of what became the album—less volume, less attitude, more space, more ambitious melodies, a totally different dynamic for a totally different band, we hoped (otherwise, why bother?).10A
SCN: Shame/dread index adapted freely from the dialectics of Steve Fisk.P&F
SCN: Of the themes that I was fixated on at the time, the main one—how old was I then? I was 31 or 32—was “why do I feel so old? Why do I feel like a genuinely old person? Why is my life so shrouded with regret? And also, why is that so funny to me?” There was a sort of comical, but also genuinely melancholy, sense of, “I’m standing outside myself all the time, looking in.”AD