Down Here at the Crossroads

Washed Away

New Orleans is a wonderful, eccentric, un-American place where people walk the sidewalks, hangout on the corners and talk to each other. Where, down on the river, the whole world meets to celebrate the mad, impetuous joy of being a human being, alive and totally, utterly and completely belonging to yourself. Where, for a few dollars, you can sit in the sun and play chess with a grand master, or sing a song with a hat at your feet. A place with dark shadows in its past - and its present. And where death dances in the street and is welcome at the Mardi Gras. Yet, all around, the waters wait, slowly rising. If Steve Bonham and The Long Road had a soul, it would reside on Decatur Street, on the corner near the Café du Monde.

Ignore foreign knock-offs. Motels are a uniquely American phenomenon. And very strange. Almost identical. Each room opens onto an open corridor shaded from the sun by the veranda above. You can check your station wagon is OK by leaning over the balcony to look at the carpark below.A heavy door with numerous locks reveals long dark narrow room with two enormous beds. On the left of the entrance is a cranking, rattling old air con unit, tin grey with worn knobs, At the far end of the room is always a plastic vanity unit surmounted by a large mirror. A small bathroom with a very shallow bath is off to the left. A coffee machine with numerous tightly-packaged consumables and enormous television playing non-stop info-torials completes the inventory. We love them and stayed in them many times. Kev was advised to stay in his room by the police after his next door neighbour was murdered, Steve has spent many a sleepless jet-lagged night listening to wanna-be singers, the primitive groanings of furtive copulation, furious arguments, and them good’ol boys playing cards and drinking rye. He wrote this song to celebrate this temple to American culture.

Music videos filmed and edited by Kat Hodgkinson and Gemma Caldwell.
Recorded at Woodworm Studios. Engineer: Stuart Jones.

There are days you just can’t win. And there are other days where it ain’t worth bothering. Days where the guy in the suit, with his slimy bonhomie, and the blond woman, with helmet perfect hair, summon up their lies, distortions and platitudes, and tell us - most sincerely - they are on our side. Behind them, self-interest lurks, stirring up a brew, and the robot people crank out their poison, and the rabid dogs sniff and howl in the night, and the slithery things wriggle and writhe, and the big stink is sold as fresh air. Ain’t it a miracle we keep dreaming!

Video coming…

Ah, those moments of truth! When you should do something better, but the silky, seductive voice of self-interest licks your ears and says “Hey, don’t be a dork!”. As Saint Augustine of Hippo, said “Oh Lord, give me chastity and continence, but not yet”  And so the whole rotten mess lumbers on. What can I do? What can I say? I’m just little me” And resemblance by the devil to persons living or dead is purely coincidental.  This is a song from Steve and Kev and is heavy and acoustic. Heavy Wood anyone?