James McMurtry





James McMurtry (born March 18, 1962, Fort Worth, Texas) is an American rock and folk-rock/americana singer, songwriter, guitarist, bandleader and occasional actor (Daisy Miller, Lonesome Dove). He performs with veteran bandmates Daren Hess, Cornbread, and Tim Holt.

His father, novelist Larry McMurtry, gave him his first guitar at age seven. His mother, an English professor, taught him how to play it: "My mother taught me three chords and the rest I just stole as I went along. I learned everything by ear or by watching people." 

McMurtry spent the first seven years of his boyhood in Ft. Worth  but was raised mostly in Leesburg, Virginia. He attended the Woodberry Forest School, Orange, Virginia. He began performing in his teens, writing bits and pieces. He started performing his own songs at a downtown beer garden while studying English and Spanish at the University of Arizona in Tucson. After traveling to Alaska and playing a few gigs, he returned to Texas and his father's "little bitty ranch house crammed with 10,000 books". After a time, he left for San Antonio, where he worked as a house painter, actor, bartender, and sometimes singer, performing at writer's nights and open mics.

In 1987 McMurtry's career entered an upswing. A friend in San Antonio suggested McMurtry enter the New Folk songwriter contest; he became one of six winners that year. Also around this time John Mellencamp was starring in a film based on a script by McMurtry's father, which gave McMurtry the opportunity to get a demo tape to Mellencamp. Mellencamp subsequently served as co-producer on McMurtry's 1989 debut album, Too Long in the Wasteland. McMurtry also appeared on the soundtrack of the film Falling from Grace, working with Mellencamp, John Prine, Joe Ely, and Dwight Yoakam in a "supergroup" called Buzzin' Cousins.

McMurtry released follow-up albums Candyland (1992) and Where'd You Hide the Body (1995). Walk Between the Raindrops followed in 1998 and 2002 brought St. Mary of the Woods. In April 2004, McMurtry released a tour album called Live In Aught-Three. Choctaw Bingo, one of McMurtry's most popular songs, is featured on both St. Mary of the Woods and Live in Aught-Three.

In 2005, McMurtry released his first studio album in three years. Childish Things again received high critical praise, winning the song and album of the year at the 5th Annual Americana Music Awards in Nashville, Tennessee. The album was perhaps McMurtry at his most political, as his working-class anthem "We Can't Make It Here" included direct criticism of George W. Bush, the Iraq War, and Wal-Mart. The music critic Robert Christgau ranked "We Can't Make It Here" as the best song of the 2000s. 

McMurtry released his follow-up album to Childish Things in April 2008. Just Us Kids continued with the previous album's political themes and included the song Cheney's Toy, McMurtry's most direct criticism of George W. Bush so far. Like We Can't Make It Here from the previous album, Cheney's Toy was made available as a free Internet download.

In November 2014, McMurtry announced that his new album "Complicated Game" will be available on February 24, 2015, on an LA record label, also named Complicated Game. 

McMurtry currently resides in Austin, Texas. When in Austin, McMurtry and The Heartless Bastards play a midnight set at The Continental Club on Wednesday nights. He is usually preceded by another Austin roots rock legend, Jon Dee Graham. 

  Discography-Albums 

 1989 
Too Long in the Wasteland 
1992 
Candyland
1995
 Where'd You Hide the Body
1997
 It Had to Happen
1998 
Walk Between the Raindrops
2002 
Saint Mary of the Woods
2004
 Live in Aught-Three
2005
 Childish Things
2007
 Best of the Sugar Hill Years
2008
 Just Us Kids 
2009
 Live in Europe 
2014 
Complicated Game


ΠΗΓΗ:  James McMurtry




The Official Site of James McMurtry:

YOUTUBE:VIDEOS-James McMurtry:



 James McMurtry:
Peter Pan 
-------- 
Beer cans to the ceiling
Ashtray on the floor
Laundry on the sofa
Need I say more
I walked out with my hair wet
I caught one awful cold
Should have been more careful
Should have done like I was told
I can't believe it
How could it be
Just like you said could happen
So it did to me
Just when I might have seen the light of day
I crossed my eyes 'til they stayed that way

 (chorus)
I keep my distance
As best I can
Living out my time here in Never Never land
I can't grow up
'cause I'm too old now
I guess I really did it this time mom

 The boogie man came calling
I said I wasn't home
He didn't believe me
He wasn't alone
He had my number
He got my goat
He bought my ticket
He paid off my note
And he left in a hurry
Said he couldn't stay
I guess he had his reasons
I'm not the one to say

 (chorus)

 Lets go chase tornadoes
Just me and you
You don't often catch 'em
But man when you do
Just take my catch rope
And crawl out on the wing
We won't come down 'till we own that thing
Then we'll sit out on the front porch
Quiet as a mouse
One last time before they close on the house



"We Can't Make it Here" In Support of the Occupy Movement from James McMurtry on Vimeo.


 James McMurtry:
''We Can't Make It Here'' 
---------- 
There's a Vietnam Vet with a cardboard sign
Sitting there by the left turn line
The flag on his wheelchair flapping in the breeze
One leg missing and both hands free

No one's paying much mind to him
The V. A. Budget's just stretched so thin
And now there's more coming back from the Mideast war
We can't make it here anymore

And that big ol' building was the textile mill
That fed our kids and it paid our bills
But they turned us out and they closed the doors
'Cause we can't make it here anymore

You see those pallets piled up on the loading dock
They're just gonna sit there 'til they rot
'Cause there's nothing to ship, nothing to pack
Just busted concrete and rusted tracks

Empty storefronts around the square
There's a needle in the gutter and glass everywhere
You don't come down here unless you're looking to score
We can't make it here anymore

The bar's still open but man it's slow
The tip jar's light and the register's low
The bartender don't have much to say
The regular crowd gets thinner each day

Some have maxed out all their credit cards
Some are working two jobs and living in cars
Minimum wage won't pay for a roof, won't pay for a drink
If you gotta have proof just try it yourself Mr. C. E. O.
See how far 5. 15 an hour will go
Take a part time job at one your stores
I bet you can't make it here anymore

And there's a high school girl with a bourgeois dream
Just like the pictures in the magazine
She found on the floor of the laundromat
A woman with kids can forget all that

If she comes up pregnant what'll she do
Forget the career and forget about school
Can she live on faith' Live on hope'
High on Jesus or hooked on dope
When it's way too late to just say no
You can't make it here anymore

Now I'm stocking shirts in the Wal-Mart store
Just like the ones we made before
'Cept this one came from Singapore
I guess we can't make it here anymore

Should I hate a people for the shade of their skin
Or the shape of their eyes or the shape I'm in
Should I hate 'em for having our jobs today
No I hate the men sent the jobs away

I can see them all now, they haunt my dreams
All lily white and squeaky clean
They've never known want, they'll never know need
Their shit don't stink and their kids won't bleed
Their kids won't bleed in their damn little war
And we can't make it here anymore

Will I work for food, will I die for oil
Will kill for power and to us the spoils
The billionaires get to pay less tax
The working poor get to fall through the cracks

So let 'em eat jellybeans let 'em eat cake
Let 'em eat shit, whatever it takes
They can join the Air Force or join the Corps
If they can't make it here anymore

So that's how it is, that's what we got
If the president wants to admit it or not
You can read it in the paper, read it on the wall
Hear it on the wind if you're listening at all
Get out of that limo, look us in the eye
Call us on the cell phone tell us all why

In Dayton Ohio or Portland Maine
Or a cotton gin out on the great high plains
That's done closed down along with the school
And the hospital and the swimming pool

Dust devils dance in the noonday heat
There's rats in the alley and trash in the street
Gang graffiti on a boxcar door
We can't make it here anymore