Highway 5
"Highway 5" is the 11th song on American Music Club's second album, 1988’s California.
| "Highway 5" | |
|---|---|
|
Error creating thumbnail: File missing California cover | |
| Song by American Music Club from the album California | |
| Released | 1988 |
| Format | LP / CS / CD |
| Length | 3:49 |
| Label | Grifter Records/Frontier Records/Demon Records |
| Writer(s) | Mark Eitzel |
| Producer(s) | Tom Mallon |
| California track listing | |
| |
Eitzel told Unhinged, "The drive from San Francisco to L.A is weird: it's an irrigated desert. The left side is all irrigated, the right side is the real thing: barren dry mountains. So it's this phony Californian situation, which California is wonderful for. I love California for disgusting, wasteful conflicts like that. And then I sang the song around a romance I once had. First time I drove down it, I knew I had to write about it because I'm really into '5', not that I'm a silly numerologist, but five is the martyr's number. I love the number."[1]
Lyrics
Try and try, leave a trace
And all we ever leave is a sour taste
You're half asleep when I crash through
I'm like a drop of water on the dry sand
I'm a scar across your face
I'm an itch that's driving you mad
Highway five
Takes so much to make us feel like we're alive
A weary traveler at a smooth seventy-five
Make pretend the landscape ain't so dry
Do anything to maintain a lie
To the left, a beautiful California landscape
Dead ends in the sky
And to the right, beautiful mountains rise
High and dry
Another futile expression of bitterness
Another overwhelming sensation of uselessness
Make pretend that the landscape ain't so dry
Do anything to maintain a lie
Make pretend that the lover ain't so barren
Though in Los Angeles things like that don't matter
Highway five
Video
American Music Club performing "Highway 5" on September 2, 1989 at The Burro Room in Chico, CA, US.
Personnel
American Music Club
- Mark Eitzel - vocals, guitars
- Danny Pearson - bass
- Vudi - guitar, accordion
- Tom Mallon - drums, producer, engineer
Others
- Bruce Kaphan - pedal steel
Also appears on
- United Kingdom & California CD
- Over And Done promo
References
- ↑ Drew (Winter 1989). "American Music Club". Unhinged. Retrieved March 27, 2018.