August 2018 | Arkansas | recorded by @nickfutch.media
Love me some Nick Shoulders. We've been buds since 2012, when Thunderlizards was playing at the Lightbulb Club, and we shared the stage on drums and banjo for Shawn James and the Shapeshifters. Nowadays, Shoulders uses his vocal gifts to share with us modern folks the history and context of ole-timey music.
Nick walked me through his childhood stomping grounds and sang us a tune inspired by his love for this little corner of Arkansas. He told about the folklore which gave Ghost Holler its name and showed us ruins from the Civil War that used to run right up to his back yard. I set up the field recorder and let Nick do his thing with nothing but a guitar, a Moose, and droning cicadas.
Porch lights, on distant ridges dark.
Rock lined valleys, ringing with every bark.
From flat water bottom to wind blown timber tall.
Its my land, of snakes and waterfalls.
16 score and 7 years my blood’s called home.
To all the crimson clay and the old roads that I roam.
This place might be curse’d after all.
But its my land, of snakes and waterfalls.
And I know, that when a distant shore’s before me
Oh how my poor heart aches, for every hollow that I forsake
I’ve been trying to run since I could crawl
But I’m bound, to snakes and waterfalls.
Blue cave water and canebrakes forever call, me on home, to snakes and waterfalls.
