Slippin’ Away (Sleepin’ a Wage)

Chorus
Throughout the age/Slippin’ away
Throughout the age/Slippin’ away
Throughout the age/Slippin’ away
Throughout your mind/Trippin’ away
Throughout your mind/Trippin’ away
It’s time to reflect on events of the day.
We did what we could, but it’s gone anyway.
So catch what you can for your sunsets won’t stay.
Don’tcha know it’s the price that we all have to pay.
Chorus
For pain is what stands in the way of the truth.
Don’tcha know the first casualty’s always your youth
So stop adding tears to your gin and vermouth.
Can you find your way to your most precious excuse?
Chorus
Grasping at straws in the dead of the night.
There’s nothing there in the dark that isn’t there in the light.
For darkness is but an illusion of sight.
And I fear that we might be…Slippin’ away

Make no mistake. This lyric is little more than gibberish. Joe Adams and I wrote this in my bedroom late one evening in 1987. The only stipulations were that the verses sound mysterious (but they don’t mean anything) and that all the lines rhyme.

I like Joe’s 12-string playing accompanying my finger-picking. I don’t remember where the tune came from or who wrote it, but the chords suit the 12-string very well.

The song was recorded live in my childhood bedroom in my parents’ house in Southwestern Pennsylvania on a standard cassette deck. There are 4 ‘tracks’: the finger-picked 6-sting, the strummed 12-string, Joe’s voice, and my voice. These inputs were mixed together on a Radio Shack 4-channel mixer.

Originally recorded live in 2-track stereo in 1987. Re-engineered to digital using Cool96 September 1999

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