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Grand Ole Hopry

by Matt Hopper & The Roman Candles

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1.
Fools Gold 05:13
Fools Gold Key of C C Dreams turned cold in the F winter C time The F wind blew C hard, we G lost all F rhyme Down in the months of the dead and bleak We walked along towards Bleeker Street Taxi cabs swim like sharks towards Central Park’s cold dark heart I’m haunted by the ghosts of yore that swam the lakes and walked the shores G All I F know is G what I C see and C staying F here is G fools Am gold Found myself on a sunny shore, Pacific Highway number one Late at night we came alive somewhere between Sunset and Vine Wearing masks of fleeting fame, I lost my way inside a flame Oh the waves of bitter hopes and the hangin’ thread of final ropes All I know if what I see and staying here is fools gold Where I grew up all the roads were long, with twists and turns, but we had our songs It’s colder than it was before, and the sun don’t shine, most all the time So take me from these gravel roads, cause the city lights they shine so bright Reminding you you’re in the dark and there are things that you can’t be All I know if what I see and staying here is fools gold
2.
Dangerous 04:04
Two Dollar Whiskey Key of D in dropped D tuning D I cracked a smile cause you A didn't get my joke It's been G three years since I'd heard it I guess Em I don't remember Nothing much has changed except you and I older And I'm still trying to love you but you're just getting colder Some say I'm friendly and I try to be a good boy But trouble always finds me and sometimes it bites me I want to drown in a two dollar whiskey but I get so hung over Where did my day go? A If you think I'm missing you well I D am A If you want to go drinking I'm your Em man D You are dangerous, you're dangerous Every time I come around you I Em bleed You're dangerous, you're dangerous Beat down, broken hearted and cryin' all the time I'm going to the bar cause it isn't all that far and a friend that likes my band has got a cash heavy hand Sometimes when I go out on a Tuesday night I see a girl I like but she never will come over... Pre-chorus / Chorus And D nothing A feels as Em good As the G promise of A spending D all night Em wrecking All my G dreams on your A shores D You're dangerous, you're dangerous Every time I get around you I Em bleed You're dangerous, you're dangerous Beat down, broken hearted and cryin' all the time X2
3.
CASINO LIGHTS Key of D / Dropped D tuning D (riff) SAW HER FACE IN A CASINO SHE WAS THERE TO SEE A FRIEND DIDN'T HAVE NO RHYME OR REASON JUST A SMILE AND OFF SHE WENT Bm - D - Em NEXT NIGHT AT A VEGAS PARTY SHE WAS THERE TO PLAY THE KEYS SADDLED UP TO A GREAT PIANO, OH NO PLAY US MORE PRETTY PLEASE IF YOU Bm SAW HER STANDING THERE WITH THAT D SMILE AND THOSE EYES WELL YOU Em JUST MIGHT BE ALARMED CAUSE YOUR FEET WILL FEEL LIKE DANCING YOUR HEART WILL GO ON PRANCING THROUGH THE YARD I SAID GIRL WHERE YOU GOING SHE SAID DOWN TO THE POOL WHERE YOU BEEN ALL MY LIFE SHE JUST LAUGHED BEEN CHASING FOOLS OH NO I THINK I'M DEAD SHE'S GOT ME IN HER SIGHTS SHE JUST MIGHT PULL THE TRIGGER SHOOT OUT ALL THE GODDAMN LIGHTS IF YOU SAW HER STANDING THERE WITH THAT SMILE AND THOSE EYES WELL YOU JUST MIGHT BE ALARMED CAUSE YOUR FEET WILL FEEL LIKE DANCING YOUR HEART WILL GO ON PRANCING THROUGH THE YARD D-Em CASINO LIGHTS A DON'T SHINE AS Bm BRIGHT AT THE D MEMORY OF THAT Em NIGHT (x2)
4.
Wild Horse 03:37
Wild Horse Wild Town (Key of D) D Spent a little time in the 208 G Growing my hair stayin’ up late A Maximized all of my time and space With new Em ideas A coastal line ain’t lost on me And skiing your slopes, never felt freer But all I have now are simple tools And all my fingers I get G high A on Bm you From your Bm south end A to your G north Playing in your wild towns I ride you like a wild horse They’re a hell of a band but nobody’s dancing With hearts made of stone sinking in water I ain’t got much of anything to keep you from drowning Except a trip to where the craters are Like the ones up on the moon But how would I know I ain’t ever been Guess we can pretend I get high on you From your south end to your north Playing in your wild towns I ride you like a wild horse Ride you like a wild horse Ride you like a wild horse Take a trip down fifty-five And dive into a lucky peak If I end up in a dive Will I land on my own two D feet? solo / repeat chorus quietly once then build into full chorus and done
5.
Wedding Ring 03:22
Wedding Ring Key of C C Sit in your truck by the light of the moon the wind’s gonna howl that you’re out too soon G Cause love’s gone by you and now you’re all alone Caught down sight from a fleeting sparrow Ripped through your heart like a sharpened arrow Cause love’s gone by you and now you’re all alone Spoke too soon your words were unkind a glass of truth the wine was so fine Now love’s gone by you and now you’re all alone C D G F# C {walk up with guitar and bassline) D Am So, who are you? D C walk Bone or marrow see through? Save your wedding ring Lost your bet on a 1 to 2 chance caught up hard in a two bit romance Now love’s gone by you and now you’re all alone Sunlight hurts and your bed is so cold waiting for another day to unfold Cause love’s gone by you and now you’re all alone Photographs taunt like a pale reflection ripped in half by harsh conditions But love’s gone by you and now you’re all alone So, who are you? Bone, or marrow see through? Save your wedding ring Save your wedding ring Save your wedding ring Save your wedding ring Save your wedding ring
6.
NIAGARA FALLS Key of C C I’m jumping off Dm cliffs like Niagara G Falls just trying to C reach B you with my calls Am7 but you won’t even G answer your telephone C I feel like a creep for stalking your house, I know that I’m never allowed to climb through your window’s once again F Honey I’m G sorry F honey I’m Am sorry G please hear me F now I am so sorry just let me in I know that I’ve said all the wrong stuff, maybe those comments were too rough And I am so sorry I can prove it now I saw that you threw out all of my things, I got your letter with the rings A little heartbroken to say the least Honey I’m G sorry F honey I’m Am sorry G please hear me F out I am so sorry just let me in
7.
Curse 03:31
Curse Key: F# F# - D#m - B - C# This is a curse, I don’t want to believe you Feels like a bust, feels like you’re messin’ with my head A# - B - C# - F# A# - (B - C# - D#m x2) Baby’s got her Daddy’s eyes, baby’s got her Daddy’s smile Little girl’s gonna be just fine cause she’s not mine x2 This is a curse, I feel it in my bones This is a cheap shot, ten spot, liquor and motel to ease my pain I just wanna be alone Baby’s got her Daddy’s eyes, baby’s got her Daddy’s smile Little girl’s gonna be just fine cause she’s not mine x4
8.
Elko 03:43
Elko Key of D It's D cold in California Bm but there ain't no snow in G Elko A tonight Sitting round a campfire playing my guitar with my friends We've been travel G ing A We've been travel G ing on Bm - A - G full band kicks in here, maybe one pass through with lead guitar or pedal steel City lights are fading, past distant memories, can't you see the starry night and the moons eye is looking down on me pulling me to sleep We've been traveling We've been traveling on... There's an Em evening light, casting D shadows in the Am dark Highway Cm7 80, Bm you always did me Am7 right Highway 80, calling through the night... Written by Matt Hopper & Evan Phillips
9.
Summer Holiday Key of G G I’ll send a message to you my darling I’ve gotta wrestle with the G thought that I’m Gf living Em alone It’s been the easiest winter, at least, easy till I met her C Once I saw her smile my D world turned upside down Won’t you Em meet me for a Bm summer holiday C Cause It’s so Em hard to hear you when you’re Bm so so far C away I’ll keep in touch cause I’m working as a mail clerk I spend my days wondering how we’re going to make this work I’ll make another invitation, you can visit without any hesitation Cause I want to see you again and again and again Won’t you meet me for a summer holiday Cause It’s so hard to hear you when you’re so so far away x2 And I wish we D lived closer so I wouldn’t Em add9 have to call I could just come C on over and we could B7 have a ball I wish I lived closer so you could be my dancing queen We’d make our own little world we could do D anything Won’t you meet me for a summer holiday Cause It’s so hard to hear you when you’re so so far away
10.
Words Are Cheap D [D] OUTSIDE NEAR THE BRICK HOUSE [D add E] KILLING TIME ON TUESDAY THINKING ABOUT THE [D add B] ONE I LOVE LOOKING FOR A REASON TO CELEBRATE HER MEMORY AND JOIN THE LONELY HEARTS CLUB SEE I'M FAR ACROSS THE OCEAN, WRITING IN SLOW MOTION, WISHING SHE WAS NEXT TO ME CALLING UP MY BEST FRIEND TO SEE HOW SHE IS DOING BUT SHE DON'T WANT TO TALK TO ME AND IF YOU [Em] SEE HER COMING ROUND WON'T YOU [D] TELL HER WHERE TO FIND ME OUT ON [C] I-5, SOUTH DAKOTA OR THE [G] MOON CAUSE IF SHE COMES AND FINDS ME I COULD SHOW HER HOW I MISS HER WITHOUT WORDS, LETTERS OR GUITARS TAKE ME FROM THIS CITY CAUSE I'M READY FOR THE COUNTRY AND ALL THE STARRY NIGHTS I'M FLYING HOME ON FRIDAY HOPING MAYBE I COULD SEE YOU IF THAT WOULD BE ALRIGHT IT'D BE NICE TO HEAR YOUR VOICE IT'D BE NICE TO TALK AWHILE IT'S BE NICE TO GET IT RIGHT BUT I KNOW WHAT YOU'RE THINKING BEST TO GET ME STARTED DRINKING CAUSE I KNOW I'LL BE ALONE AND IF YOU SEE HER COMING ROUND WON'T YOU TELL HER WHERE TO FIND ME OUT ON I-5, SOUTH DAKOTA OR THE MOON CAUSE IF SHE COMES AND FINDS ME I COULD SHOW HER HOW I MISS HER WITHOUT WORDS, LETTERS OR GUITARS [A] I RECKON I'LL [Bm] STAY UP [G] LATE RIDING THAT GIN REMINSINCING OF OUR VERY FIRST DATE WHERE YOU WERE ROCKING MY WORLD, YOU DIDN'T EVEN HAVE TO TALK TIME WAS SHORT, WORDS WERE CHEAP AND I WAS [G] A LOT LIKE [A] YOU
11.
Gravel Slide 10:24
Gravel Slide Open D tuning D I was caught back in G 1989 by a A girl who rode the bike without her hands E-F-G-F-D She got bored so she took me for a ride and I won’t forget that painful gravel slide E-F-G-F-D E I missed the way she closed her eyes when she was kissing me goodnight E-F-G-F-D E I hopped a train and I left her there in the town of icy stares Settled down on a bed beneath the stars trying hard to stop the fever on my mind It’s been awhile since I’ve seen the country side with the mountains and the rivers oh so wide I just hopped into my old truck, the same old stubborn clutch is stuck Going for a ride downtown just to see if you’re around B Honey G yes or A no, there’s no E gray F where I’m G living You can not choose both better make a decision, you better make it right Memories all the good ones do their part to remind me not to trust your wicked heart But I won’t lie, guess I’ll love you till I die but I’ll never be the fish that you will fry No one loves a heart of fear, guess it’s now or never dear and I miss seeing you around but I’ll never miss your dirty town Honey yes or no, there’s no gray where I’m living You can not choose both better make a decision D Back E off the F door and E let me G go, D you E made your F choice there E don’t you B know A-G Back off the door and let me go, you made your choice there don’t you know... B-A-G x3
12.
Son of a 49er by Matt Hopper Key of A Well I started out as a desert rat swinging sticks for baseball bats Got a dog to call our own and when you called she came home Summer in the Phoenix heat made my dad move his feet and Pack his bags to head up north where wolves would holler back and forth Years rolled by one by one and I became an adopted son Alaska called us to it’s roots where pioneers wore sheep skin boots Killed the food by their own hands, dressed the kids, sowed the land Drank all the beer left at Chilkoot Charlies I am a son, I am a son of a 49er It’s this feeling that we share it’s the clean air that we breathe Makes us proud to be so bold My brothers were good at games, sports and things we stayed up late Racing our bikes, chopping trees and torching bees with fireworks Once I caught a baseball hit to my left eye, blackened it Bruised and blue well I must confess that I got pictures of this mess The sun would shine all through the night, midnight sun is hella bright and in the winter darkness fell to some it was heaven to others hell But I was busy doing things I was good at school and drooling on girls But my mom raised me right never once did I fistfight Except one time my ass was about to get kicked and my little brother Did all the fighting for me, we call him Big Ben He is a son, he is a son of a 49er It’s this feeling that we share it’s the clean air that we breathe Makes us proud to be so bold Well my mother, bless her heart, raised us up to healthy start With homecooked meals and lots of love, never pushed when it came to shove Taught us all that she did know then at 18 it was time to go Taught me how to cook and clean, wash my clothes and pick up things And open doors for pretty girls, notice when they had new colored curls Thanks ma, girls seem to like me now She is a daughter, she is a daughter of a 49er It’s this feeling that we share it’s the clean air that we breathe Makes us proud to be so bold My Dad has a lot of scars from hunting things and fixing cars On our walls two bear rugs, black and brown, looking smug Once I went to Kodiak and fell into a bear attack And I got this scar on my neck from a paw so big it hurt like a wreck But my dad shot him in the heart, my was stopped but soon did start and that bear went down on wounded knee and on our wall for all to see (now I don’t like killing animals if I don’t have to, but sometimes you just gotta eat moose meat) He is a son, he is a son of a 49er It’s this feeling that we share it’s the clean air that we breathe Makes us proud to be so bold This song is dedicated in the loving memory of my friend Aaron Tanner, who lost his life during the making of this record. RIP.

about

MATT HOPPER TO RELEASE 11th ALBUM “GRAND OLE HOPRY” ON 11/11/2015

Wasilla, Alaska - Matt Hopper had a pretty clear idea of what he wanted for his 11th album, where he wanted to do it, how he wanted to do it, he even knew the name of the album before laying down the first note. But as the saying goes, “the best laid plans of mice and men often go awry”.
“Grand Ole Hopry” had a clear focus - it was supposed to be Hopper’s quintessential country album - but as a musician with a foot firmly planted in rock and roll, blues, and folk music - the finished product outgrew it’s tidy mission and now sits in that bigger catch-all known as “Americana” music. Some of these songs simply couldn’t help jumping out of the speakers. Despite flourishes of pedal steel and violin, quite a few of the jams rock a little too hard to be considered country music.
Hopper began the process of gathering the 12 songs for the album in 2012 after recording a Kris Kristofferson song with Boise based bluegrass band Reilly Coyote for a tribute album that was released on PIAPTK Records. When he presented to the group his idea for the ambitious album project, which included a tour to Nashville to record the album, the somewhat established local musicians wouldn’t commit, forcing Hopper to put the entire project on hold. It would be two years before he revisited the idea, instead recording and releasing two more rock based albums “Husky” and “High Hopes” in 2013.
In the winter of 2014, he assembled a band that would make Grand Ole Hopry a reality, featuring Bryan Daste on pedal steel, Jon Fust on drums, and Bryan Garfinkel on bass. The goal was to perform the songs on the album every night on a tour from Boise, ID to Nashville, TN and then cut the album live to tape in an all analog studio. They arrived in Nashville in early March 2014 to record; but many issues arose with the studio where they were supposed to cut the album and after spending only three hours there, the group decided to pull out.
With a 10 day block of time set aside to record the album in the middle of the tour and nowhere to record it, the album seemed heading for another crash and burn. But as luck would have it, Garfinkel had packed all his home recording gear in a trailer he was hauling across the country and their gracious host, fashion consultant and blogger Milton White, agreed to let them take over his entire house in Germantown to cut the tracks.
Soon there was a pedal steel in the kitchen, a drum kit in the living room, and amps in the bathrooms and the “Exile on Main Street” style sessions began. Over the course of the next week the basic tracks were laid down and special guests Jamie Timm (guitar), Tim Easton (harmonica, mandolin, vocals and organ), Angela Oudean (violin), and Nelson Kempf & Keely Boyle (vocals) shuffled through laying down parts and hanging out. Garfinkel, who had engineered Hopper’s “Husky” took control in the middle of the house recording the album with assistance from Daste, also a skilled engineer from Portland, OR.
As a fan of hip-hop culture’s willingness to showcase homies on each others’ records, Hopper reached out to a bevy of his favorite singers and Samantha Crain, Freddie Stevenson, Julia Haltigan, Jaime Wyatt, Leslie Stevens, Jodi James, Steven Wilson, Tracey Holland and Riana Riggs all sang on it along with Easton, Daste, Kempf and Boyle.
Upon their return to Boise, the album was showcased live at Treefort Music Festival and then Hopper left the U.S.A. for an extended three month solo tour of Europe, six weeks on the east coast and a six week Alaskan tour. He began digging in on mixing over the winter of 2014-15 with trips to Tiny Telephone in San Francisco with Rob Shelton mixing a couple songs, and a trip to Flying Blanket in Mesa, AZ where Bob Hoag mixed a few. The rest of the mixing was handled by Garfinkel, Hopper and Daste in Portland, OR. The mastering was performed by Chris Parks at Tonic Room in Boise, ID.
While reading “Shakey” an autobiography on Neil Young and simultaneously listening to his entire catalog as he moved through the years, Hopper found it amusing how Young would decide on artwork for his records. While he was in Portland in singer Rianna Riggs’ bathroom he looked over and noticed a wood cut on the wall that her father had done in 1979 and immediately felt the artwork fit the vibe of the record. A few weeks later, driving down Grand Ave in Phoenix, he noticed a large mural that said “Ain’t Life Grand” and he knew that this was THEE photo opportunity for the album and immediately pulled over and had his friend Josh Hart snap the shot that you see on the back cover.
If you count some early works, pre-Roman Candles, this is Matt Hopper’s 11th release and will come out on 11/11/2015 after years and years of false starts, let downs and best laid plans gone awry. It features some of his favorite up and coming singers, pedal steel and fiddle in a grand attempt at making a Nashville-style album...ladies and gentlemen, we present to you, Grand Ole Hopry.

credits

released November 11, 2015

Matt Hopper - acoustic guitar, electric guitar, vocals
Jamie Timm - electric guitar
Jon Fust - drums
Bryan Garfinkel - bass, keyboards
Bryan Daste - pedal steel

with

Angela Oudean - violin
Tim Easton - harmonica, organ, vocals, mandolin
Jaime Wyatt - vocals
Samantha Crain - vocals
Jodi James - vocals
Freddie Stevenson - vocals
Julia Haltigan - vocals
Nelson & Keely Boyle - vocals
Steven Wilson - vocals
Tracey Holland - vocals
Leslie Stevens - vocals
Riana Riggs - vocals
Daniel Blumenfeld - piano, accordion
Dave Dembroski - piano

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Matt Hopper & The Roman Candles Anchorage, Alaska

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