Jeff Davis County Blues Lyrics
I head north from Toyahvale
Switch to 285 in Pecos
Head up to Red Bluff
My walk's real steady and my eyes are real cold
But I feel like I'm all of 16 years old
Lost in the Travelodge with the television on with the sound down
I don't feel so tough
Old issues of Sunset magazine to read
Sleep for twelve hours and dream about home
I have no place to go
So I drive up to New Mexico
Fix my eyes in the rear view
When I cross the state line
And I panic, I guess, and although it's quite late
I take the first exit to 128
I am coming back to Midland
And I hope you won't mind
Polaroids of the two of us
Scattered on the passenger seat
I drive slowly and evenly
And I dream about home
About
Track #10 on The Mountain Goats‘ twelfth full-length album All Hail West Texas.
Q&A
Find answers to frequently asked questions about the song and explore its deeper meaning
John Darnielle before playing this song at the Bowery Ballroom in New York, NY on March 28, 2011:
“It’s a song you may find yourself singing if all hope is gone. And you’re like, ‘Oh, man, this sucks that all hope is gone. I liked it better when there was hope. Guess it’s too late to really be worrying about that now, though, and that’s what the whole meaning of the word gone is, isn’t it.’ And maybe you look it up in a dictionary, but there’s just a picture of your motel under that. And you think, ‘That’s really fucked up.’ It’s like a movie, and you start looking around for cameras — there’s no cameras.”
- 4.Jenny
- 5.Fault Lines
- 6.Balance
- 10.Jeff Davis County Blues
- 11.Distant Stations
- 12.Blues in Dallas
- 13.Source Decay