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Daily Lyric: NORTHEASTERN BEACHTOWN BOOGIE

I said Help me Doc I got songwriters’ block

I just can’t find my inspiration

He said That ain’t no block you just ran out of stock what you need dude is a long vacation

I was in the east my heart was in the west

and when asked why resist assimilation

I left my heart back in Asbury Park

that was the explanation

In junior high I would lift my eyes

to from where will come my salvation

In the army I swore I’d head straight for the shore

when my three years reached their cessation

The beacon that shined its light into a mind

blackened by social darkness and isolation

With the promise that someday

after the bull gets blown away

I’d undertake massive relocation

Chip on my shoulder since I was a soldier

Drive your friends crazy don’t get lazy

Underground homesick grab yourself a broomstick

This ain’t no statement just block abatement

Tramping around through the streets of this town

under an onslaught of precipitation

The mist was so thick I knew I’d be sick

without some spiritual medication

I staggered my way to nuevo dolce café

and sat down to the taste of innovation

Then the evening sky cleared so I regrouped and steered my sights to nocturnal invasion

Saw her sitting on the boardwalk rails

with her usual gang of friend females

in sweatshirt jeans and flirtation

Flashed her my jazz and blues and snakeskin shoes

and then she was mine for the duration

She took my arm she felt so warm

she was soft intoxication

I didn’t inquire she was lover for hire

but she didn’t fit the characterization

What am I trying to say here this ain’t no cliché here

You wanna be a beatnik you gotta be a streetnik

Check the rhyme and meter you ain’t gonna beat her

Blinded by the light Bruce no use call a truce

But you know it’s all right

Yeah you know it's all right

But you know it's all right

It's all right if it's all night

Long Beach Rockaway Beach Jones Beach Lido Beach

Not looking for a job or a vocation

Long Island Block Island Fire Island Coney Island

Just blowin’ through town on revisitation

Monmouth Beach Bradley Beach

Point Pleasant Beach Island Beach

Don’t want no redemption or salvation

Atlantic Highlands Mystic Island

Holgate Margate Long Beach Island

I’m just here in life to find my station

Jamaica Bay Raritan Bay Sandy Hook Bay Delaware Bay

Mile upon sandy mile of sensation

Montauk Point Breezy Point Somers Point Cape May Point

Pick choose point and shoot for my destination

Surf City Sea Isle City Atlantic City Ocean City

The possibilities of limitless exploration

Sea Bright Barnegat Light

Sea Girt Sea Gate Seaside Heights

I won’t accept any statute of limitation

Playing my wordgames all the same I’ll drop names

None of this crap rap beatin’ like a clap trap

Radio hum drum makes me go ho hum

Rock’n’roll tidy bowl no soul pigeonhole

Grab your attention keep it in suspension

It’s the great backlash against all the cheap trash

Mindless conformity mental deformity

If you ain’t receivin’ it don’t you believe in it

©2024 The Hesh Inc.

"Northeastern Beachtown Boogie" - original AI art by The Hesh Inc.
Quintessential beach town somewhere in the Northeast

In the best tradition of songs like "Subterranean Homesick Blues" and "Blinded by the Light" comes this song, which actually is more closely modeled on "The E Street Shuffle." It came to me during my time in Boston, when I was feeling the ache of being away from my beloved Jersey Shore. I would take long road trips by myself, often leaving Boston in the middle of the night or the wee hours of the morning, and I'd cruise through the deep darkness of the New England night, through the light pollution and endless road constriction of the New York megalopolis, and then down the Garden State Parkway till I reached my shore point of choice by the time the sun came up. Mind you, I had left the East Coast for Israel with my family some nine years before and all I had were memories and romanticized visions of the beach towns I had left behind, and now, armed with a driver's license and beat-up old Datsun, I went on a whole series of exploratory trips to begin to see what these places were really like. This era ended after two years, at which point I made good on it all and finally moved to the Shore. The exploration didn't stop after I moved there, however; I drove a limo for a living and it afforded me the opportunity to get to know the tristate area like the proverbial back of my hand, and it got to the point where I could find my way from any point in central New Jersey to any of the area airports in my sleep. And on days off, I hit the road with my songwriting notebooks and my camera. I'm glad I'm no longer driving for a living, but I do miss those days of road-tripping and exploring.

The song itself ... it was always intended as the second section of the five-song suite that made up "Side One" of the Soul In Exile record that I envisioned from the start. I really kept the music to myself for a number of years, not quite ready to spit the wordy lyrics out while playing the frenetic piano part at the same time. But eventually, after changing the last verse to make it a bit less location-specific and a title change to "Coastal Groove," it was recorded for my second album, Soul In Exile 2: Jersey Shore Baby, in 2002.

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