We were the kings of the city and no one could unseat us
We were five blues brothers and no one could defeat us
We made history here in this town
Undisputed and nobody could beat us
We had our own world
And we were frozen in time
We were young and innocent we never thought those times would leave
We were practicing at being somebody we were so naïve
Everybody was a class clown
We got away with stuff you wouldn’t believe
So much happened here in these streets
We shocked authority with some of our feats
We were the furthest thing from discreet
But we were born out of time.
What have they done to the old neighborhood where we scuffled?
It all got swallowed up in some urban reshuffle
You come back after all these years to the old familiar places
But the world you loved so much fell apart and you don’t know half the faces
We would dress up so crazy to look like a public eyesore
You could terrify people that way then but you can’t do that anymore
Even making romance ain’t what it used to be
Half the fun was waiting for her to make up her mind
Everybody’s looking for a “relationship” now
Whatever happened to just having a good time?
We were born in the sixties
kids in the seventies
and cut loose in the eighties together
Where does the time go when you’re locked in the land of never?
We watched the Stones and the Who become granddads
Hell, you can’t stay seventeen forever
Today all these kids just look good and POOF! They’re stars
We worked hard on our music but now look where we are
Still playing sleazy two-bit bars
Oh, we were born out of time.
There once was a time for our wild recklessness
For our Big Bad Influence and Beauty of Holiness
But now we’re lost in helplessness
We were born out of time.
©2023 The Hesh Inc.
This is one that I wrote toward the end of my army service in the late 1980s, when I was looking back at my high school and post–high school years, which had taken place not all that long before, with a sense of wistfulness, wondering where the glory of the glory days evaporated to. Musically, it rolls the Boss's "Saint in the City" up with Thin Lizzy's "Don't Believe a Word" and "Chinatown." Never recorded or performed.