the band was last seen careening on a canyon road southwest of
monroe utah looking for beaver, the town, firing empty
mickey's big mouth jars at low flying vultures with their
capos in their broken mouths as bridgework ever since leaving
nuevo leo on three tires after three days of trying to find
the exit from el serappe's cantina. they'd picked up a woman
named trixie boomshaboom and she immediately got married to
billybob mazappa becoming trixie boomshaboom mazappa at one in
the morning in hobbs, new mexico... the clincher for billybob
being that trixie plays mandolin with her teeth while
blindfolded... cletis meanwhile has taken to eating snakemeat
and has agreed to work for scale. if you ain't got that do re
mi... buddy meanwhile was looking for val fuentes on the
band's detour through trinidad colorado, up through the raton
mountain pass that townes van zandt sang so lovely of,
"snowin' on raton, come morning i'll be through these hills
and gone"... stopping in alamosa on the northern arm of the
rio grande up in the sangre de cristo range, buddy stopped by
a house where a young hopi woman lived with her adoptive
parents. he used to know a hopi couple way up in southern
montana a long time ago, back when his granddaddy played with
git tanner. they weren't related to the young hopi woman in
alamosa, though. buddy didn't even know this girl. he just
walked up, knocked on the door, and asked if he could use the
biffy. never know what will happen. cletis, trixie and
billybob were moaning in the car with food poisoning from yet
another one of buddy's sidetrips to an eaterie that hadn't
ever seen a health inspector, but when they complained that he
was too chickenshit to take a dump outdoors, buddy snapped at
them and said, "don't check me with no lightweight stuff." so
it goes...
buddy mazappa (2003)
alamosa hopi girl / smile an open meadow /
reminds me of another girl / we loved down in
cerrolvo / playing just to save our skins /
bobbie trix and cletis / god had another gig
that night / he couldn't come to meet us /
our hopi gal she's got a name / it isn't
worth a dollar / her folks don't know her
native name / patricia's what they call her /
we took her with us to a place / that served
up tasty tapas / our hopi princess fell in
love / with all of us mazappas
alamosa hopi girl / skin brown as a penny / trying to find out who she is / in her adopted family / lost her parents long ago / lost her own good people / whispered us her secret name / mish-keh-wonta-seepoh / trixie taught her mandolin / cletis taught her banjo / bobbie taught her violin / i taught her how to whistle / she was the river far below / the eagle high above us / young enough to make us young / wise enough to love us
alamosa hopi girl / we're off to colorado / won't forget your secret name / mish-keh- wonta-seepoh / hope the locals treat you well / and your foster parents love ya / know that everywhere we go / we'll be thinking of ya / one mazappa guitar pick / a photo of you singing / a ring from trix's magic box / all the prayers we're sending / to the family in the sky / the nation's hoop unbroken / little things we tried to say / so much left unspoken
chorus after each verse:
the road is long, the road is wide / there's an even longer road inside / all the stories we can tell the people / one story gave us back a song / made the road seem half as long / love ya love ya mish-keh-wonta- seepoh