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Don Paul, Kidd Jordan, Morikeba Kouyaté - It Must Be Love (Word Passed Down through Forbidden Radio)

from Women Center Earth, Sea, and Sky by Don Paul, Kidd Jordan, Morikeba Kouyaté,

/

about

Marigny Recording Studio, New Orleans, July 24, the last track of a 16-track session over two hours with Kidd Jordan, Don Paul, and Morikeba Kouyaté. Kidd said about the Women Center ... album: "It sounds good. Nice balance." He said about 'Word Passed Down ...":
'We really were stretching on that one."

lyrics

It Must Be Love
(Word Passed Down through Forbidden Radio)

for Chuck Kinder and John Sinclair on their birthdays

The voices beside your pillow,
Friends past midnight,
Wailing from the River, blowing through the Gaps,
Whistling "Whoo--whoo--Hoo-hoo" for the Gras,
Bring tales and tones so pure and sexual
They lift you like a knife.
Their guitars and drums like Indians,
Slaves and Gospels freed,
Raise heroes from the outlaw,
Racing in the streets,
All they say truer than what's on
Your parents' new black-and-white TV.

The Hill!--the Hill!--
shines beyond Highways' humming fins
The Hill!--the Hill!--
gives you Muddy Waters and Hazel Dickens
The Hill!--the Hill!--
is gained by going far out past Main Street
The Hill!--the Hill!--
asks you to dance like one who can't be seen

Ree-bel! Re-be-ba-be-bah-ah-bop-ee--ah ...
Re-bop-'n'run-through-bell!

What is this dreamt-for America but promises
That those left out
May rise according to their worth?
What is it but best minds and hearts
In red jackets ripped apart?
What Wars and wars haunt Desks
Of Insurance agents
From George Pickett to the West Virginia John Wayne?
What results might be outright
When fields are level, when the long brown Path is open,
When Old Dean Moriarty's Wobbly
Choices are abundant?
What more might happen to Motor Cities, Iron Cities,
And High Lonesome Country
After Bebop, Doowop, and John Coltrane chords--
Yea-ay-ah!--chords from notes!--
More join Highland melodies?
What more might you bring with your hungry ears,
The wound and bow from pillows' pain?

John reached out to make Rock free as jazz.
John reached out to enrich White with Black.
John reached out to smoke and drink and fuck
Upside-down, under the bed, out in the Lake,
Or any other way or place he liked.
John risked his life for all he felt gave some light.
Chuck punched his way out of West Virginia parking-lots.
Chuck claimed seven Armed Robberies when age seventeen.
Chuck dove into Elizabethans, Matthew Arnold,
The Golden Bough, and McCluhan with the same drive.
Chuck threw up the past to ride whatever bus was out there.
Chuck brought friends West to share in edges' glow.

Decades pass. Partners split
And losses wrench.
Knives of Indians and Blacks show up in the dark.
Water Follies lap against corpses found beside the Ocean.
A Jimmy Carter, a Ronald Reagan, a Bush and a Clinton
Are U. S. President.
John and Chuck smoke and drink,
Teach, create, promote and inspire
More who listen and talk around kitchen tables.
They keep pumping up forbidden radio.
They can be ignored but not stopped.
Their beards thin to catch light.

What is the word abideth Night?
What is the sound of Spirits bright?
What holds the hand that grips your hand
On what might have been your death-bed?
What moves the horns of devotees
Who play to be a force for good?
What is the force made strangers by your bed
Call you to be their friends, to know their worlds,
To sing through the wounded throats of wild birds?
What is the word, the sound, the force, you heard?

It must be love. It must be love. It must be love.
Like a knife. Like a bell. Like Gods' own bells.
Raging love. Tender love.
Unbending and undying love.
Calling you to go out there,
Do your thing and make it ring.
Like endless light in giant night.
The word, the sound, the force, you heard,
So 'way back when and all your life,
Under Ben Bulben and in Tunica,
Eric Dolphy and Patsy Cline.
The light you bring your road ahead,
Like endless balm for wounded birds to get it right.
It must be love. All will be well.
It must be love. All will be well
If we can love. It must be love.
All will be well. It must be love....

Don Paul

credits

from Women Center Earth, Sea, and Sky, released January 18, 2016
Don Paul words, vocal, and bodhran
Kidd Jordan tenor saxophone
Morikeba Kouyaté kora

license

all rights reserved

tags

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