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about

Down to the River: I'd been talking about writing the 'don't go down to the river' murder ballad for about 8 years, and then when Erik Peterson from Mischief Brew killed himself last year I realized what the song needed to be was a cautionary tale for how we harm ourselves - and how we try to reach out and love and support our people but sometimes... it's just not enough. While I was writing it and finishing it I lost two more friends - one to the Ghost Ship fire, and one to the Golden Gate Bridge. While it started out as a memorial song - I had no idea that some of the lyrics would so exactly match how I was going to lose more people. I tear up when I sing it - but to me - it's about knowing how much we want to love and save our people from themselves - and it just doesn't always work.

lyrics

DOWN TO THE RIVER

Hitting the road again while you do a little dance
Sometimes this is as hard as it gets
My shirt still warm from your arms around my back
It’s too hard leaving friends like that

CHORUS
Never go down to the river
Never go down to the tracks
If the one you love is asking
You're never coming back

Another show and it’s just another angle
Whatever happened to three chords and danger
A night on the road running solo again
A night on the road who knows how this will end

CHORUS

Truest hearts always walk alone
Into the past and into the woods we go
Looking back we already knew we’d lost you
Looking back I can’t judge those things you do

CHORUS

All it took was one haunted look
Smoke in the air and your life’s a burning book
Did you fall in love when that last moment fell
Seeing to the stars did you hear the bells

CHORUS

credits

from The Stars Fall Shooting Into Twangsville, released July 21, 2017
Lyrics / Music by Cindy Emch

Cindy Emch - vocals, acoustic guitar
Tolan McNeil - tremolo guitar
Grayson Walker - accordion
Joel Fernandes - rhythm elec guitar/solo, drums
Carolyn Mark - vocal harmonies
Dennis Siemens - upright bass

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Secret Emchy Society Oakland, California

"One could describe Emch as if Nick Cave had grown up in Bakersfield with a dynamic swagger that could part the Red Sea." - NoDepression

The Secret Emchy Society plays foot stompin' heart breakin' California country tunes for gay cowboys, queer witches, and all kinds of cowfolks.
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