Charlie O'Neill

Chords with Lyric
AUDIO/LYRIC
Golden Ray, that spill from heaven, it never lit our way.
Live life joking, always groping for the way.

Paradise, how do I salvage, this wreck I’ve made of life?
And live life to dream of, you and me in paradise.

Pantomime, the tunes we made up, with that sweet old forty’s rhyme.
The words we betrayed, you and me in pantomime.

Pair of dice, just keep ‘em rolling, still you turn up snake eyes.
The rules have wronged us, you and me a pair of dice.
Endless sea, the moon’s a-tiding, still your anchor is in me
I live life to sail on ,you and me on endless sea.

NOTES ON SONG WRITING

This is a song I was happy to have written early in my musical life. I was 24 years old and living in the Blue Ox Band farm house in Boston NY. An out of state couple with a toddler were staying with us for a few weeks. I remember that during their stay that I was picking the child up as she would fall while trying to learn to walk. Over and over again...‘Here we go...upsi-daisey’. I somehow made the connection between this new song I was writing and the act of encouraging this youngster to get up, brush yourself off and keep going. The romantic lyrical theme was probably entwined with the reality of my love life back in 1974. But it’s hard to say if the song came first or the situations. I recall laughing with my brother Dennis when I first played Upsi-Daisey for him, He said he could envision a 50’s ballad crooner singing ‘Upsi-Daisy Blues’ in a trench coat with the collar turned up, taking a long drag on his cigarette, all shadowed and silhouetted, standing in the mist from the Bay under a street lamp, down at the San Francisco water front. I agreed with him. We laughed our hippie heads off. The Upsi Daisey Blues is my would-be contribution to the Tony Bennett Song Book I guess.

The Blue Ox Band recorded this version and performed it in regular rotation on our gig set list. I liked the fact we used to get a lot of requests to play it. The song was recorded in Clarence NY at Star Track Studio in October 1975. This cassette tape master featured Norris Lewis on bass/background vocal, Willie Schoellkopf on guitar background vocal, yours truly on electric guitar lead and lead vocal, new band members Phil Youkam on drums and Ron Davis on keyboard. Faced with my limitations as a keyboard player we had the good fortune to be introduced by the studio to Mr. Davis. He ended up joining The Blue Ox Band and played with us for years after that. This recording is available along with the rest of the Blue Ox Hits Collection at www.charlieoneill.net

CHORDS WITH LYRIC

    C#m7  F#7aug   B(m)7sus2   G#m7             C#9           F#m11         D9 (13)
1.  Gol – den        Ray,              that spill from heaven,  it never lit our way.
2.  Par -  a -          dise,                how do I salvage, this wreck I’ve made of life? And
3.  Pan  -to-          mime,          the tunes we made up, with that sweet old forty’s rhyme


   G#m7     C#9       G#m7     C#9                  F#m7  G#m7 A9 D9(6) C#9
1. Live life joking,    always groping for the way.
2. Live life to dream of, you and me in paradise.
3. The words we betrayed, you and me in pantomime.

SOLO guitar, piano

  Dm11 G7aug.   C(m)7 sus2  Am7             D9                    Gm7               Eb9
4.Pair     of            dice,            just keep ‘em rolling, still you turn up snake eyes.
5.End-  less          sea,              the moon’s a-tiding, still your anchor is in me.


          Am7           D9              Am7       D9              (4) Gm Am Bb7  Eb9 D9 
4. The rules have wronged us you and me a pair of dice.  (5) Gm9 arpeggio
5. I live life to sail on,             you and me----                on endless sea.