"OLD SKOoL" is mostly original songs. Buy Now Listen to Song Clips Badger in the Outhouse Columbus Stockade I Won't Be Back Emotional Duct Tape Daddy's Old Guitar Gotta Keep Up The Organ Recital Windy Bill East Virginia Blues Silver City Ginny Little Annie Black And White Leave Me In The Rockies Straddlin' The Fence Read The Liner Notes 1. Badger In The Outhouse: Randy Helton 3:10. A comedy inspired by my 83 year old mother and her ongoing battle with tunneling rodents on her little Idaho farm. Groundhogs had tunneled under and into several of the old outbuildings and her mobile home’s front porch until the damage was getting out of hand. With the aid of the County Varmint controller, she placed poisoned carrots in all the holes and wiped out the 30 or more of the creatures. Thinking her troubles over, she filled in the holes and went about her business. Within days, something began digging open the tunnels and dragging dead groundhogs out onto the ground. She tried stuffing them back and refilling the holes to no avail. Eventually, armed with a flashlight and a lawn chair, she watched into the night to finally identify the culprits: Skunks! Attracted in from along the river bordering her property by the smell of rotting groundhogs, they were digging them out of the tunnels and eating them. She hopped at first they’d go away once they’d scavenged all the carcasses, but instead they set up housekeeping and began having babies! Now she had skunks on the porch eating cat food in the mornings and mommas with lines of babies marching down the path she took to the road for the mail and newspapers. Disturbed by the carnage of the poisonings, she decided to rid herself of skunks thru trapping. The County agent set her up with a live trap which she baited with sardines and cat food. She learned to keep a blanket over the trap. Once a skunk was caught, she’d slip up to it from the covered end and flip the blanket over the entrance end with a stick. A skunk won’t spray unless it has a visible target. The agent passed her farm on the way home from work each day and would pick up the filled traps whenever she called. He would then dispose of the skunks and return the trap next day. She trapped 14 skunks that summer, and her neighbor got 2 more on his place with a shotgun. 2. I Wont Be Back: Jerry Firth 3:57. I was inspired to write this song while driving through the Idaho Rockies on a lovely spring day. Experiencing the treasures that are found there easily convinces one to stay on as long as possible, dreaming about never returning to the more hectic life of a city dweller. Those of us who are fortunate enough to live in the Pacific Northwest all cherish the vast wilderness at our doorstep. 3. Daddy’s Old Guitar: Randy Helton 3:42. My father passed away in 2001. The last twenty years of his life he dragged this old Yamaha guitar to the junk shop where he worked (and drank) and the bars where he just drank. He only ever could play two chords on it, but he played the hell out of them and yodeled and sang his confused versions of the Appalachian folk songs of his childhood. He was always surrounded by people laughing and asking for another song. I never learned to play and sing ‘till after he passed on and deeply regret not being able to share the music with him. Still, when I hold his old guitar, I feel him there, his touch reaching out to me. Does the wood still resonate from his touch? I miss you, Daddy.. 4. The Organ Recital: Randy Helton 3:43. My father-in-law gave warning one year after Thanksgiving dinner. His friend Art was coming over for after dinner drinks. “Don’t ask about his health, he’ll give you ‘The Organ Recital’”. . 6. Ginny: Randy Helton 2:21. This song just popped into my head one day. I’ve no idea why. It just seemed cool. I drew from my father’s Kentucky mountain culture for inspiration. . 7. Black And White: Jerry Firth 3:48. This song is about the first generation of television programming that was watched on black and white TV’s. Most Americans did not get color TV sets until the late 1960’s. This song is supposed to enable the listener to recapture the magic of a simpler way of life that was experienced in the 1950’s and 60’s. As children, the band members grew up watching such classics as The Lone Ranger, I Love Lucy, Andy Griffith, and others that are mentioned in this song. Most members of the Baby Boom generation will identify with the lyrics in Black and White.. 10. Emotional Duct Tape: Randy Helton 3:31. The first song I ever wrote. My mother and I were lamenting our families difficult years. Poverty, alcoholism, and mental health issues abounded. But, Mom and Dad stayed together, we kids finished school and stayed out of jail; we survived intact. She said we were a “functioning dysfunctional family”. Some how we overcame all the trauma though we couldn’t afford therapy or good drugs. I joked that we relied on ‘emotional duct tape’. The song came in a rush over the next two days.. 11. Gotta Keep Up: Randy Helton 2:55. Every new gadget I get seems to have a huge manual to wade thru. My latest camera and telephone each have about four functions I need and want and several hundred more I have no use for. Hours of reading, yellow highlighter and sticky notes later, I’m finally able to turn it on. I’m in my 50’s now and feel the word spinning away into the future at an ever frantic pace. It makes me tired and afraid. But I’ve ‘gotta keep up’ if I want to survive!. 13. Silver City: Jerry Firth 4:16. Silver City is a mining ghost town located in the Owyhee Mountains in Southwest Idaho. The town contains many abandoned structures as well as some that are still inhabited. It is a place where the earth bears the scars of industrialization of the late 1800s softened by the passage of over a century. Those who spend time here can’t help but feel the presence of the pioneers who once called this place their home. This song was a result of walking around the town site, absorbing the history and imagining what it was like to live here. . 15. Leave Me In The Rockies: Randy Helton & Jerry Firth 3:35. I love being up in the mountains. We live in a large river valley at the border between the deserts of the American Great Basin and the foot hills of the Rocky Mountains. When ever I get up into the high meadows and forests, I feel my soul come to rest..