Rehearsals for Retirement

Producer

Larry Marks

Releases

 Date    Label    Number     Country   Format     Comments
 ----    -----    ------     -------   ------     --------
  69      A&M    SP 4181       US        LP       out of print
  79   Pickwick  SPC-3707      US        LP	  out of print
  ??      A&M    pocm1919     Japan      CD       out of print
  00      CCM    WWCCM0150x    US        CD
This CD is currently available (together with Gunfight at Carnegie Hall) from Collector's Choice Music.

Credits

Engineer: Roy Gerhardt
Piano accompaniment -- Lincoln Mayorga
Guitar and Bass -- Bob Rafkin

Reviews

Thanks to the Freedom of Information Act, we can see the FBI's review of this album. :-)

Liner Notes

(The Pickwick reissue has liner notes by Howard Brinkman in place of the liner notes below)

This then is the death of the American
imprisoned by his paranoia
and all diseases of his innocent inventions
he employs the farce of force to crush his fantasies
he calls conventions of salesmen and savages
to reinforce his hopelessness
So the poet swordsmen and their lost generation
must divorce themselves from their very motherland
only for the least sensation of life or love or pain
our deepest and most religious moments
were on elevators posing as planes

Part two of this earnest epic
finds seaweed lapping against your eyes
the sailors have chosen the mystery surprise
to join the flying dutchman in his search for a green disguise
Still others invade the final colony
to present their tinted tributes to the millionaire assassin
While I stumble through this paradise
considering several suicides
for distant lavender lovers
or bless the violence of the ridiculous revolution
for self bronzing brothers
and finally turn away from the turquoise towers
of this comic civilization
my responsibilities are done let them come let them come
and I realize these last days these trials and tragedies
were after all only
our rehearsals for retirement.


Back to the Phil Ochs web page
Last modified 31 Mar 02 by trent