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in: All Eternals Deck songs, All Survivors Pack songs, Video

Liza Forever Minnelli

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Liza Forever Minnelli
All Eternals Deck

Album

All Eternals Deck

Released

2011

Artist

the Mountain Goats

Length

3:20

Previous track

"Never Quite Free"

Liza Forever Minnelli is the 13th song on the album All Eternals Deck. This song also appears as a demo on All Survivors Pack as the 12th track.

Lyrics[]

There's the part you've braced yourself
 against and then there's the other part
Steal up inclining northward streets
 with some weird sickness in the dark

Saw your name on the sidewalk
 saw your brave face in my mind
If you're gonna sit next to the dealer
 you get to bet blind

Never get away, never get away 
I am never ever gonna get away
 from this place
Lay down on the streets
 my eyes toward the sun,
 your star next to my face

The compasses I came into this world
 with never really worked so good
Gentle shadows spilling down the hills
 up on Mulholland at Ledgewood

Turn back turn back, 
find someone to tell your secrets to
Dream past an old hotel on Ivar
 and seconds later I saw you

Never get away, never get away 
I am never ever gonna get away
 from this place
Lay down on the streets
 my eyes toward the sun,
 your star next to my face

Let the camera track me
 from the footlights to the wings
Let me set aside an hour or two
 in memory of sweet things

Regrind the lens again and again
 and again and again
but still the picture flips
Anyone here mentions "Hotel California"
 dies before the first line
 clears his lips

Never get away, never get away
I am never ever gonna get away
 from this place
Lay down on the streets
 my eyes toward the sun,
 your star next to my face

Comments by John Darnielle About this Song[]

  • "[on the 'Hotel California' line] It's not that song, it's that that song is about me going back to California and remembering younger times. and, uh, if you have that experience in California, you, you harbor a little bit of resentment for the fact that that particular experience of, of nostalgia for a different time in California has sort of been branded with a great big 'E', right." -- 2011-03-30 - Soundcheck - WNYC Session - New York, NY
  • "It was written, uh, on a day when I was extraordinarily sick and had to leave tour while the rest of the people went ahead of me, and I had to sort of get my health together. It's about Liza Minnelli." -- 2018-04-21 - Upstate Concert Hall - Clifton Park, NY
  • During 2018-05-30 - Thalia Hall - Chicago, IL, John mentioned that the hotel referenced in the song was the Alexandria Hotel, presumably referring to the Hotel Alexandria in Los Angeles. However, the Hotel Alexandria is on Spring Street in downtown LA, not Ivar Avenue in Hollywood.

Things Referenced in this Song[]

  • Ledgewood Drive intersects with Mulholland Highway in Los Angeles, directly south from the Hollywood sign.
  • Ivar Avenue is a north-south street in Hollywood.
  • "Hotel California" is a song by the Eagles; from its Wikipedia article:
    • The hotel at first appears inviting and tempting, but it turns out to be a nightmarish place where "you can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave". The song is an allegory about hedonism, self-destruction, and greed in the music industry of the late 1970s.

Live Shows this Song Was Played at[]

Videos of this Song[]


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