Get all 26 Jeni Hankins releases available on Bandcamp and save 20%.
Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of String Unraveller Demo May 2021, The American Dream (Harlis and Freda), Voice Memo Demo, I'm Letting Go of You – Kitchen Single, The Wondarium: Songs For Kids, A Body is a Delicate House, I Fell Into the Fire, The Loneliest Snowman, I Fell Into The Fire – Limited Edition Handprinted, and 18 more.
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The Hoot Owl (Live)
03:55
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The Hoot Owl
© Jeni Hankins
Oh, Jesus, this is Janey,
a’ calling to you now.
I need for you to hear me,
so I’m praying right out loud.
Mama’s ten years dead
and Daddy’s got so poor.
I’m the only one to tend him
since brother’s killed at war.
The blackest of all sinners,
I stand before you plain,
shamed by the miller’s boy
who I’ll not see again.
He promised me we’d marry,
but a soldier, now, is he
and I but one poor Christian girl,
disgraceful though I be.
Oh, Jesus, there’s a hoot owl.
At night he cries my name
and tempts me to the rafters
where I should hang for shame.
If this bird be a devil,
then I’m a devil’s maid
and false to your own precious blood
by which my sin was paid.
If this bird be an angel
then he’s Lucifer himself –
a fallen angel come to carry
fallen me to hell.
Oh, Jesus move my hand
from round this length of rope,
unbind the slippery knot
that tightens round my throat.
Though I should swing like Judas
from the crimson gallows tree,
oh, Jesus, ain’t there hope
for a broken girl like me.
Sweet Jesus make that bird
into the whitest dove
and make his cry into the song
of your redeeming love.
Sweet Jesus make his cry
into a young girl’s prayer
that she may live another day
beyond the Devil’s snares.
Oh, Jesus, this is Janey,
a’ calling to you now.
I need for you to hear me,
so I’m praying right out loud.
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3. |
Chicken Ridge (Live)
03:19
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© Jeni Hankins & Billy Kemp, 2007
Goin’ up Chicken Ridge
Don’t you wanna go?
If you’ve a notion
we could do-si-do.
Curves on Chicken Ridge,
kissin’ back to back,
make a crooked road
and there ain’t no turnin’ back.
Goin’ up Chicken Ridge
Goin’ up Chicken Ridge
Goin’ up Chicken Ridge
Don’t you wanna go?
There ain’t no shoulders,
ain’t no lines,
just a little mule road
cut between the mines.
Houses up on Chicken Ridge,
lonesome and squat,
left by the miners
the company forgot.
Goin’ up Chicken Ridge
Goin’ up Chicken Ridge
Goin’ up Chicken Ridge
Don’t you wanna go?
The top of the world
is closer than you know.
Take my hand, we’ll
catch a cloud and go.
Up that windy road
we’ll spin from ear to ear
and find ourselves
in that high atmosphere.
Goin’ up Chicken Ridge
Goin’ up Chicken Ridge
Goin’ up Chicken Ridge
Don’t you wanna go?
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4. |
McHenry Street (Live)
05:15
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Down on McHenry street the sidewalk glitters
with broken glass bottles and household litter
houses are vacant, burned out and shuttered
and weeds grow knee high in the cracks of the gutter
While the sign on the trash can says to believe
and the sign on the fire house seems to agree
Believe in Jesus, Believe in Baltimore,
Believe in something you ain’t never seen before
Kids make guns and flags, pickins from scraps of trash
or sit on their front stoops just kicking at the glass
and there ain’t no happy, and there ain’t no sad
there’s just thinking maybe this ain’t so bad
While the sign on the trash can says to believe
and the sign on the fire house seems to agree
Believe in Jesus, Believe in Baltimore,
Believe in something you ain’t never seen before
There ain’t no promise it’s gonna get right
with a citywatch camera and a flashing blue light
but down on McHenry Street the sidewalk glitters
with broken glass bottles and household litter
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5. |
Picnic in the Sky (Live)
04:22
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Picnic in the Sky
by Jeni Hankins & Billy Kemp © 2013
–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
I pulled up the milkweed, hid neath the willow tree
from the church bell and the mystery
‘cause I did not understand
Christ Jesus’ victory and how that he loved –
the tears and the tongues, the power in the blood.
Frozen dinners were a special treat
listening to radio obituaries
Great grandma hoed the yellow squash
We listened while the women talked
and the voice said, “These are the Days of Our Lives.”
I wondered did they go to the picnic in the sky
while I braided sister’s hair, watched the biscuits rise
Oh, do this in remembrance of me
The men washed their faces, removed the traces
of the local mining industry
years of working underground
to get at the low seam, to pick out the old dream
of a house and some land, a heavenly reward.
Frozen dinners were a special treat
listening to radio obituaries
Great grandma hoed the yellow squash
We listened while the women talked
and the voice said, “These are the Days of Our Lives.”
I wondered did they go to the picnic in the sky
while I braided sister’s hair, watched the biscuits rise
Oh, do this in remembrance of me
The miner now a memory, in the same place as little me
fussing with my dolly and singing
the old rugged cross
listening to the women speak of patchwork and recipes
the power in the blood, the power in the blood.
Frozen dinners were a special treat
listening to radio obituaries
Great grandma hoed the yellow squash
We listened while the women talked
and the voice said, “These are the Days of Our Lives.”
I wondered did they go to the picnic in the sky
while I braided sister’s hair, watched the biscuits rise
Oh, do this in remembrance of me.
by Jeni Hankins & Billy Kemp © 2013
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6. |
Reckoning Day (Live)
05:55
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Reckoning Day
© Jeni Hankins & Billy Kemp, 2005
________________________________
There are somethings ain’t worth rescuing
some ships you watch go down
while you stand there on the shore
holding fast to the new love you’ve found
There’ll be a love, catches you unaware
some angel will come your way
and you’ll take her into your heart
though you know there will be a reckoning day
There are somethings ain’t nothing but trouble
some prisons you build yourself
brick by brick with your misfortunes
til some angel pulls you from hell
Look out for love, halos and feathers,
your wishes, the things that you pray
‘cause your dreams, just might come true
and you know there will be a reckoning day
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There hung a banjo
alone on a wall
hung there for years
making no sound at all
till along came a Robin
in the window to sing
and oh how that banjo did ring
She sang, “I’ve been flying
through a nearby wood
where the air is clear
and the water is good,
the pines so sturdy
and their needles so green
and oh how that banjo did ring
He said, “I once travelled
with a lonesome hobo,
I rode the steel rails
and I joined that hobo
in many wild tales.
Now that old hobo
is naught but a dream.”
and oh how that banjo did ring
One day the old house
with the banjo fell down
and the Robin cried
when she heard the sound.
She sang a tune
sad and true
of a hobo and a banjo
and the rambles they knew
and in the rubble
she heard the strings
and oh how that banjo did ring
She plucked the strings
and the ebony pegs
she took the bridge
and the broken head
all to her nest
where together they sing
and oh how that banjo did ring
© Jeni Hankins & Billy Kemp
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The Mill Hurries On
by Jeni Hankins © 2012
Oh, the cotton flew around us like an alien snow.
Having no way to melt, in our lungs it did go
and there made its home, like an unwelcome guest,
‘til it grew and it grew so we could not take breath.
There are trees in the country that give fruit for free –
not belonging to you or belonging to me.
No free thing can grown in a cotton mill town,
so to work we must go. Child, let us go down.
The machines, they did roar. They made my head ache,
but I could not take rest nor make a mistake
for the wages I earned, though meager alone,
when put with my family’s, preserved our dear home.
There are trees in the country that give fruit for free –
not belonging to you or belonging to me.
No free thing can grown in a cotton mill town,
so to work we must go. Child, let us go down.
Way down in my dreams, lived a devil well dressed.
He counted his money with his foot on my chest.
I knew that my fever told a story well known.
I am no longer and the mill hurries on.
There are trees in the country that give fruit for free –
not belonging to you or belonging to me.
No free thing can grown in a cotton mill town,
so to work we must go. Child, let us go down.
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The Mystery of You and Me © Jeni Hankins & Billy Kemp, 2006
____________________________________________________
Vs.1.
How can we say we’re meant to be
and then doubt we should be in it?
How can we say we’ve waited so long
and then end it before we begin it?
Vs.2.
So many nights we’ve laid awake
thinking it was only the weather,
wondering if our troubled hearts
thought we should have known better.
Ch.1.
If we could find the compass and map
to show us that heavenly key,
we could unlock the mystery of love –
the mystery of you and me . . .
the mystery of you and me.
Vs.3.
How will we ever learn to love
if we refuse to let love teach us?
Is it we who are too deaf and blind
for it’s light to reach us?
Ch.2.
If we could find the compass and map
to show us that heavenly key,
we could unlock the mystery of love –
the mystery of you and me . . .
Ch.3.
If we could find the compass and map
to show us that heavenly key,
we could unlock the mystery of love –
the mystery of you and me . . .
the mystery of you and me.
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10. |
If I Ever Get $10 (Live)
02:47
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If I ever get ten dollars
gonna buy me a three piece suit and
gonna buy you a diamond ring and
gonna marry you.
If I ever get ten dollars
gonna buy me a piece of land and
build a house with a picket fence
with my own two hands.
If I ever get ten dollars
gonna quit this railway car and
hang up my walking shoes and
stay right where you are.
@ Jeni Hankins & Billy Kemp
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11. |
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I heard some trouble came your way
just flew on in the other day
It shook you up, knocked you flat
left you hurting quick as that
I’m no doctor, I’m just a friend
who’s had his share of old dead ends
I’m no preacher, but here’s what I know
You take it easy, take it slow
When tales of sorrow chase you down
leave you lyin’ on lower ground
Don’t you listen (don’t you listen) to that sound
there’s a sweet song comin’ round
I’m no doctor, I’m just a friend
who’s had a share of old dead ends
I’m no preacher, but here’s what I know
You take it easy, take it slow
When tales of sorrow chase you down
leave you lyin’ on lower ground
Don’t you listen (don’t you listen) to that sound
there’s a sweet song comin’ round
© Jeni Hankins & Billy Kemp 2011
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12. |
Goodbye (Live)
00:17
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Jeni Hankins London, UK
Jeni Hankins grew up in the coalfields of Appalachian in Southwest Virginia among a family of miners, moonshiners, and
journalists. Her writing pulls the grit, gumption, and keen sense of observation out of that heritage like drawing water from her grandmother’s well.
In every song, Jeni’s “true sense of place shines through – old as the hills, but brand new at the same time.”
... more
Jeni Hankins recommends:
For me, this is the best of folk music, what it's all meant to be. After years of listening to Rebecca & Ken, I still get shivers up my spine when I hear them together.
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