John Gorka
John Gorka (born 1958) is a contemporary American folk musician. In 1991, Rolling Stone magazine called him "the preeminent male singer-songwriter of what has been dubbed the New Folk Movement."
Personal life
Gorka received his first guitar as a Christmas gift. He eventually learned, instead, to play the banjo, and began performing in a folk music group at his church.
Gorka attended Moravian College in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.
As of 2005, he was residing in the St. Croix Valley area near Saint Paul, Minnesota.
Career
Gorka formed the Razzy Dazzy Spasm Band with Doug Anderson and Russ Rentler and would also include guitarist Richard Shindell. He began performing solo at the Godfrey Daniels coffee house as the opening act for various musicians including: Nanci Griffith, Bill Morrissey, Claudia Schmidt and Jack Hardy.
In 1984, Gorka was one of six winners chosen from the finalists in the New Folk competition at the Kerrville Folk Festival. Since then he has regularly toured Europe and North America.
Podcasts:
John Gorka
ALBUMS
- Bright Side of Down released: 2014
- So Dark You See released: 2009
- Writing in the Margins released: 2006
- Old Futures Gone released: 2003
- The Company You Keep released: 2001
- After Yesterday released: 1998
- Between Five and Seven released: 1996
- Out of the Valley released: 1994
- Temporary Road released: 1992
- Jack's Crows released: 1991
- Land of the Bottom Line released: 1990
- I Know released: 1987
Land of the Bottom Line
Released 1990- Land of the Bottom Line
- Armed With a Broken Heart
- Raven in the Storm
- The One That Got Away
- Full of Life
- Stranger in My Driver's Seat
- The Sentinel
- Dream Street
- Mean Streak
- Italian Girls
- Jailbirds in the Bighouse
- Promnight in Pigtown
- I Saw a Stranger With Your Hair
- Love Is Our Cross to Bear
- That's How Legends Are Made
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The Ballad Of Jamie Bee
by: John GorkaJamie ran aground out in Ohio
Wife left for the great unknown
He says he's gonna take to the high road
She will find a place alone
He says he just could not make her happy
That he never tried so hard before
He'd wake up first and make the coffee
Now the mornings were like war
There's a barroom for every way the wind blows
And a harness for every mother's son
You pull your own weight or else it pulls you
It gets harder the longer that you run
Jamie's from the last great breed of roadmen
Woody, Jack, and Kerouac and such
But here was a woman he would die for
Beauty no road could ever touch
The town was nearly famous for the glassworks
The factory where they made hoods for the klan
There's a football hall of famer in the phonebook
There's only trouble for an empty man
There's a barroom for every way the wind blows
And temptation in every substance known
You pull your own weight or else it pulls you
It gets harder the older that you've grown
At home in the harley-ridden poolhalls
I guess it's best they never had those kids
Closer to the outlaws then the in-laws
They said Jamie's heart don't break but I know it did
They said Jamie's heart don't break but I know it did
He will find some refuge in his music
And a long shot that they will reconcile
The meantime is a mean time and he knows it
Til the day he's back upon the pile
Now there's headlights heading from Ohio
And there's teardrops saltier than rain
There's taillights to tell a tale still tender
And a cold wind blowing through the night