Free Music Tuesday: Gerald Collier

When some people are feelin' the blues, they put on the Cure or Miles Davis or - I don't know - Elton John (because sad songs say so much). All fine choices, yes, but when I want to relish my depression with some countrified tear-in-my-single-malt music I reach for my Gerald Collier CDs. The guy is the master of this type of music. I swear, his acoustic I Had to Laugh Like Hell album was made for hard drinking. Here are some choice lines of his:

• "I'm holding up my end/of the bar again" ("Forgiveness From Revenge")
  
• "If I could throw a rock/I'd throw it at the sun/Hard enough to bring that bad boy down here/And laugh like hell as burns a whole through everyone/It burns a hole right through you, my dear" ("Losing Everything")
  
• "I would do almost anything you told me/I'd do anything but lie/I'd blow my brains out if you asked me/I'm just that kind of guy" ("To Break the Ice")
  
• "You let me know you wish that I/Had never been born/And with the strength left in your hands/I'm torn apart at the seams/Somehow it's my fault you have no dreams" ("Dark Days")
  
• "My ship came in just in time for sinkin'/And now that it's gone I've got more time to get wasted/Who could as for more?" ("Who Could Ask For More")
  
• "I don't want a fight/I want pills/Something strong enough/The stuff that kills" ("I'm Not Coming Back")
  
• I'd like to play truth or dare/With someone who cares/I'd like to sleep around/But no one calls anymore" ("Truth or Dare")
  
• "You'd think after all this time/I'd have closed the case/Opened a book of matches/And torched this place" ("Still Your Fool")
  
• "Gonna sit in this chair/Drink until you're not there/Fall on the floor/Wake up and drink more" ("Bender [I'm on One]")
  
• "Don't discard me on this evidence/Don't believe what's on bathroom walls/You know I'd never stay the night/You know I'm not a good time at all" ("Don't Discard Me")
  
• "I was up thinking to myself last night/How much better I'd be if I'd a shot her on sight" ("Pure Lonely")

Well, you get the idea. Yesterday I wasn't in the best of moods, so I took a page from the Book of Henry Rollins (who lifts weights to ballads and sad music) and hit the gym with my mp3 player full of GC and had a good, cathartic work out.

Today I'm offering two Gerald Collier songs: "Dark Days" and "Note From a Woman to a Man." Leave me a comment requesting either or both of them and I'll e-mail them to you.

(THSE, should I just directly desposit these files into your inbox? After all, you're pretty much the only one who ever takes me up on my offer.)