Lyr Req: Hurricane (Leon Everett)

Subject: unknown words
From: F.A. Williams
Date: 26 Dec 96 - 01:39 AM

I'm searching for the words of a song. It is about the flooding of the Ponchartrain. It is about an old timer who knows that the flood waters will be down by morning, and there's not a lot to do about the waters flooding, but a young engineer from the North came down and was putting sand bags, etc. to control the flood while the chorus keeps saying the waters will be down by morning. That's all I can remember about the song. Hope someone can help at least with the title.

Subject: RE: unknown words
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 16 Sep 01 - 05:24 PM

Songs that contain the name "Pontchartrain" have a confused history. According to the All Music Guide:

Hank Williams recorded a song called "On the Banks of the Old Pontchartrain." (Note the spelling.) The same song (I think) is also called "The Banks of the Old Pontchartrain" and "Banks of the Pontchartrain." And some sources call it "traditional."

There is also a song called "The Lakes of Pontchartrain," but I have also found it spelled "Lakes of Pentchartrain/Ponchartrain/Ponchetrain."

This might be a good place to clear up the spelling problem. According to the Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names, there is a Lake Pontchartrain in Louisiana; an "inhabited place" in France called Pontchartrain; and an old name for the city of Detroit was Fort Pontchartrain Détroit or Fort-Pontchartrain-du-Détroit. There are numerous places in the US called Pontchartrain Creek, Pontchartrain Gardens, etc., and the spelling seems to be consistently "Pontchartrain." Apparently, it is only music publishers who are inconsistent!

Sorry for the rant, because none of these seems to be the song you asked for!

Subject: RE: unknown words
From: catspaw49
Date: 16 Sep 01 - 06:01 PM

And it's that inconsistency that makes searching for some stuff so difficult.....

Spaw

Subject: RE: unknown words
From: GUEST
Date: 16 Sep 01 - 06:06 PM

?

Subject: ADD: Hurricane (Leon Everett)
From: Joe Offer
Date: 16 Sep 01 - 08:07 PM

The one the Guest linked to above is "Louisiana 1927," by Randy Newman. That's not the song, but I think it's one verybody should take a look at.
I found the song here (click). I know nothing about Leon Everett, but it looks like a great song.
-Joe Offer-

---

Hurricane
Leon Everett

  F#                      A
  Thirty miles out in the Gulfstream
        B                      F#
  I can hear those south winds moan
  
  Bridges are looking lower
  Shrimp boats hurrying home
  The old man down in the quarter
  Slowly turned his head
  Took another sip of whiskey
  He looked at me and said
  
  CHORUS:
  
             F#                      A
  Well I was born in the rain by the Ponchartrain
       B                    F#
  Underneath that Louisiana moon
    F#                         A
  I don't mind the strain of a hurricane
           B                  C#
  When she comes 'round every June
  F#                         A
  High black water she's the devil's daughter
        B                             F#
  She's hard an' she's cold an' she's mean
                            A         
  Nobody taught her that it takes a lot of water
     B             F#
  To wash away New Orleans
  
  Man come down from Chicago
  Gonna set that levee right
  He said it's got to be three feet higher
  Or it won't make it through the night
  The old man down in the quarter
  Said don't you listen to that boy
  The water be down by morning
  So he'll be on his way to Illinois.
  
  CHORUS
  CHORUS

Subject: Lyr Add: LOUISIANA 1927 (Randy Newman)
From: Joe Offer
Date: 16 Sep 01 - 08:09 PM

LOUISIANA 1927
Written by Randy Newman
As sung by Randy Newman on "Good Old Boys" (1974)

What has happened down here is the wind have changed.
Clouds roll in from the north and it start to rain.
Rained real hard and it rained for a real long time.
Six feet o' water in the streets of Evangeline.

River rose all day; the river rose all night.
Some people got lost in the flood; some people got away alright.
River has busted through clear down to Plaquemines.
Six feet o' water in the streets of Evangeline.

Louisiana, Louisiana,
They're tryin' to wash us away.
They're tryin' to wash us away.
Louisiana, Louisiana,
They're tryin' to wash us away.
They're tryin' to wash us away.

President Coolidge came down in a railroad train
With a little fat man with a notepad in his hand.
The President say, "Little fat man, isn't it a shame
What the river has done to this poor cracker's land?"

Louisiana, Louisiana,
They're tryin' to wash us away.
They're tryin' to wash us away.
Louisiana, Louisiana,
They're tryin' to wash us away.
They're tryin' to wash us away.
They're tryin' to wash us away.
They're tryin' to wash us away.

Subject: RE: unknown words (Hurricane)
From:
Date: 16 Sep 01 - 08:12 PM

Thanks guys.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Hurricane (Leon Everett)
From: GUEST,nurse
Date: 02 Sep 05 - 01:16 AM

I remembered that song, Hurricane, and isn't it so appropriate for what is happening in New Orleans right now? It did take a lot of water to wash it away. Our prayers are with those people in that area.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Hurricane (Leon Everett)
From: GUEST,A country favorite
Date: 03 Sep 05 - 09:55 PM

Leon Everett, the artist, circa 1981 probably never envisioned what could happen if a cat 5 hurricane hit New Orleans head on. As a 21 year old in 1981 this was one of my favorite country tunes. I was raised on rock. Who ever put the guitar chords above...I thank you!!!!
Sincerely
Mikey

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Hurricane (Leon Everett)
From: GUEST,writertrc in Louisiana
Date: 07 Sep 05 - 01:42 AM

I live in Louisiana & was begging WYNK in Baton Rouge to play that song during hurricane Andrew and I couldn't talk him into it. That and another song, "There's Nothing Like A Louisiana Rain," keeps going through my head & I can't get them out just like during Andrew. It's real bad when the wind is howling and the windows shaking and the rain pounding and you don't know if your home is going to survive or be flooded & if you'll loose anything, everything or just have no electricity for a week & all you can do is hear those too songs going through your head!

Considering all the evacuees in Baton Rouge I don't think I'd be brave enough to play either or at least not "Hurricane," right now. Native Aaron Neville redid "Louisiana" & the news has been playing it to pictures a lot lately. Nice but the clouds didn't roll in from the north & it didn't rain very much at all. It was all storm surge & wind.

Oh, & New Orleans didn't take a direct hit. If it had it wouldn't be even worse than Gulfport & Biloxi, Mississippi. Had that of happened Baton Rouge would be under the type of water New Orleans is right now.

Subject: Lyr Add: IN THE SHELTER (Jimmy Buffett)
From: GUEST
Date: 07 Sep 05 - 03:20 AM

I don't know much about Leon Everette although the name is vaguely familiar. But I'm familiar with a brilliant version by Levon Helm and haven't been able to get it out of my mind all week. If only the old man in the Quarter had been right one more time! Another one that's been haunting me is a song by Jimmy Buffett that my sister used to play all the time. I don't remember all the words but it goes something like:

In the shelter
In the morning when the sun was brightly gleaming
I heard her crying out
"What is it all about?
I just don't know
But I can't go back home."

Lonely princess,
All your days out on your own are growing empty
Nothing is going well
If you could only tell them how you feel
But they're too real to understand.

On the streetcar
To the city where she knows she may lose it all
Riding for just a dime
Taking her own sweet time
And knowing well that this could be her final fall

Past the boutiques
Down the alley people pass her by
She sits on a big gray rock
Takes off her shoes and socks
And, not knowing what she will do next,
Just starts to cry.

Too many innocent faces in too many far out places
Something's wrong
And it's been that way too long
And it's a shame.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Hurricane (Leon Everett)
From: GUEST,Nance
Date: 07 Sep 05 - 08:26 AM

I've been hearing the song HURRICANE all week on the Don Imus show...just was sitting here and decided to find out who recorded it and what the actual name of it was...it's haunting. I searched 'Louisiana it's trying to wash us away', and found the info right away. What an appropriate song to be playing...

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Hurricane (Leon Everett)
From: GUEST,guest- thysfunctional1
Date: 08 Sep 05 - 01:33 AM

yeah... You probably won't hear 'When the Levee Breaks' by Led Zeppelin on the radio either any time soon. I live in Louisiana and can't get any rock station to play it. The Leon Everette song just plain kicks ass!

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Hurricane (Leon Everett)
From:
Date: 08 Sep 05 - 10:45 AM

THANK YOU SO VERY MUCH.The artist Leon Everett is an american country singer and song writer. I had been trying to find this song for years. I never could find out who the writer was, but thanks to you I can live here in good ole Louisiana and be at peace.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Hurricane (Leon Everett)
From: GUEST,Friend
Date: 12 Sep 05 - 05:13 PM

Some really good info on songs here...just wondered if anyone knows the history of Lakes of Ponchartrain. It's going to be sung at a concert to raise funds for Katrina victims and the question of it's origins were raised.
The furthest back I can get for sure is it being in England in 1969 and a theory that it was brought back there by soldiers of the war of 1812 but the reference to railroad in the song are said to make that unlikely.

Thanks everyone and God Bless!

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Hurricane (Leon Everett)
From: GUEST,NOel
Date: 13 Sep 05 - 10:58 PM

I was hoping to find the song on a website so I could down load it. I was about to give up all hope when I found this web site. This is such a relief. It is a great song. Please help if you know where I could down load this song.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Hurricane (Leon Everett)
From: GUEST,Infogirl
Date: 28 Aug 06 - 12:58 AM

im the head of a louisiana "rebuilding New Orleans Foundation". I'm in the process of obtaining songs that haver to do with the Gulf Stream. I am trying to find his CD, or maybe even him to see if he would like to come to Los Angeles to perform. Thanks and please answer!!!

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Hurricane (Leon Everett)
From: GUEST,tsr6d5
Date: 25 Nov 06 - 07:20 PM

His song, Hurricane, has only appeared on CD once. It is on "Classic Country Volume 1" from Renaissance Records which is now out of print, but one could probably find a used or new copy of it on Amazon.com. Sadly, pretty much all of his music is not commercially available and probably never will be. I have all his albums, and they are awesome!

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Hurricane (Leon Everett)
From: GUEST,gerdelt
Date: 14 Dec 06 - 02:35 AM

I have this song in MP3 format. If you want it, send an email to gerdelt at hotmail dot com