Joshua Hayes Carll, known as Hayes Carll, is a singer-songwriter from The W… Read Full Bio ↴Joshua Hayes Carll, known as Hayes Carll, is a singer-songwriter from The Woodlands, Texas (a Houston suburb). He is currently signed to Lost Highway Records.

Carll has toured relentlessly in North America and abroad (performing over two hundred shows a year), founded a successful singer-songwriter music festival on the Gulf Coast of Texas, secured a record deal with Lost Highway Records, and has even seen his album Little Rock become the first self-released album to reach #1 on the Americana Music Chart.

"When I started, I moved down to this place called Crystal Beach, Texas where you need to take a ferry from Galveston across the bay to get to this little peninsula on the Gulf of Mexico," recalls Carll, who grew up just outside Houston. "It's this isolated coastal community with a wild assortment of people either hiding out, hanging on or getting lost-- a lot of drugs and drinking, a fair amount of violence, but at the same time a lot of really interesting people with great stories to tell. Folks in the bars there weren't necessarily interested in what I had to say as a songwriter-- they wanted to hear David Allan Coe and Merle Haggard, and other stuff they knew. So that's what I did six nights a week for four years. I haven't run into tougher crowds since. It was an initiation into becoming a performer."

Those experiences not only gave Carll a thick skin, they gave him plenty of material to spin into songs like the low-slung, finger-picked blues "I Got a Gig" -- populated by characters like the "barefoot shrimper with a pistol up his sleeve" -- and the tear-in-your-beer waltz "Beaumont," in which a suitor bearing a single white rose makes a fruitless trip to try to win over a lady love. Carll says of the latter tune. "I like to try to tackle a heavy topic but do it with a light touch. The more personal, weightier stuff doesn't come as easy, even though that's what I like to think about the most."

Carll has developed that touch over a long stretch that began when he was still in his teens, a stretch he spent writing poems, short stories and songs by the notebook-full. He eventually discovered that the last of those three flowed from him most easily, and while he dutifully headed off to college, he spent more time strumming and singing. To hear him tell it, "I sort of sabotaged my career options to the point where, by the time I was out of school, I was pretty much unemployable and had no choice but to be a musician."

After moving to the Gulf Coast, Carll honed his craft in the area bars and beer-joints as well as more serious folk clubs like the venerable Old Quarter in Galveston, where he opened for a wide array of respected songwriters such as Ray Wylie Hubbard, Willis Alan Ramsay and many others. By 2002, he was ready to unleash his recorded indie debut, Flowers and Liquor, which, while not widely distributed, garnered plenty of critical praise, including American Songwriter's claim that the disc "suggests the young Texan might be the next great songwriter from a state full of maestros."

He lived up to that praise on his next outing, Little Rock, an offering on which Carll showed off his stylistic breadth by steering his band from searing rock to jazz-tinged balladry -- a scope that earned praise both at home and across the pond, where the Irish Times raved "This is the first mighty country record of the year, a bruised, bedraggled affair full of jagged memories and wry observations."

On his 2008 album Trouble In Mind, there's a much sharper focus to the material, thanks in part, to more time in the studio and some great players sure to be familiar to roots-rock aficionados, including, Dan Baird, Darrell Scott, Will Kimbrough and former Flying Burrito Brother Al Perkins.

“My first record I did in five days, and my second one we did in twelve," Carll explains. "This time around I had a solid month, so it was really a luxury. It was amazing to get all these talented people in the room and have them listen to me describe my vision and then go out and try to realize that and capture it on tape. My strength isn't that I have the world's most amazing voice or that I'm this incredible player -- hopefully it's that there's some aspect of my personality and my lyrics that people can relate to."

Carll’s personality, emotional but never too sentimental, mischievous, funny, world-weary and sardonic, imbues every track of Trouble in Mind. He’s never afraid to be vulnerable and direct, as on one of the standout tracks, “Willing to Love Again” - “I feel too much, I protect too much, most times I probably expect too much. I spend my life on this broken crutch, and you believe I can fly.”

Carll's 2011 album KMAG YOYO (& Other American Stories) was The album includes "Another Like You," a duet with Cary Ann Hearst The L.A. Times described the album as "Carll is every bit as expressive a singer as he is a writer, drawling his trenchant observations with deceptive ease."

Carll’s live performances continue to win over fans everywhere. His clever, irreverent lyrics and sharp observations combined with his warm Texas drawl make his stories and anecdotes as compelling and entertaining as his songs. There’s that sweet taste of honey followed with the sharp sting of a wisecrack. Never is that tongue-in-cheek humor more obvious than on the red neck rant “She Left Me For Jesus”, where a clueless lover is upset and suspicious over the changes in his girlfriend. “Now she’s acting funny and I don’t understand. I think that she’s found her some other man. She’s left me for Jesus, and that just ain’t fair. She says that he’s perfect, how can I compare?” “You know I’m always a little nervous when I sing that song. Like Ray Wiley Hubbard says, the problem with irony is that people don’t always get it.”

Long Way Home
Hayes Carll Lyrics

Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴

Ramblin boy you've been around
Dallas to the underground
High above and down below
And places I was scared to go
You sang it loud in case they heard
Hanging on to every word
Gentle as a lullaby
Firecrackers in your eyes

I would give anything
For one more night to run
And one last song to sing
You weren't asking much at all
Just catch you when you fall
On your own
The long way home

What's that sadness in your smile
You've been crying all the while
Could you lean upon my shoulder
In case you die or just get old
So what are we supposed to do
Just walk around forever blue?
And all this hurry up and wait
Was it chance or was it fate

I would give anything
For one more night to run
And one last song to sing
You weren't asking much at all
Just catch you when you fall
On your own
The long way home

You weren't asking much at all
Just catch you when you fall

On your own
The long way home

Overall Meaning

The song 'Long Way Home' by Hayes Carll is a beautiful tribute to a ramblin' friend who has been around quite a lot, from Dallas to the underground, high above and down below, and places that the singer is scared to go. The song's lyrics narrate the singer's admiration for the friend who was always singing loud, gentle as a lullaby, and had firecrackers in his eyes. The song talks about how much the singer misses this friend and would give anything for one more night to run and one last song to sing.

In the second verse, the singer asks about the friend's sadness in his smile, as he has been crying for a while. The singer offers his shoulder to lean on, in case the friend dies or gets old. The singer then contemplates the meaning of life, and wonders what they are supposed to do, just walk around forever blue. He then asks if it was chance or fate that brought them together, and if it matters in the long run. The song ends on a melancholic yet hopeful note, with the singer promising to catch his friend if he falls, on his own long way home.

Line by Line Meaning

Ramblin boy you've been around
You have travelled to many different places

Dallas to the underground
From a big city to a gritty scene

High above and down below
You've seen the extremes of life

And places I was scared to go
You've gone to places I was too afraid to visit

You sang it loud in case they heard
You sang your heart out so others could hear your message

Hanging on to every word
People were captivated and intrigued by your performance

Gentle as a lullaby
Your voice was soothing and calming

Firecrackers in your eyes
Your eyes were bright and full of energy

I would give anything
I would sacrifice anything

For one more night to run
To spend one more night running around with you

And one last song to sing
To hear you sing one last time