Dance, Dance But It's Let's Get It Started by The Black Eyed Peas

[Monologue] Around about 1953 I went down to New Orleans Perhaps I should say many years ago It was in the summer time I went down there with Frank and Guy We sang and bust our way through the Smoky Mountains And on down to New Orleans And while we were down there, we had a name of a fella to look up Billy Fair was a five-string banjo picker Lived in a house called 912 Toulouse Street And the way we found him, well that was a whole 'nother song Let's just say we found Billy Fair And he took us over there to 912 Toulouse Street The only entrance I knew to this place Was over a back fence up an alley And over a fence, by some garbage cans, look out for that rusty nail Now you're up, now you're over And there was a cement over patio With a pave of concrete, with a banana tree in the middle it Well, I never did see no banana hanging on it As they said it was a banana tree And a wooden staircase leading up to a wooden balcony That connected all the various different musicians And different various pads And a grey cat with three legs named Grey That used to lope along and fall down 'Cause Grey he had a stroke, couldn't run too good on them three legs no how It was very hot there and humid in August What with the wind coming off the Mrs Miller River by the Jack's Brewery And around towards sundown, the weather broke and the To a tropical rainstorm and the rain came And there was this girl there who had once been an ex-ballet dancer And she took all her clothes off and danced around in the rain Around the banana tree, around and around And I followed suit Until the rain stopped So naturally everybody ran indoors And we sat around drinking Billy Fair's wine And getting acquainted till it was almost sun-up And as day started breaking, everybody start splitting Over that back alley fence Which was the only entrance I ever knew to that place And I split too Stayed around three weeks in New Orleans Never did see the light of day And I never have been back Did you ever, stand and shiver Just because you were, looking at a river Version 2 from Kerouac's Last Dream (1981) Here come this little blue car, I think it was a Plymouth All the way from L.A. into New York town and I was fooling around in Washington Square Park playing guitar There was fiddles and banjos and mandolins Everybody was singing songs One Sunday afternoon, Guy and Frank They came in this little car They were on their way to North Carolina Said they's going down there to hear some live music And they invited me to come along on their trip Threw my guitar in the back seat and we took off down Highway 301 Past Richmond, down across the North Carolina line Guy's uncle lived on a farm near the ocean On the coast of North Carolina Neighbor was a fisherman, took us out on his boat And we went shrimp fishing We caught some shrimp, mostly we caught some sunburn Got back just in time for dinner Boy, was that good, Southern cooking Black eyed peas, corn bread, oakry, buttered beans After the dinner, dishes were put away We're sitting on the porch watching a thunder shower And Frank he pulled out his guitar Started playing a weird song about California I asked him about it the next morning as we were heading west Heading for the Smoky Mountains Frank was in the back seat practicing the banjo Said "Hey Frank, what was that song you played yesterday?" And he said it was the South Coast So I asked him if he'd play it No, wouldn't play it, couldn't play it And he didn't play it for about four days till we had another thunder shower It's just that kind of a song, I guess By this time we were clear over Tennessee We saw the Grand Old Opry, met Grandpa Jones Met Earl Skruggs too And we got back in our car and headed over to the Mississippi River Headed south down to New Orleans, New Orleans, Louisiana We had the name of a guy to look up there, he's a banjo picker Billy Fair, looked him up in a telephone directory But we wasn't there So we parked the car and took to the streets Down Bourbon Street, up Rue Royale Ended up down at the Waterfront Near the Mrs Miller River there in a café There was Billy, drinking a coffee He invited us over to his pad which was located at 912 Toulouse Just a short walk up the street and up a back alley And over a board fence Up over a garbage can lid and over the fence And down you go landing lightly on your feet For there's concrete in the patio And there's a banana tree there, I think it was a banana tree Had a lot of bananas hanging on it And a three legged cat He sat there on the stairs like it was guarding something I ran past the cat and I went upstairs It was a dark room, I went inside the room There was a chair in there that was carved out of an old Mexican palm tree And Jack Kerouac had sat in that chair Only a month before down in Mexico Don't ask me how I knew that I just knew that, I sat down in the chair Composed a ballad about Jack Kerouac, sitting in that chair Then it started raining, I got up and went outside Standing on the balcony over the patio, smelling the air A delicious smell of mean fall in New Orleans Everybody went inside and started picking the banjo Guitar, singing songs, telling stories, getting acquainted Before you know it the sun came up, everybody split I guess they didn't want to be caught out in that hot New Orleans sun Went out over that back fence Didn't seem to be no front door on the place We all ended up in a bar down in the Waterfront With John Truman telling stories about the Merchant Marine And ships and the sea for three and a half days One night after that story, I decided to ship out Ship out around the world Went down to the Merchant Marine, NMU hall Come to get our seamen papers Well, in order to get your seamen's paper you got to get a letter From the ship owner, to the Union And get a letter from the Union to the Coast Guard Get a letter from the Coast Guard to the Union To get a letter from the Coast Guard to the ship owner To get a letter from the ship owner to the Union To get a letter from the Union to the ship owner Get a letter from the Union to the Coast Guard So it said "Frick it!", we'll build our own ship [Sung] Did you ever, stand and shiver Just because, you were looking at a river