Greaseball Heaven

Written: 1970

Writers: David Jenneson, Alan Hovden

Status: Unrecorded and unpublished

Genre and Style: Country lament parody

Comments: Dave: I wrote Greaseball Heaven in prison when I discovered why the hippies had taken over and the greasers had vanished from the landscape like dinosaurs. They were all in jail. Although it satirized the greaseball culture the greasers in our audiences identified heavily with it and adopted it as a kind of anthem. It wasn’t unusual to see them falling into states of rapture and bliss listening to it. It remained a signature tune of the Burner Boys from beginning to end.

Comments: Al: Probably the song we will be remembered for.

They say I’m going to Grease ball Heaven

Up in that Wild Root Cream Oil sky

Up there, short hair in Grease ball Heaven

Oh Lord, I don’t deserve to die.

I’ll play softball till past eleven

I’ll work on broken cars and dreams

And fight each night in Grease ball Heaven

I’ve got a hole here in my jeans

This hanging around the clouds is new to me

Gee it’s just like 1953

Hello tattoo, goodbye marijuana

Goodbye brother, hello fear

If you see me in Grease ball Heaven

Shut your mouth, boy, and drink your beer.

And if I seem a trifle indisposed

It’s just the grease ball that’s inside me trying to stretch his toes

They say I’m going to Grease ball Heaven.

I can’t imagine nothing worse.

If you see me in Grease ball Heaven

Make sure that I don’t see you first.