Goin' Cali - Bruce Springsteen

Well he’d been hearing too many voices and feelin’a little off-rack

Like there was something big pressing down on his back

So he called up his friends and they said come on out west

It’s a place where a man can really feel his succes

So he pulled his heart and soul down off the shelf

Packed them next to the faith that he’d lost in himself

Said his good-byes and when the dirty work was done

He turned his wheels into the fading sun

For seven days and nights like a black-top bird he sped

Maintained radio silence 'cept for in his head

And just like his folks did back in '69

He crossed the border at Needles and heard the promised land on the line

Now where the Transcontinental dumps into the sea

There’s a bar made up to look like 1963

Girl in the corner eyed him like a hungry dog a bone

As he brushed the desert dust off that Mercedes chrome

Bartender said «Hey, how’s it hangin', tiger?»

He had a shot of tequila, smiled and whispered «lighter»

He went down to the desert city where the rattlesnakes play

And left his dead skin by the roadside in the noon of day

Sun got so hot it almost felt like friend

It could burn out every trace of where you been

There was a woman he’d met in a desert song

A little while later a son come along

Looked at that boy’s smile and called it home