Tubeman ©1997 Rich & Flo Newman (BMI)

I saw the coast guard reports - seemed so strange to me
I saw the coast guard reports
The ones about Tubeman - are you wondrin 'bout Tubeman at sea
What's up with this Tubeman

(Chorus)
Tubeman, do you have the answer sheet
Tubeman, are you keeping score
Tubeman, do you need directions
Has Tubeman ever known the shore

Coast guard pilot reports in September 22
Sights a fleet of people floating - drifting on inner tubes
Calls for action - calls for the cutter
Calls coordinates - then flies home
Tubeman - do you ...

September 23rd - second sighting just occurred
Pilot Shube of the "Clear Sky" -HU25
Hails Captain Young in District One
Who responds, dispatches, and files report

Twenty five floating on black tubes
20 miles, east of Cape Ann
Twenty five floating on black tubes
13 women, 12 men - no visible means of support

Tubed ones - do you have...
Cutter Constance diverted - search and rescue no success
It was Young himself who made the calls
State and locals been cross~checked
No missing persons land or sea - foghorn moans a mystery

Within 2 days - 18 miles beyond the bay
Now there's 26 on tubes
Young is hailed by Pilot Shube
Calls for action - no response - calls coordinates - no response

Tubed ones ...
I saw the Coast Guard Reports
They're hard to understand at all
Captain Young is m.i.a.
Captain Young presumed a.w.o.l.
Call for action - no response, call for action ...

rock, pop, easy listening, kids/family, alternative, ac (adult contemporary)

(note to a&r: Genre is strictly speaking a subset of performance, not lyric and melody. So if you are looking for material to cover, consider searching all genres ... then interpret it in your genre)

upbeat tempo, hooky, mysterious, upbeat feel,with a slight melancholy undertone,

description: This song was inspired by an art show consisting of paintings by Christin Couture. She had painted a series of paintings of people floating on inner tubes surrounded by water. There was an aura of mystery in these vast oceans with tube people at sunrise (or is it sunset?) -pink reflected across the clouds.
We researched coast guard reports to learn the correct terminology. After having the initial idea to create a coast guard related incident, we were stunned and amazed when we studied the reports, showing the work that the US Coast Guard does on a regular routine basis, every single day. We tried to incorporate their terminology to give the song a feeling of authenticity. The fictional pilot captain is based on Flo's uncle who was shot down in Europe (France?) during World War II. He came from Marblehead Massachusetts.
For a sense of place, we used Cape Ann on the Massachusetts North Shore near Gloucester. For this bizarre story to work, we had to make it sound and feel like it came right off the coast guard report. We tried to create the reactions of real people to an inexplicable event.  But we also wanted to maintain an air of mystery and freedom suggested by the original paintings that had inspired it. We also hoped to capture the feeling and fantasy of freedom that people experience when floating on their inner tubes. It's also suggestive of someone re-examining his life, and his values -trying to decide what is really important and significant about life.


Title: Tubeman
Author(s):Richard & FloraLee Newman
Year:©1997
Pro:BMI
Licensing: contact authors
Publisher: contact authors

Title: Tubeman
Author(s):Richard & FloraLee Newman
Year:©1997
Pro: BMI
Published: on TagYerit's CD "Heavy Construction"
Artist: TagYerit with Flo (guitars, vocals) Rich (bass) Patrick Lavery (drums)
Producer: Ed Vadas
Recorded: Greg Steele (engineer) at Derek Studios - Dalton, MA
Mastered: Northeastern Digital Southborough, MA
Review Quotes:
GoGirls (GoGirlsMusic.com) "Megan MeGehee "2001 Hit Picks: Tubeman and Milestones"
Pam West (Geoff Wilbur's Renegade Newsletter) - "What would happen if you floated into the Bermuda Triangle on an inner tube? Flo and Rich Newman have done it again. Savvy and sleek, quirky and fun, dark and funky pop with phenomenal lyrics."
Eric O'Brien 181.4 DftN! - "Back is the refreshing Tagyerit. "Tubeman" is the follow up to the highly acclaimed "Heavy Construction". Luckily, "Tubeman" does not float lazy like down the river of music... oh hell no.
Barney Quick Indie-Music.com (http://Indie-Music.com/tagyerit2.htm) "The title cut may be the cleverest of them all, with its great rhymes & rich Coast Guard lingo. "
Licensing: contact authors
publisher: contact authors

These 3 stores are just a few places you can buy the tracks digitally

• Apple iTunes   (you'll have to search for the song there)
• MP3Tunes  (this will take you directly to the page with this song)
• The Next Big Thing (South Africa)

To buy the entire CD check it out at CDBaby (the best CD store online)

For all other inquiries, contact Rich Newman

reports of person-filled inner-tubes floating in the ocean, a ship's captain who joins a band of renegades floating in the sea on inner tubes after setting out to investigate them. enigma, unsolved mystery, unexplained phenomena, very singable hummable chorus - It has been suggested that this song gives a slight nod to David Bowie's song "A Space Oddity".