my father is a doctor he s a family man my mother works for charity whenever she can and they re both good clean americans who abide by the law and they both stick up for liberty and they both support the war my happiness was paid for when they laid their money down for summers in a summer camp and winters in the town my future in the system was talked about and planned but i gave it up for music and the free electric band i went to school in hand washed shirts with neatly ordered hair and the school was big and newly built and filled with light and air and the teachers taught us values that we had to learn to keep and they d clip the ear of any idle kid who went to sleep and my father organised for me a college in the east but i went to california the sunshine and the beach my parents and my lecturers could never understand why i gave it up for music and the free electric band well they used to sit and speculate upon their son s career a lawyer or a doctor or a civil engineer just give me bread and water put a guitar in my hand cause all i need is music and the free electric band my father sent me money and i spent it very fast on a girl i met in berkeley in a social science class yes and we learnt about her body but her mind we didn t know until deep rooted attitudes and morals began to show she wanted to get married even though she never said and i knew her well enough by now to see inside her head she d settle for suburbia and a little patch of land so i gave her up for music and the free electric band the free electric band the free electric band the free electric band the free electric band the free electric band the free electric band the free electric