Lyrics Tried to Be a Man - Rickie Lee Jones

'Round here we don't need no one trying to set us straight
I got a redneck in plaid suit, he's on TV real late
Balalaikas tolling, Sheba plays the flute
There's Communists and Capitalists
They all think I'm cute

You know, I'm out of rehab
You know, I'm with the band
Anyway I think it's time to say exactly what I am

'Cause I tried to be a man
But that's what I'm not meant to be
You know I tried to be a man
But that's not what I came to be

Well, there's seven years of famine
And seven years of drought
Seven years of Sam
You know what I'm talking about
And it won't take very long before it's hard to tell
If they're trying to take you back with him
To heaven or to hell

They make her so pretty
She won't be pretty long
She'll be rising out of the sea of planet Babylon

'Cause she tried to be a man
That's not what she came to be
Because she tried to be a man
That's not what she came to be

She's living down on Bronson
She never blinks her eyes
The family in Wisconsin
Look like they're hypnotized
I get a strange sensation
When I lay down in my bed
In fact, if you could drop me on the corner here

Instead on planet Babylon
That's where they wrote the book
There's something here about you, come on and take a look

You tried to be a man
But that's not what you came to be
It says, it says, it says, it says
You tried to be a man
But that's not what you came to be

Came to be
What you came to be
That's not what you came to be