Let's look at my song, Dangerous Girl. Plus, a show next week.
She'll take you to heaven every time
Next Show:
April 26, 2025 - 5:30PM
Tomato Joe’s Pizza and Taps (Canyon Country
Facebook event page
Dangerous Girl - the story behind the song
I’m going to tell this story without including any of the names involved. The woman who inspired the song has a life and family. Her past is her past and, in truth, any moralistic finger-waging should be directed solely at the adults in her life who abused their position and her trust.
2008, post divorce, I was mired in a two year depression that I didn’t recognize as such. But, on the upside, I was performing music around Phoenix and had played a couple house concerts!
I was speaking to a friend who was booking me for a house concert. I knew her from a church I used to attend. She had, as a young woman, been drawn into an intimate relationship with a teacher at her Christian school. The story is so sadly cliche as to make it unremarkable.
As I remember it, this led to the teacher losing his job. Certainly an appropriate response.
Later, a Christian pastor started an affair with her. This scandal would, for the most part, remain undiscovered for some time. Eventually it came to light and he was removed from his position as well.
She and I were on a Zoom call back then discussing the details of the house concert she was booking, discussing her past, my divorce, and my songwriting.
She mentioned that she wanted me to write a song for her. I told her that if I were to do so, I would have to write something about how dangerous she had proven to be… particularly in the church world.
This led to the lyrics below.
Note: She and I never had any sexual or intimate interactions. The song plays more on fantasy and positions her as both instigator and the person in control of the situations. Rarely (read never) is this the case when it comes to a young person and any adult in a leadership role.
If you are a teacher or a pastor, your position has, as a byproduct, greater responsibility to avoid these types of failings. I’m not without a degree of understanding about how such incidents occur - humans are sexually driven apes with more in common with chimpanzees that we like to recognize. I’m also not confused where the responsibility and ire (if that is needed) should be placed.
There will be no biblical stoning for the woman in this story… not on my watch!
By this time I had mostly eschewed the moralistic, hand-wringing, trappings that accompany faith. In fact, this is when I began to recognize that the most dogmatic and religious are VERY EFFECTIVE at aiming their moral ire at others while failing to scrutinize their own behavior.
This, to me, is the greatest cultural and moral failure of dogma. It took me several more years to apply reasonable skepticism to my own faith, revealing my belief blind spots. That is a topic for another day.
Yesterday, she and I chatted a bit on Facebook. I wanted her to review what I’d written to ensure it was both accurate and tactful. She offered a few minor corrections to my original and thanked me for how I had written about it.
Years have passed and we are both very different people. She loved the song when I wrote it and thankfully, she still thinks it is a great tune! I do too. ;-)
I’ve included a video I shot this morning of me performing the song. It can be found below the lyrics.
I hope you enjoy!
Dangerous Girl: Lyrics
The song remains one of my favorites. I haven’t played it out live since 2012 but it is on next Saturday’s set list.
It’s funny… I mention an “e-ticket ride” - which definitely dates me.
I’ll have a simple performance of the song below.
Enjoy!
The boots come on when the sun goes down From lace to leather, suburbia to downtown The change you never saw it comin’ on By the time you realize, you're too far gone She'll take you to heaven every time It's in that sin she plants into your mind But you know it’s a phantom that you’re chasin' down Cuz you can't climb into her world She's a Dangerous Girl All dressed for havoc in her Sunday dress Don't know for certain, but they can guess And the ladies all talk, cuz they’ve got a clue They want justice, but I want you Yeah you take me to heaven every time It's in that sin you plant into my mind But I know it's a phantom that I'm chasin’ down Cuz I can't climb into your world You’re a Dangerous Girl She can play it up, or she can play it down Play you the fool, make you the clown But at the end of the day you're still begging for more As you try and climb into her world She's a Dangerous Girl Wake from a dream, did I catch her eye? Is there more than friendship in her smile? Won't be no sleep for me tonight And she's the reason, but that's alright I know there's a heaven, cuz I've seen it walk by It's in that sin she plants into my mind I'm going there again, she's my e-ticket ride I'm gonna’ climb right into her world She's my Dangerous Girl I know there's a heaven, I've seen it in her smile Going to go there again with her tonight She's closin' the door, she's turnin’ out the light As she climbs right into my world She's my Dangerous Girl ###
Video Performance
Recorded this morning.
I recorded the song in 2009 as part of my CD project, Girls, Songs, and Other Delusions.
I’m proud of that project even though, In listening to those track, it is painfully obvious that I had no idea what I was doing on the production front. However, I recorded all the songs in a four week period and released them to the world. That is worth something and I should keep it in mind these days especially.
I’ve said it before but it bears repeating. I have a lot of music and should be releasing it more frequently.
Let me know your thoughts on the song.
Thank you for joining me on this journey!
With Love and Gratitude,
Matthew Moran
April 22, 2025
I like this song a lot. From the very beginning, the notes, made by the guitar (I don’t know the technical language of music), jab you, they are fiercer than a porcupine but not as fierce as a knife. They have a stabbing, staccato quality that announces: We’ve got something serious here to put on the table.
I know two people who have told me about being sexually used in Church. (I may have known other people who were used, but they didn’t tell me about their ordeals). One guy, before he was even in puberty, was used by an adult at his mostly black Christian church. My friend, who had been molested — I’d call it rape — had gone to college but he is in a dead end food service job, snorts coke every single day, and is doing quite poorly. The other guy had been used when he was a joyous teenager in suburban staten Island. He is not joyous now.
When an adult uses his power and authority, with a little help from scripture (Which becomes something like Rushdi’s satanic verses), to get into the pants and then the orifices of a child, he really deserves unmitigated contempt, scorn etc.