The Ballad of Chris McCandless Songtext
von Ellis Paul

We met on the highway.
He was smilin′,
A mystic in torn blue jeans.
The kid left his trust fund to come out walking.
He said, "I'm Alexander, Supertramp,
A Star catcher, a Chaser of dreams..."
I could′ve sworn he heard the earth a'talkin',
talkin′...
"Sometimes," he said, "don′t it feel
like the concrete's closing in?
We′re putting bricks on the horizon..."
Was he chasing fool's gold,
Or a holy man walking
a dirt road till the end?
I don′t know but
I hitched a ride with Chris McCandless.
I stepped in the wild of a dream.
The horizon in South Dakota
was an ocean of harvest grain.
In a dusty silo we found work for the taking.


We'd hitched up from California,
But he never told me his real name.
Never told me what past he was out here shaking.
We′re all shaking something.
"Sometimes," he said, "don't it feel
like technology's closing in?
We′re raising towers on the horizon..."
Was he chasing fool′s gold
Or a holy man walking
A dirt road till the end?
I hitched a ride with Chris McCandless
I stepped in the wild of a dream-
a stone,
a path,
a river of glass,
The night sky-
Hey, can you see stars
From wherever you are?
With both feet on the planet
Can you feel this old world
Spinning around you?
The pull of the magnet
Is gonna take you from your town,
Your home town.
In a broken school bus they found him
In the heart of the Alaska range
The journey ends
When the heart stops beating-
Our time is so fleeting
Sometimes, don't it feel
like the concrete′s closing in-
like we're putting bricks on the horizon?
Are you chasin fool′s gold,
Or a holy man walking a dirt road
till the end?
I don't know, but
I hitched a ride with Chris McCandless,
I stepped in the wild with Chris McCandless,
And I felt alive with Chris McCandless.
I was wide awake in the dream,
the dream,
the dream.