1. |
Blow, Gabriel, Blow!
05:38
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I was nearing perfect symmetry
Till somebody crossed the line
The artist in their artistry
Distilling the divine
And all God’s awful creatures
Will know it in their time
Dispassionately dancing
The steps they have been taught
Near crippled by the weight of human thought
I was halfway to the heavens
I was forced to turn around
I’d been searching for that secret
Often felt and never found
How mortal mouths are moved
To make that hallelujah sound
Reluctantly reciting
The words they have been taught
Speechless at the voice of human thought
The pearl inside the oyster
The rot within the seed
The ghost in the machine
The monks inside the cloister
The starlet on the screen
Variations on a theme
Why bother curing hunger?
What we need is a cure for greed
The ferryman will row
Blow, Gabriel, Blow!
I was standing at the crossroads
With a pocketful of gold
When I heard a choir of angels
Sing the devil’s rock and roll
They wouldn’t take my money
So I offered up my soul
Now soullessly singing
The songs that I had bought
Bankrupt by the cost of human thought
I was sailing for the new world
I was stranded by a storm
I was sweating in the spotlight
Under pressure to perform
The remnants of a renegade
Who can’t help but conform
Remorsefully romancing
The last sailor in the port
Landlocked on a sea of human thought
The pearl inside the oyster
The rot within the seed
The ghost in the machine
The monks inside the cloister
The starlet on the screen
Variations on a theme
Why bother curing hunger?
What we need is a cure for greed
See my cup overflow
Blow, Gabriel, Blow!
Two hundred thousand years of progress
And what have we to show?
Fast food at the Alamo
I never felt so low
I was destined for Damascus
I was seeking peace of mind
A brushstroke from my masterpiece
Could see but now I’m blind
So I tuned into the radio
And I felt the stars align
The movement of the planets
In their gravitational force
Sent spinning on the wheel of human thought
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2. |
Ichabod Sells Out
03:34
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I saw you standing by the abattoir
Looking every inch a soldier
You were chewing on your fingernails
I lost my appetite
What a miserable year that was
Falling victim to wanderlust
But I just ended up right back at the start
I’ve no sense of adventure
Everyone was going
So I figured I had better tag along
Dancing at the dry disco
My body knows that these aren’t sober songs
So I got myself clean
And I fled from the scene
That had stolen my brother away
What a depressing thought
These could be our halcyon days
And I will lead by example
Toward the summit of the species
In a world’s first first-world phenomenon
Suicide by diabetes
Alone
In a hole
In the middle
Of the desert
Yeah I guess that I’ve been better
It could be worse
I could be in Sunday school
Reciting some insipid Bible verse
Or clocking into work
Destroy these distractions to relieve the human curse
Like a Freudian slip
Or a shirt that don’t fit
I’ve given too much away
What a distressing thought
These could be our halcyon days
And I’ll find the answers in time
But there isn’t time enough
Sometimes it’s a time for giving up
We were standing by the reservoir
After forty weeks of drought
You were sucking on a cigarette
I lost my appetite
You said you’d be a millionaire
If only you weren’t riddled with this doubt
I told you I would write a song
And call it Ichabod Sells Out
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3. |
Too True to be Good
03:40
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I was contemplating sinful things
The sum of human suffering
Don’t add up to a hill of beans
When stacked beside the things I’ve seen
A dearth of decent poetry
Celebrity apologies
It’s all artistic poverty to me
Misery loves company but I don’t
Where there’s a will there is a way but I won’t
And if love true enough
Is the only measure of our wealth
Well I wish I loved a single thing
The way I hate myself
The crown sits heavy on the king
The ending of a lovers fling
Their hands weighed down by wedding rings
I don’t feel much of anything
The loss of rational faculties
Immeasurable casualties
In the war against reality
The dreamer always wins
Even though I tried the best I could
These songs never sound the way they should
Too tuneful to be truthful
Too true to be good
I always miss the trees for the wood
My brain’s abuzz with sordid shit
These thoughts and visions I can’t shift
Of high school girls in hockey kits
And blueprint plans for terrorists
Put too much stock in honesty
And hear the words sound back to me
In tuneless mediocrity
The song remains the same
Regrets
I’ve had a few
But then again
What else is new?
I’m human after all
Since my abandon came to pass
My mother’s love has dried up fast
My other love keeps looking past
The red flags nailed to my mast
And everything’s just as it seems
The ends don’t justify the means
Concessions for my upbringing
Just bring me down again
Even though I tried the best I could
These songs never sound the way they should
Too tuneful to be truthful
Too true to be good
I always miss the trees for the wood
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4. |
Something for the Kids
03:46
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The stillness that still moves the pollen grain
The first sliver of moonlight that put motion in the waves
Since you things haven’t been the same
An artist to elucidate the soul
The aimless acts of cruelty that give rise to rock and roll
In echoes from the heavens on my dashboard radio
Something real
Something big
Something for the kids
A solid gold selection of the hits
An empire long lost beneath the sand
Uncovered in the brushwork of unsteady human hands
Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band
A pioneer who’ll plot the way to go
The odd impulsive actions of a lovelorn Romeo
Their spirits in the static of my bedroom stereo
Something real
Something big
Something for the kids
Let ‘em know there’s more to life than this
Something pure
Something hip
Something for the kids
A solid gold selection of the hits
One more time before we call it quits
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5. |
The Rider-Waite Deck
02:56
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When I arrive in hell
With the whistles and the bells
Befitting my ascension to the throne
Incite the instinct to rebel
With sacred secrets I would tell
Dissenting seeds have already been sown
A revolution soundtracked by the rattling of bones
I was torn between two worlds
The sacred and profane
In one world I was dead and dumb
The other blind and lame
I was trying to up the ante
But I’d already lost the game
There’s a certain skill in knowing when you’re beat
This life’s a lonely chorus line of softly shuffled feet
Another loser in the lie of love
The blushing bride has butcher the bouquet
Playing he loves me not till only stalks remain
A fitting tribute for a grave
I’m off to join the monastery
Don’t even try and stop me
With a vision of the man I want to be
But the monastery won’t take me
Say I’m just too goddamn lazy
So I left that place no longer on my knees
When I finally found the light switch
There was nothing much to see
I gave up all my possesions
And in a feat of misdirection
Come out the other side a millionaire
I’d tell you how I did it
But I don’t think you’d want to hear it
From where you are I guess it’s hard to care
There’s a bubbling at the bottom of the barrel of despair
Another loser in the lie of love
The restless groom turned heel and run away
He vows to live out his remaining days
Letting the chips for where they may
And there’s the crux of things
How true love conquers everything
Once said in jest
I’d never guessed
Now I know it to be true
On baited breath
And beating wing
Each silent soul now moved to sing
They will reject
All loneliness
To be born in love anew
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6. |
Sloe
06:28
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You wore denim shorts
Pizza grease dripping down your chin
There was nothing on the telly
Nothing on the table
So I settled in
Fool am I
What mess have you gotten me in?
What in the hell was I thinking
Seeking salvation in this den of sin?
And we were dancing real slow
We were almost standing still
Our bodies barely touched
It was almost such a thrill
I never told you then
Now I guess that I never will
In your Sunday best
A Friday night look on your face
Telling half-truths at confession
All the best stories we’ll take to our graves
A parachute penance
To slow down this long fall from grace
I thought you were trying to catch me
Turns out you just loved the thrill of the chase
We were dancing real slow
We were almost standing still
And I thought that you were kidding
Till you went in for the kill
I never got over that
Now I guess that I never will
There’s a swallow suspended in the sky
And the dew on my lips begins to dry
It’s a tragic tableaux and it just goes to show
If you do nothing you let it pass you by
You wore nothing at all
White as the heavenly dove
Still you were gilding the lily
Do you not know by now
It’s your bones that I love
Laying flat on our backs
Taking stock of the heavens above
Some days I want something better
Most days I think what I got is good enough
We were dancing real slow
We were almost standing still
From your half-full glass of cola
I had almost drunk my fill
I should have told you then
Now I guess that I never will
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7. |
Practical Use
04:12
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Another perfect night
In my perfect life
There’s really nothing that I’m missing
I’ve a couple grams
A PlayStation
And a coke bottle to piss in
I’ll be damned if that ain’t living like a king
Like a Mennonite
Like a parasite
I’m a slave to my ambition
I could throw the fight
Ditch my acolytes
And never seek contrition
Still all would be forgiven when I sing
What am I to do?
Were these limbs never destined for practical use?
I’m short on attention and long in the tooth
Who cares?
How am I to choose
Between what I believe and infallible proof?
The tip of my tongue trips ineffable truth
I swear
All the endless days
We could while away
Watching water levels rising
Trying to make it pay
Facing slow decay
Pushing toward event horizon
Is this living or surviving?
I can’t say
There’s a friend of mine
He’s been killing time
Trying to rouse me from my slumber
But I’m feeling fine
In this dream sublime
An unwaking world of wonder
Think I’ll roll another number
Drift away
What am I to do?
Were these limbs never destined for practical use?
I’m short on attention and long in the tooth
Who cares?
How am I to choose
Between what I believe and infallible proof?
The tip of my tongue trips ineffable truth
I swear
Some people are strange
Most people are stranger
We all remain strangers
Unique in our strangeness
Some people change
Here I remain changeless
Misguided and aimless
But basically blameless
Another perfect night
In my perfect life
There’s really nothing that I’m missing
I’ve a couple grams
A PlayStation
And a coke bottle to piss in
I’ll be damned if that ain’t living
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8. |
Simple Song
03:00
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Just a simple song
Just a token of
A feeling that came passing through today
It lingered for a moment
Then in shadow slipped away
A tune to fill the spaces
When we’ve nothing left to say
Just a melody
Just a memory
That drifts across my mind once in a while
A long forgotten friendship
I am glad to reconcile
A lapse in concentration
I can’t help but crack a smile
I wish that I possessed the gift
To put it into words
Or hands that on the potter’s wheel
Could give shape to the Earth
I wish I could create something of worth
Like a useful phrase
From a vacant stage
Waiting for the players to arrive
They’ve memorised the words
But not the meaning of the lines
Is patience not rewarded?
Even simple things take time
Like a simple song
Like the setting sun
Gently introducing evening sky
It’s luminous transcendence
Overcomes us by and by
Bereft of comprehension
I just hang my head and cry
I wish that the old masters
Had the foresight then to see
That cracks in ancient paintings
Map out our mortality
How I wished that spirit moved in me
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9. |
It's Sunday, Here We Are
07:57
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It was one hell of a party
This time I swear I very nearly spoke to somebody
Maybe next time we’ll touch body to body
Then settle down
Our future before us
Existence contriving to baffle and bore us
The best we can hope is that time marches forward
The world goes round
Day by day
It’s growing
The shadow ascending the wall
With my heart in my mouth
And your hand down my pants
On the back seat of your car
It’s Sunday, here we are
There are kids in the car park
The dull drunkards babbling wisdom to impart
They’re going in circles unwilling to embark
On unfamiliar roads
A thirst for adventure
A half-hearted promise to never surrender
Symphonies rung out on Mexican Fenders
While stars explode
River run
Flowing
They’ll all coalesce in the sea
Now you’re hell bent
Making sure we’re all spent
As they’re ringing the bell at the bar
It’s Sunday, here we are
The man I have become
Is not the man that I had hoped to be
Reluctantly we all wind up
A product of our history
Each window frames a picture of
Somebody else’s misery
I look at them looking at me
A bad education
Libraries bursting with misinformation
The road to hell masked as the path to salvation
So here I’ll stay
Will words sound forever?
Or just fill the space till you find something better?
Language is arbitrary symbols and letters
With nothing important to say
Second hand
Slowing
The minutes pass penitently
We render the days
In impressionist strokes
That only make sense from afar
It’s Sunday, here we are
And all that is left here in the end
A legacy I can’t possibly defend
An honest epitaph inevitably penned
To a ham fisted lover
A second rate brother
And really not much of a friend
Took leave of my senses
Fooled into thinking it’s fun painting fences
White picket lines of genetic defences
Keep ambition at bay
The hand of the master
In music and moonlight and natural disaster
Revealing the path to the great ever-after
We’ll soon be on our way
God it’s great
Knowing
Nothing’s expected of me
Careening through space
On a desolate rock
Countless miles from the nearest star
It’s Sunday, here we are
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