1. |
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Though I came in like a conqueror of old
Here to spin shit into gold
Down the sundried boulevards
Past the young flaneurs
Roll it over, roll it up and pick the bones
And our eyes look over the city
Our hands will grasp it all
We’ll carve slices from the belly of Paris
And there’s plenty to go round
There’s plenty to go round
Jealous eyes look down from crowded tenements
A fever hangs in the warm air
There is sweetness, there is light
There is innocence to spoil
Plunge our arms into its gutters
Up to the elbows
And our eyes look over the city
Our hands will grasp it all
We’ll carve slices from the belly of Paris
And there’s plenty to go round
There’s plenty to go round
So we feign a pose of nonchalance
But our fever grows with every stride
How are the green? How are they blind
To every sous that’s there to take?
Roll it over, roll it up and pick the bones
And our eyes look over the city
Our hands will grasp it all
We’ll carve slices from the belly of Paris
And there’s plenty to go round
There’s plenty to go round
Though I came in like a conqueror of old…
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2. |
There Was No Snake
04:38
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There was no snake. There was no dragon
Just things that happened one after another
No clouds confess or leaves reveal
There was no snake that took her away from you
There was no snake. There’s no Peg Powler
Just a river that he was dragged under
Tell every father of every daughter
There was no snake
There was no huldra
We dressed their skeletons and made them dance
Gave grace and spite to a ball of gas
The cold earth can’t care if you wither
Or how many skinny children you bury inside it
There was no snake. There was no dragon
Just men who found the quicker way
Tell every mother of every son
There was no snake. There was no dragon
We dressed their skeletons and made them dance
Gave grace and spite to a ball of gas
The cold earth can’t care if you wither
Or how many skinny children you bury inside it
When things that happened, happened to us
When he was gone and we had nothing
When in our heads and hands that joined
When in the eyes that fellow eyes avoid
It’s plain as day, there’s no avoiding
You cannot hide the truth in words
There was a snake
There was a dragon
We saw its teeth. We did, we did
The dark is full, the clouds form signs
The accidents are all designed
He had a meaning. He’ll never fade
Look closely you can see the stars are spelling out his name
Oh you’re no fool
So tell me honestly
You saw the same? You saw the same?
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3. |
Conyers Falchion
06:52
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Some old rude song lies under stone
Such as the Sockburn Wyrm calls home
With teeth made black by poison breath
That sent our young men to their death
The wyrm lay Sockburn town to waste
It took our children young and strong
It burned our houses to the dirt
And left no livestock, crop or field
And every trembling hand agreed
The Sockburn wyvern must be slain
But who around to do the deed?
Who has the valour? Who will bleed?
For Sockburn which, although half-dead
Must have a savior in its ranks
Until John Conyers of the town
Went to the church and knelt there down
And pledged the Holy Ghost his son
He’d see that darksome shade undone
With gleaming falchion in his grip
And tarnished armour on his back
He set out for its savage den
And there to take the wyvern’s head
For every talon, every tooth
There is a blade that cuts the root
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4. |
Hometown Kick
04:40
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It’s just a numb dumb sleep
It’s just a hole to crawl inside
This is a sadness we can
A sadness we can set aside
It’s in a mirror by the beach
Comes from a hometown kick
This is a sadness we can
A sadness we can set aside
It’s where they still sleep fast
And in the border stamp click
This is a sadness we can
A sadness we can set aside
A faded vista filled with junk
The tire rubber burned to threads
It’s an uncertain focus
There’s no fixed ending point
We piss into the sunlight
And throw our used cups on the pile
It’s eyes still sticky from the dawn
It’s contact lenses dried out
Dismissed with clicking fingers
Our passports bent and torn
The windows close and open
Our bags are searched and thrown
We conceal secret hunger
In case they take that too
And we just need a moment
To claim a climate of our own
This is a sadness we can
A sadness we can set aside
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5. |
Cable Coming
05:38
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Lucky-Pierred on the highway
While his blood runs under metal hunks
We need to get back to Europe, before it’s too late
Tied up, restrained with duct-tape
As the broken AC prays
From the chimneys that watch over Cleveland
To the ghost towers over Manama
Half constructed but complete
And the red thread rears up wildly
And ties off on her heart
And her heart
Over here the phoney war is just beginning
So we drink like the world is ending
There’s a message, there’s another cable coming
So we drink like the world is ending
In the theme bars
And the dive bars
And the souk bars
In the hotel bars
Your work is fantastic
I love what you’re doing
Your work is amazing
I love what you’re doing
So let’s get on the next plane
And hope for new cities
Let’s get on the next plane
And hope that it works out
Landscapes arrive in waves
30s menace
Bones in vineyards
Bars in ruins
A sense of ending
Safety videos in Delft pottery
Calm and decent
We need to get out of Europe
Before it’s too late
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6. |
Great Preserver
04:17
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As the late snows fall on Jericho
I catch flakes on black velvet
To be the Great Preserver
Of an elegance they won’t know
Sublime! Sublime!
A symmetry fixed in negative
I wrench the rude contraption
With gloves that creak in the keen air
But all my words have sublimed
And the wind whips through the beams
As a youth she taught me beauty
A stack of rough notation
No fragile aggregation is unique as her warming smile
The negative draws my tears
And I am on my knees
None of these unique crystals is as unique as she
Sublime! Sublime!
A symmetry fixed in negative
When on a lonely night in Jericho
A Great Preserver steps outside into the snow
When he falls
Will his bones
Warm and sublime
Into the ether
Like her?
Up into heaven they go…
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7. |
Hechizado
03:43
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They called me spellbound, and it sounds so beautiful
Though they bell, book and candle it out of me.
I can chew when I dream, and I can fight when I dream
I ride and they bow…
I’ll be the last of the Habsburgs I know
No king should walk as I walk
And on the tit for far too long
She cries in the night
And in the morning her eyes widen though she keeps her smile in place
While I can only rictus in return
With a tongue that can’t win her
Words spit and mangle my replies
When they question all my devils but it’s only me who answers
I’ll be the last of the Habsburgs I know
(She’s not a vessel I can fill with earth/
She’s not a vessel for an empty prayer/
There is no end to this. No end to this)
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8. |
Macie Shot The Barn Owl
04:56
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With an air rifle over her shoulder
On a day that’s half asleep
Macie shot the barn owl ‘cos she could
And all those fat-arsed old men
Won’t stand a chance
Not a chance
Oh autumn was a bastard
The same as spring but now she’s sprung and they won’t find her
She will lead them deep into the dark
“Oh she’s gotta go
She’s gotta go
We got feathers, we’ll have bones
She’s gotta go
We can’t create
But we can destroy
And when we find that girl we’ll show them where their money goes to work
Macie it’s time…”
So they gave her a dashing alias
Published pictures she made at school
Questioned the dog-walkers at the beach
“There was nothing we could have done
There was nothing we could have done!”
Because autumn was a bastard
The same as spring but now she’s sprung and they won’t find her
She will lead them deep into the dark
And who’ll care when she’s a grinning picture on a page
With a feather saluting in her hair?
And who’ll know what she washed away
‘Til the river wears the wires down?
“Oh she’s gotta go
She’s gotta go
She’s got the headlines in her eyes
She’s gotta go
We can’t create
But we can destroy
And there’s no forest we won’t search and there’s no river we won’t dredge
Macie it’s time…”
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9. |
Stalking Bird
05:08
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And the plains stretch out ahead
And a swirl of sand that forces eyes to close
One day you’ll turn your head and see him
He was born on the second you were born
Coalescing out of dirt
A stalking bird hatched from a small brown egg.
Eyes, blinking in the sun
And when you crawl, he crawls slightly faster
Spindle legs scratch out crude pictograms on the dry soil
A slow lurch, step in step.
Harryhausing frame by frame.
A fraction closer every day
Never even knowing why
A stalking bird who has your name
A stalking bird who has your name
On two feet---
Fitful burst of manic speed
Towards settees and TVs
Godlike parents call you on
And when you grow and you find
Some pretty girl as scared as you
And feel that life has just begun
He just keeps surging, like a tide towards you
A spun eye-stalk
Strait is the gate, he steps inside
A fraction closer every day
Never even knowing why
A stalking bird who has your name
A stalking bird who has your name
To a prime, and faster than you’ll ever be,
He’s faster than he’ll ever be
Get to know him, to hear of him, some will rush to meet him.
Takes them all under black wings
Years run low / spindle legs slow
He’ll slow too, / slower than you.
At last you turn / and give your hand
As to a friend / you always knew
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10. |
Boys
06:51
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These boys haven’t got enough for what she’s got, yet
They just haven’t got enough for what she’s got, yet
But when she’s calling we’ll come running we can’t hold back
When she’s calling we’ll come running we can’t hold back
Boys haven’t got enough for what she’s got, yet
So if you’re holy, just be holy
Don’t be flinching when the devil calls
‘Cos every good man is just a minute away
Every good man is just a minute away
Your sandals flapping at your feet
As you swing your legs from the bonnet
Comes from a primal ache
You. Oh when will we be ready?
So don’t be holy, don’t be holy
Can’t you see we’re in up to our necks?
And as she raises her head you know you’re certain to stay
A curtain closes and it’s too late anyway
Boys haven’t got enough for what she’s got, yet
We just haven’t got enough for what she’s got, yet
But when she’s calling we’ll come running we can’t say no
When she’s calling we’ll come running we can’t say no
These boys haven’t got enough for what she’s got, yet
What she’s got, yet
Your sandals flapping at your feet
As you swing your legs from the bonnet
Comes from a primal ache
You. Oh when will we be ready?
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MuseLand Records Bahrain
Museland Records is a community-driven label seeking to share fresh and original music from the Arabian Gulf.
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