Just fucked up once
Not worth the talk
It was just one night
Can’t I make it right?
Do you want to leave
Go away for a while
step all over me
Then we can agree

Coming down from this climb
We’ve slid down this slide
You've gotten off this ride
Coming down from this climb

Time to reconnect
Find you like a gem
We’ll be strangers again
Just meet now and then
Let’s accept everything
Plant a foot on the floor
You can call out my name
I can run just like rain

Coming down from this climb
you let me break
We’ve slid down this slide
just one mistake
You've gotten off this ride
beyond the try
Coming down from this climb
won’t tell me why
 

I think this was our first completed song. It came together very quickly. I had the basic verse part and Justin came up with that killer chorus riff.
 

 

Four ease the breeze - I can't stand please
this game for sleaze – no blame to seize
Abuse laughter - like we’re dreamers
I won't be taken to the cleaners
All you mystifiers touching housewives
I left my number with a sleepy slumber
Brought a shovel – left it level
I've brushed metal right on the kettle
These encampments won’t resettle
These encampments won’t resettle

Break the sun –
just for fun –
now you’re done -
You are the object.
Jump the life to come –
tear the numb –
nothing’s dumb -
The be all end all.

Talk about this - I never get that
You sit on a fence - I'm down on the mat
Leave me this moment, spoiled a buyout
Fall down the stairs - whiskey bottle tryout
This night-crawler’s got me smaller
There’s a caller on the dollar
I’ve been told I’m - ready for closeup
I'm just delinquent - dare with luck up
Oh this won’t be my final fuck up
this won’t be my final fuck up

CHORUS
I won’t suffer - with your problems
There is no more - promised no more
It’s all forgiven - destined bubble
Blond hair strands bigger trouble
Single truth - defunct appliance
reject math, reject science
poker players – hide in closets
Wasted youth in my pocket
Returned items won’t bring rockets
Returned items won’t bring rockets

CHORUS
Out, out
 

The title and some key phrases comes from Shakespeare's Macbeth, who has his great existential speech:
Out, out, brief candle!
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more: it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.
And yes, I know Frost wrote a famous poem with this title and Faulkner got a title for a book from this speech, too. Justin had that cool riff the first night we jammed!
 

 

(for P. Neruda & A. Neill)

I’m sick of this shell
This anger of losses
Fraught with sobriety
The price of humanity
Water of wombs
The only thing I want
is to lie like a stone
completely alone

I want
I want
I want
I want it for me

I’m still walking around
Dirty tears falling
Passing lifeless ground
still walking around
Trust is wasted on you
It’s money for pain
It is just what it is
and that’s just the is

CHORUS

Hey mother fucker
You fucked my mother
Her name is Earth
And you fucked her over
I’m stuck on buffer
And nobody cares
The whole damn project
Is going nowhere

CHORUS

It’s over.

 

From the beginning, we knew this would be one of our signature songs, from Andrew's swing to Justin's caustic riff to my hatred of humanity! Obviously, I recite pretty directly from Pablo Neruda's poem "Walking Around," one of my favorites I always thought should be put to music. Andy Neill is a professor of Biology and Botany and the closest thing to Aldo Leopold in my life. I had the basic bass line and Justin gave me the "I want" I wanted and Andrew gave us the tempo.
 

 

Life is razor-sharp - a search for fact
an unweeded garden- it’s all abstract
Conflicting demands – infect the mind
we can’t evade today – justice is blind

standing in my way
a prison of doubt
clichés lead astray
it’s much without
inauguration day
as a slave to fate
message to convey
recall and negate

Standing in my way
Standing in my way
Standing in my way
Standing in my way

learn the rules – accept your ceiling
learn the rules - avoid the repeating
learn the rules - it’s all schematic
learn the rules – and be pragmatic

You think you do but you really don’t
You think you will but you really won’t
You think you’re moving standing still
you think this nothing is such a thrill

It’s so important to YOU
It’s so important to YOU
It’s so important to YOU
It’s so important to YOU

Everything falls out of bottom
Everything falls out of bottom
Everything falls out of bottom
Everything falls out of bottom

It’s so important to YOU
It’s so important to YOU
It’s so important to YOU
It’s so important to YOU

 

I wanted to write a song in two parts and avoid that verse-chorus thing because the song is really about repetitive obsession. Many phrases come from Hamlet and it's about how we all need to "give up" our shit when forces outside our control inhibit them (like your father's ghost visiting you!). I wrote the first part - Justin the second.
 

 

walking home on rainy nights – kept away. kept away.
past rat and cat city blight – kept away. kept away.
trip over bones of broken homes – kept away. kept away.
pretty soon the last door is closed – kept away. kept away.

I think about you when I’m drinking
the truth is I’m not really thinking
you’re not just an after-thought
you’re more a dream I’ve wrought
I deify this image of you
an allusive angle of view
I approach, a devotee
you stand waiting for me

beaten face-down pavement – kept away. kept away.
easy to become complacent – kept away. kept away.
a cigarette lit in the dim – kept away. kept away.
just an empty cryptonym – kept away. kept away.

CHORUS

passed out in abandoned building – kept away. kept away.
cold vein removes all feeling – kept away. kept away.
waiting for signs of miracles – kept away. kept away.
wrapped in ancient parables – kept away. kept away.

CHORUS
 

Justin brought the basic riff to us and I had some words that seemed to fit. We figured the chorus together. Pretty straight-forward rock!
 

 

Did you come to find someone?
did you meet your possible?
left the lies piled high
still the search has obstacles
wandered round for hours
feel just like passing through
push me up on the line - and
I’ll pretend to stop you

You’re no emotion
no regret
no memory
no sweat
But I keep pushing
on the fret
try to try
still sweat

In my mind I’ve killed the time
perfect each one satisfies
if I could only come out to play
streets are there to sanitize
this duet on the desk - is
just a nervous obsession
driving this manic love
an arithmetic progression

CHORUS

I want to tear out my eyes
blinded by your milky thighs
There’s just slightly less action
bandaged on the other side
the cold emotion on your face
makes it difficult for me to gauge
I’ll give it a tug just before
I go out on the stage

CHORUS

First you’re up / Then you’re down
First you’re up / Then you’re down

 

The lyrics come from a night out with single friends at a couple of bars. The guy is nervous as hell and the women is a statue. I wrote the first bass part and Justin again came through with a killer chorus riff.
 

 

I keep running, climbing, treading this hill
Pushing up stones and carrying Jill
There’s nothing can help me reverse the spill
I live this absurdity, another’s will
I get close to top, forced to stop, nothing’s free
The wheel reverses, everything drops, physics agree
Gravity pulls the truth the shock, I fall to knee
Tumbling after, letting it go, God’s decree

Why am I forsaken?
You’re born – you’re dead. You can fill in the rest
You’re born – you’re dead. You can fill in the rest
born – dead. fill in the rest
born – dead. fill in the rest

I cheated on my test - it ended my string
30 seconds without a lie - I gave up my dreams
I’m terrible, I’m horrible, some kind of unreal
Back at the origin, the root primeval
I’m learning to let it go, no victory
This condition I live contradictory
Life’s so temporary, taking inventory, stone and me
This incline I’m on drowning down is my story

CHORUS

I’m here waiting, carbon dating, bottom of hill
Contemplating tragedy, the end of Jill
Village is broken, lives unspoken, under siege
Vamps have stolen, rocks are rolling, fractured beach
Only ghosts left to conquer, fighting the rage
Just a human lab rat on this twisted stage
Please mr. death won’t you play your game with me?
I’ve got the rotten pieces ready for life’s disease.

 

Andrew and I worked on this song before we began playing with Justin. Sisyphus is one of my favorite myths and after I read Albert Camus' treatment, I was hooked for life. His book The Plague is a favorite of mine and I'm attracted to absurdism. So, even if this song is pretty pessimistic, I see it in Camus' absurdist tradition - one must simply accept the absurd and enjoy the shit out of life, letting go of the unanswerable and uncontrollable. I wrote the basic plodding bass line and then decided to bring in the chorus as the counterpoint.
 

 

Just occupying space – just resting my eyes
out on the free green – nothing obscene
something I did against your machine -
but I’m not resisting!

You’ve got your fucking manacles – scraping fucking manacles
knee in my chest – you’ve got your knee in my chest!
little man, little man with hot heavy breath -
but I’m not resisting!

security shirts
need to feel tough
abuse their authority
but it’s never enough.

I yell out in pain – scream out in pain
no call for reason – these guys have no reason!
what’s my fucking, what’s my fucking, what’s my fucking treason -
but I’m not resisting!

You lead me by the cuffs – lead me by the cuffs
show the crowd – show the crowd your enemy
It took you seven men – seven men you fucking pussies –
but I’m not resisting.

CHORUS

The empty of your cage – empty of your cage
the report of your lies – I see your lies!
the hate of your ambivalent replies -
but I’m not resisting!

Treat me like a vagrant – even though I paid
Treat me like a criminal – you just want a suck
you losers cost your boss two hundred bucks -
but I’m not resisting!

CHORUS

Fuck you, Monterrey Security.

 

This is a true story about me at a Bob Dylan concert in 2013. I passed out on an inclined lawn outside the stadium and woke up to 7 security guys trying to take me to the infirmary. I got up and told them off, which I guess set them off. Anyway, I got a settlement for being fucked with and a great story to tell. My win, although I've still never seen Bob Dylan. Justin wrote the riffs to my words and cadence.
 

 

There'll be no more bullshit
to get in the way
Everything's serious
Why so broken?
Gonna major in liberal arts
the best kind of losers.
I'm gonna light a fire
You’re such a steady waster
Won't be another chance
universal breeding
You treat me this way?
Laugh at the trying.

eye - clock winds round the neck - do you want this - to last forever?
seek - attachment is important - you talk to me - know you want more.
you - don’t know what I'm thinking - please ask me - to tell you a story.
everything - everything was fine – fine and then you – CHANGED THE RULES.

Trajectory zero degrees
Strain down main st.
Why not be a longing?
Why not another time?
travail travail –
rinse and repeat.
Move forward veins
Work and feed.
I’m gonna write my way out of this mess
This breakdown the last.
Well enough said
the what will be answered.

CHORUS

drones are in the clouds
drones are in the parks
drones are in the neighbors
drones are at your door.
drones are in my kitchen
drones are in my bedroom
drones are in my closet
drones in my garage.
drones are suburbia
drones are cleaning floors
drones are watching porn
drones are cooking meth.
drones are in my neurons
drones are in my dreams
drones are in my colon
drones control my cock.

YOU CHANGED THE RULES

 

This song came from some joke about "drones making porn" or something. The spoken lyrics are just random nonsense that happened to sort of fit the idea. I had that basic bass line and Justin the rest.