1. |
Away With Words
03:11
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The landline rings above the bar and it rattles every glass. The sheriff tips his hat and winks at the waitress walking past. She keeps a handgun strapped onto her hip and her memories in her coat. She leaves her wedding ring on the bathroom sink and a fish bone in her throat. She serves the witch doctors, the breadwinners, and the lonely hearted innkeeper.
With his coffee grounds he makes his rounds from the bedrooms to the docks. Where the water floods the road at night and the neighbors never knock. They bust right in, fill their cups, light the candles, leave the tv on. And when they go they’re drunk and honest. But just like mama wrote you can never trust a motor boat to get you from one place to the next. They died that night in a crashing tide that put the captain to the test.
The sheriff played the bugle horn at the funeral parade. He charged the innkeeper with murder feet from where the bodies laid. And his trial was short as the kangaroo court gave him 50 years to life. The waitress felt like dying but just bottled up her strife. She drank it down, put her best dress on, tapped against the sheriff’s door. He was beat but always wanted more.
And while he slept the waitress crept into the jailhouse with the key. And locking eyes with the innkeeper, she set her lover free. When the coast was clear, they busted out past the bad food and the cheap hotel. They sailed away at the break of day, awww neither looking back. She said, “for all the love we may have left, let’s forget about the past.”
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2. |
Oil Drum
02:19
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I don’t know about pain, I don’t know about anything. Police vans surround us hover like a fever dream. We want higher wages, we want a healthy life ensured. I want to take my baby out to dinner, yeah I’ll front the bill. That’s more than you can offer so we’re striking on the hill. And it’s humming like a drum. Running out of steam, drinking gasoline if you know what I mean.
Talk about the shame, talk about the poverty. Picket line is buzzing down where the batons swing. The sun in February’s never been so kind to me. I wanna pay my share of the groceries, I’m not in it for the thrill. It’s there if you are willing but we’re striking on the hill. It’s shining like a dime. Dancing in the sand, playing with the band, jumping like salmon over a dam.
We’re screaming for survival, they’re going for the kill. It’s not something we should beg for but we’re striking on the hill. And we smile for the drone. Sinking like a stone, picking from the bone, feeding each other yeah we’re never alone.
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3. |
Lonelilessness
02:46
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We’re all afraid of dying so we fall into religion, dig a hole out of communion. Sink into your savior’s arms. The snake’s inside the prison now, the oil’s in the garden how the blood grows with the cotton. All the crops upon your savior’s farm. Your faults will be forgiven, all your vain and violent visions, your war on wages, water, women, if you’re speaking with your savior’s tongue.
The sound of laughter the evening after all the flash bangs and the smoke grenades.
Can the city of roses, with their busted noses, smell the petals through the iron and the pepper spray? I don’t know.
There are bodies on the pavement like flowers in the basement. They’re wilted and they’re wasted, they’re knocking on your savior's door. Every beat is bitter and the pipes are frozen over like a river in the winter, you don’t know your savior’s heart no more.
Despite the street flares and the rising bus fares, the barricades, and the cavalry they’re still showing up. And in the morning as the crowd’s dispersing you ask yourself, “is it good enough?” God I hope so.
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4. |
Political Creatures
02:10
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Hop off the bus, march all day
the revolution’s just a mile away
We’re not kidding when we say they’d kill ya if they had the chance
If you go to college I won’t pretend
That it’s something I could recommend
Where you make no dollars and make no sense and they’d kill ya if they had the chance
Whoa, whoa Sheriff Joe
Janet Napolitano
From Arizona to Californ’ they’d kill ya if they had the chance
They’ll recruit ya then they’ll boot ya
Probably wouldn’t hesitate to shoot ya
They’ll test you, best you, then they’ll arrest you and kill ya if they had the chance
Left hand waves to calm the floor
Right hand shakes to settle the score
The third hand stirs the pot of war, it’ll kill ya when it has the chance
Back on the bus, sweaty and spent
Come tomorrow and we’ll do it again
Gotta count my quarters and pay my rent, it’ll kill me when it has the chance
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5. |
Shell of a Person
03:04
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The morning was pink and I drank from the sink, hard to swallow the start of a terrible week. Asleep at the gears, shrink from the fear, our ships are stuck in the harbors of a terrible year. The players are played, you couldn’t pay me to stay, eight months under our heels, already over the decade. Out of a job, sick as a dog, now the wealthy are healthy and the rest of us robbed. A white collar crime, fell from the sky like a shell of a person on a hell of a ride
I sing like I swallowed the key, but I’m gonna do it in my own way. I could be what you want me to be, and I’m only a passionate scream away. But I’m not in a race against time like a factory built on a fault line or my car overheating on the grapevine. And the past isn’t too far behind. In fact it’s just a mile ahead, cause I’ve learned the same lessons a thousand times. Gonna learn ‘em every day till I’m dead. Like my life at the expense of another’s, like there’s prisoners putting out wildfires, like there’s always someone at the bottom of the empire.
Buried and broke, I choke on the smoke, dirt under my fingernails a song at my throat. I’m takin it back, it’s okay to ask, I’ll keep on strumming and pass around the hat. Battered and bloody, scattered and trying, shattered and hungry—I’ll get in line.
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Wooden/Apple/Heart California
a regular canine cruncha
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