Release Date: February 15, 2011
Deluxe box set including four CDs, a full length concert DVD, and a gorgeous 48 page book with lyrics, images, and essays.
Lyrics
Bound (disc 1)
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It's been a long time since I welcomed you in,
And buried your treasure map under my skin
And worshipped a face that was lit from within,
By loveAnd walking the streets holding on to your hand,
With the words pouring out like the hourglass sands
I'm riding a wave that I don't understand,
So fleetingSo tell me, tell me, tell me what I'm feeling
'Cause language will falter and fall from our grasp,
And the vacuum of space is a silence so vast
It's the distance that tells us that something has passed,
Between usOf all of the wonderful lessons I've learned
When a song has been sung it can not be unheard
And though I've forgotten those beautiful wordsI still remember, I still remember, I still remember,
What they meanAlan Williams © 2008 Under a Metal Sky Music (BMI)
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Well I set out in search of things too dumb to mention
But I lost my way, I lost my nerve
I didn't notice, wasn't paying much attention
Will my prodigal soul return?I set a match to everything that once had mattered
But some bridges can't be burned
I'll find my way back home by the wreckage I left scattered
When my prodigal soul returnsForgive me for the road I'm on
Forgive me where everything went wrong
Forgive me for being gone so longSo put an end to all the rumor and conjecture
I got what I deserved
Now after many one-too-many misadventures
Will my prodigal soul return?Yeah I, I will
ReturnAlan Williams © 2008 Under a Metal Sky Music (BMI)
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Tomorrow cannot come soon enough for me
Tonight I'm as sure as I will ever be
I waited for answers and the answers never came
I cast out my demons, now there's no one else to blameAnd nothing is ever good enough for me
The surface is never all there is to see
I reached out for something and I held it in my hand
But when I looked closer, I began to understandThat when I thought I'd found it
When I thought I'd found it
It was just wishful thinking
Wishful thinking
Wishful thinking of youThe night has opened its secrets up to me
In darkness, the stark relief of clarity
We slip into focus then we slowly drift apart
Lost in the depths of our unfathomable heartsAnd when I thought I knew her
When I thought I knew her
It was just wishful thinking
Wishful thinking
Wishful thinking of youDo all of us wonder just how long we can endure
While falling apart together, shaken and unsureThat when we say I love you
When we say I love you
Is it just wishful thinking
Wishful thinking
Am I in wishful thinking with you?Alan Williams © 2008 Under a Metal Sky Music (BMI)
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Lying with my eyes to the sky
Watching stars and satellites go by
Lonesome as a song, lonesome as a song
On the radioLying with my ear to the ground
Waiting that engine to come round
Making make-believe, making make-believe
I don't have to goBut oh, flowers in my head
Roses for my bed
In summer
Hanging by a thread
Something good she said
Is coming, coming soonI'll make believe I'll leave it all behind
An emptiness, never hard to find
Promises and lies, promises and lies
And the drifting snow
Staring at the shadows on the wall
Waiting for the icicles to fall
Only killing time, only killing time
Til it's time to goBut oh, flowers in my head
Roses for my bed
In summerHanging by a thread
Something good she said
Is coming, coming trueAlan Williams © 2008 Under a Metal Sky Music (BMI)
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Taken in by her unspoken words
Singing as she tries not to be heard
Conjuring a world out of thin air
A terrifying burden she must bearBroken silences will echo in the deepest dark
Broken silences will guide me to her heartHow can so much sadness be so sweet
And all of the joy so incomplete
Searching for a reason not to cry
The beauty of the moments passing byReaching for a dream she can embrace
That love is enough to fill the spaceReaching for a dream she can embrace
That love is enough
Could be enough
Might be enough to say
That love is enough todayAlan Williams © 2008 Under a Metal Sky Music (BMI)
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Sorry, these lyrics are not ours to share.
Deborah Harry and Chris Stein © 1979
Heavens (disc 2)
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The starting of the day, you feel the first sun rays
Full of possibility
Rising out of bed, she's foggy in the head
Floating in tranquility
Coffee in her hand
The things that she has planned
Spring to life like flowers from a seedOff and on her way, she's making out ok
The morning train pulls slowly in
She'll leave the grand parade, for the tools of her trade
A telescope and fountain penLook into the lens
See how the light bends
Stretching to infinityAstronomy – discoveries
Astronomy – the mysteries
Astronomy – of what will be
Astronomy – wait and seeShe's moving down the aisle, I look her way and smile
Through the window from my seat
Relativity is all the same to me
Parallel lines never meet
Measuring a space
Too big to calculate
The chance and probabilitiesMeasuring the space
Too deep to contemplate
Stretching to infinityAlan Williams © 2009 Under a Metal Sky Music (BMI)
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The comet forms an arc that radiates so brightly
It burned a hole into the sky
From out of nowhere soon to disappear forever
With just the faintest of goodbyesThe light in the window
Tells me your home
It beckons to me
But I'm light years goneThe core is frozen and the surface is on fire
It rages silently in space
A bullet fragment ricocheting through the cosmos
And vanishing without a traceThe changing orbits of two bodies still in motion
A chance collision in the dark
The core is frozen and my surface is on fire
And I am vanishingAlan Williams © 2009 Under a Metal Sky Music (BMI)
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Cold and still like a frozen ocean
Skating past in the slowest motion
Molten steel like a burst of autumn
Falling fast and there is no bottomBlood on my hands, blood on my hands
Help me now, the sky is falling
Sing to me of dreams
Hold me now, the earth is trembling
Tearing at the seams
Caught up in a current
Rushing headlong to the sea
But all the water in the river
Will not wash me cleanAccidents, chaos and disorder
Lying still, fear will take me over
Violence, sharp and mystifying
Bends my will, still I won't deny itAlan Williams © 2009 Under a Metal Sky Music (BMI)
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So we rode into the night
'Til the sun vanished from sight
Falling back to follow your lead
'Til your trail is all that I believeIn this state of grace, no one stands alone
We will breathe as one, flesh and blood and boneTake the boat out on the sea
As the sky begins to bleed
Drifting out far from the shore
Find the strength to let go the oarsIn that empty space, nothing stands apart
I will disappear out beyond the starsAlan Williams © 2009 Under a Metal Sky Music (BMI)
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Midnight, silent as a photograph
Silent as a mirrored glass
In piecesA whisper, floating on an ocean breeze
Floating on a wave that keeps
Its secrets
But I don't want to look in the eyes of heaven
I don't want to see what I can't believe
I don't want to run to the arms of Jesus
I just want to keep the mysteryMystery calls, floating over garden walls
Floating like a wordless song
Surrounds youAnd time stops, frozen like a broken clock
Frozen like the rain that drops
Around youSearch light, soaring in the dead of night
Soaring like a wing to guide
The starlessAnd time flies, high above a metal sky
High above the space that hides
The darknessAlan Williams © 2009 Under a Metal Sky Music (BMI)
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Sorry, we can't offer their lyrics.
Mick Jagger and Keith Richard © 2009 ABKCO Music Inc. (BMI)
Vigil (disc 3)
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Wait another night for the morning light to appear
Watching time unravel, extinguishing the years
Keeping to myself my solitary sins
From beautiful companions nameless to the endBut who will wait for the light fading away
And who will stay for the counting of numbered daysThe ghosts of my life scattered by the winds
A broken line of disenchanted lovers and friends
Their faces disappear and memories take wing
Flying like a bird in my bed about to singBut who will wait for the light fading away
And who will stay for the counting of numbered daysThe future steals the past like a thief in the dark
And every memory ends with a question mark
So I wait another night, wait another year
Letting time erase, 'til my conscience is clearAlan Williams © 2009 Under a Metal Sky Music (BMI)
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Strange are the hours
In the late autumn showers
When the mist rises up from the field
Under death's spell
I will lay as i fell
Waiting for all that will be revealedSo far away
As the night follows day
She will turn down the lamp that once burned
There in the dark
She will know in her heart
That her true love will never returnTurning the light out
Sweet were the nights
In the soft candlelight
When the fires were lit in our hearts
Come to me now
In the dream's solemn vow
That all lovers are never to partSo far from home
I am lost and alone
And the darkness has swallowed me whole
Tell me again
Softly, like an amen
Let your words come envelope my soulThe blessed peace
Of the gentle release
Let your prayer come to carry me home
Tell me again, softly like an amenAlan Williams © 2009 Under a Metal Sky Music (BMI)
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Sorry, we can't offer their lyrics.
King Crimson, © 1981 Universal Music Careers obo "EG Music, Ltd." (BMI)
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Now that the lights have dimmed and silence falls like a hymn
The arms of a broken man reach for an open hand
Longing to be restored, the bottle already poured
Moments that never pass bring my lips to the glassDrink to the poison curse
Drink to the miracle cure
Drink to the memory
Drink to the remedyA remedy – bitter and pale
A remedy – nursing a heart that failedThere's something familiar here, the fragrance of bitter tears
Burns in the finest grain and echoes in soft refrains
And now that her eyes are dry, the song of her last goodbye
A kiss that will quickly fade, a lingering serenadeA serenade - broken and frail
A serenade – sung to a heart that failedSuddenly opened doors and footsteps upon the floor
The arms of a younger man reach for an open handWaltzing across the yard, a tango beneath the stars
Stepping through centuries, living in memoryA memory – faded and veiled
A memory – held in the heart that failedAlan Williams © 2009 Under a Metal Sky Music (BMI)
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I have loved you it’s true
I have wondered aloud at the grace
Of a bird as she flew
With a wave of her hand
Never touching the ground where I standEvery gesture she makes
Every movement a storm leaving
Scattered debris in its wake
But a delicate touch
I remember that muchI love you still
Although the years fade into memory
I love you still
Your distant kiss still feels so real to me
So near to me, so nearA promise was made
You embodied my ideal of heaven
But now it’s betrayed
Still your words remain clear
And your voice never seemed so nearThere’s a choice I must make
To follow your footsteps
And relive the same mistakes
So, though it may not be true
This is how I will choose to remember youAlan Williams © 2009 Under a Metal Sky Music (BMI)
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Thank you for your muted response
And turning from a loved one to a stranger
I'm learning not to say it all at once
Learning how to recognize the dangerThank you for the hollow in your voice
Your delicate and eloquent appraisal
I'm listening as if I had a choice
Of hearing something other than betrayalAu revoir, mon ami
We've come to a parting of the ways
Au revoir, mon ami
In your eyes I recognize
There's nothing left to say
More or less
Less is more
Au revoirThanks for the resistance in your touch
Your love for me withheld in hesitation
I've learned to live with needing it too much
So, I'll take the distance as my consolationAlan Williams © 2009 Under a Metal Sky Music (BMI)
Lumens (disc 4)
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So I am waiting for the morning sun
And I am waiting for my time to come
I'm waiting for that starting gun
For the sound, like a thunderclap
Stops my heart, and starts again
Infinite lines on the road map
Take a running leapAnd, go – Bounding out in the velvet indigo
And, go – Finding out in the velvet indigoAnd I can see it in your eyes you've waited too
And I have heard the voices that are calling you
And I have witnessed miracles out of the blue
In the night, when the fire is out
With the cold creeping in
Cast aside your coat of crippling doubtJust let it go – Wrap yourself in the velvet indigo
And, go – Release yourself in the velvet indigo'Til the night, comes to take you in
When the darkness starts to fall
Catch the light that you're breathing inAnd, go – Diving down in the velvet indigo
And, go – Lighting out in the velvet indigo
And, go – Dissolving into the velvet indigo
And, go – Exalt yourself in the velvet indigoGo
Alan Williams © 2010 Under a Metal Sky Music (BMI)
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I can't help myself, from falling down
Can't help myself, when you're not around
Can't help myself, I know it's true
Can't help myself, but what can I do?Can't help myself, my weakness is strong
I've paid any price to sell myself short, for so very long
Can't help myself, I know that it's wrong
Drawn to the light, can't stay away, I'm hopelessly goneI can't help myself, I'm upside down
Can't help myself, I'm all turned around
Can't help myself, I'm inside out
Can't help myself, absolutely in doubtCan't help myself, I'm trouble bound
I laugh 'til I cry, feel so uptight, I'm coming unwoundI can't help myself, from falling down
Can't help myself, when you are around
Can't help myself, too much, too soon
Can't help myself, I'm over the moonI can't help myself, it's sad but true
I can't help myself, and I don't want to!Alan Williams © 2010 Under a Metal Sky Music (BMI)
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Maria sends a telegram
To let me know that nothing lasts
Open windows, closing doors
And all that was, is no more
And never willMaria, I don't understand
Your words refuse an open hand
“Give me a chance," I will implore
Like every man who came before
And ever willLight out for the heartland
Far as eyes can see
There's no place for meMaria loved the sound of trains
The smell of grass in summer rains
Washing away the dirt and dust
The dream of spring we come to trust
'Til winter comesMaria, I was halfway there
Turning down the road we shared
Everything, or none at all
You had a choice and made the call
Thy will be doneAnd all the things you left behind
The remnants of a troubled time
Photographs of fishing boats
With empty nets and unread notes
That said it allLight out for the heartland
Yearning to be free
It's too late for meLight out for the heartland
Skies are growing dark
It's too late to startAlan Williams © 2010 Under a Metal Sky Music (BMI)
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Sorry we can't offer the lyrics.
Christine McVie © 1979 Universal Music Careers (BMI)
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Lightning strikes, cold winds blow
Water will rise above the seeds we sow
The evil we see, the evil we are
The soul a massive black hole, swallowing starsInnocence lost, the pure defiled
Every monster once some mother's child
Release the soul, let it take flight
So in the darkest heart, let there be light
Let there be light!Down in the hole, the plots and schemes
The acid tongue, the mad corrosive dreams
Thick is the air, and filled with dread
From all the tortured logic in your head
A terrible fate, the nightmare plan
The itchy trigger finger, murderous hands
But locked away, hidden from sight
In the darkest heart, there must be lightThere must be light
Lightning strikes, cold winds blow
Water will rise above the seeds we sow
Beware the fear, its grip is tight
Beware the hearts of darkness, follow the light
Follow the light, let there be lightAmidst the cries, the endless grief
Clinging to one last faltering belief
Whisper a prayer, deep in the night
Someday the darkest heart will find its lightAlan Williams © 2010 Under a Metal Sky Music (BMI)
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Worlds are blooming, just outside your window
A menagerie of petalled rainbows
Like little prizes under the skies of blue
A garden full of morning gloriesBut you won't see them, inside the shades are drawn
Another shadowed gray day is dawning
Tears are flowing from your eyes of blue
There's nothing you can do about themRain clouds are forming, and pouring
Nothing left to do, but let them
Cool the tired earth below
Where birds will sing of flowers growingAnd life continues, in the sleepy village
Days will pass into the evening stillness
A fond adieu to the sinking skies of blue
The moon has come to tell you storiesDream worlds will hold you, enfold you
Let the midnight hour awake you
Tumbling from your slumbers
Where the comfort of my arms awaits youAnd in the dawning, when the sun is rising
There's a brand new light, on your horizon
Wondrous surprises, open your eyes of blue
“Good morning, little morning glory"Alan Williams © 2010 Under a Metal Sky Music (BMI)
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Catch me, I'm falling, falling for you
Catch me, I'm falling, falling for you
So many years apart, together, so few
So catch me, I'm falling, falling for youAnd I'm over my head, over my head
Over my head in love with youI made resolutions, more than a few
I made resolutions and broke them in two
They're so overused these words, so tried and true
But catch me, I'm falling in love with youYes, I'm over my head, I'm over my head
Overly overwhelmed and overjoyed
By youSo tell me you're falling, tell me it's true
Tell me you're falling, I know what to do
Now, don't keep me waiting, it's long overdue
Just tell me you're falling
And I'll follow youAlan Williams © 2010 Under a Metal Sky Music (BMI)
Credits
Alan Williams: lead vocals, acoustic guitar, harmonium, percussion, string arrangements
Darleen Wilson: acoustic and electric guitar, harmony vocals
Greg Porter: bass, harmony vocals
Ben Wittman: drums, percussion
Fabio Pirozollo: percussion on "Astronomy," "Mystery" and "Moonlight Mile"
Jerry Leake: percussion on "Clean," "Light in the Window," "Mystery," and “Light”
Anne Elise Thomas: qunun on "Adrift," and “The Heart That Failed”
David Gutierrez: orchestral drums on "Light"
Kevin Barry: lapsteel on "Velvet Indigo" and "Heartland"
Marissa Licata: first violin
Maximillian Haft: second violin (Bound and Heavens)
Stephanie Skor: second violin (Lumens)
Rose Wollman: viola (Bound and Heavens)
Helen Sherrah-Davies: five-string violin (Vigil and Lumens)
Catherine Bent: cello
Produced by Alan Williams
Bass and drums (Ben Wittman) recorded by Roy Hendrickson, assisted by Aki Nishimura, at Avatar Studios in New York City.
Strings recorded by Antonio Oliart at Fraser Performance Studio, WGBH in Boston.
Fabio, Jerry, and Anne Elise recorded in their homes by Alan Williams with the Backpack Mobile system.
All other performances recorded by Alan Williams at The Aviary (Mach 1 and 2).
Mastered by Mark Donahue at Soundmirror in Jamaica Plain, MA.
Photography by Julia Margaret Cameron
About The Music
Annals of My Glass House | Birdsong At Morning
Release Date: February 15, 2011
Deluxe box set including four CDs, a full length concert DVD, and a gorgeous 48 page book with lyrics, images, and essays.
Bound (disc 1)
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Ah, beginnings. This song is based on a recollection of my first "date" with Darleen, the exhilarating rush of discovering someone as we walked through the streets of Boston, talking non-stop. Nearly two decades later, the feeling remains.
This song is also important for Birdsong as it was one of the first that we recorded, and one that defined the template for our sound when the sound of strings would not leave my brain, demanding that we try to record a string arrangement. It could have gone so many ways wrong, but as soon as the players began to read through the chart, we caught a glimpse of the future.
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About a character who has followed a path into the deep dark woods, and now desperately wants to make his way back home, though much of this journey might have only occurred "in his heart" (to paraphrase Jimmy Carter).
Not exactly biographical, but who hasn't ever exclaimed, "What was I thinking?" At least internally.
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An uncomfortable acknowledgement of the doubt that creeps into many relationships. But to raise the question doesn't render a foregone conclusion. This recorded performance has been modified slightly from its initial release.
One line of the lyric was changed, corrected really, as I mis-sang it on the first version. We also employed technology to give a little more rhythmic push to the arrangement. Hey, it was our first time out.
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This is the song that led to forming the band. After a long, long dry spell, Roses emerged from experiments with altered guitar tunings, in this case a standard Hawaiian slack key system. Conceived (appropriately enough) while in Hawaii, the second verse came to me upon our return to a sub-zero New England winter, as I was literally staring out the window at the massive icicles, longing for the lush tropical breezes.
During one of the 'living room' sessions that we periodically organized with a loose affiliation of musician friends, only Darleen, Greg, and myself showed up. I hesitantly played them my new song, and they spontaneously created the harmonies on the chorus. That sound told us we might be on to something, and it's a joy for me to hear their voices whenever we perform this song.
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About the unbearable tension between having something to say, and being terrified that someone might hear. Anyone who has ever embarked on a creative endeavor will know the feeling of anxiety associated with a first hearing/viewing/reading of a new work. And yet, so many of us are compelled against our natures to share.
This song is meant as a little nudge of encouragement. I was proud of the guitar part as it required that I move my left-hand fingers up and down the neck while maintaining a very specific finger pattern in the right hand. A considerable challenge for a guitar-playing pianist. Never too late to try something new.
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Several years ago, a group of my students at UMass Lowell initiated a concert to celebrate women in popular music. After being stunned by the quality of the performances at the first show, I wheedled my way onto the bill the following year, selecting this Blondie song as my contribution. This event was significant for me as it was my first public performance in many years, and solo at that.
The positive response from the audience was an enormous boost to my confidence, and gave further fire to the notion of forming a band. Cover songs have always loomed large in my musical world. My senior recital at New England Conservatory was composed completely of radically altered arrangements of pop songs. When I played this song to Greg, he immediately pushed for its inclusion in our repertoire. Good call Greg.
Heavens (disc 2)
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In the mid 1980s, Suzanne Vega's debut album turned my synth-immersed head around. Her minimalist lyrics, and especially her very precise and sparse guitar playing sounded so different from what I had long dismissed as "folk music." There's an element of her style in this guitar part, not consciously so, but in hindsight, so clearly present. Like a lot of my songs, this one long consisted of nonsense syllables, with the word "lobotomy" coming closest to real language. But that just didn't seem to match the feel of the music. After several weeks, I finally sat down to create a list of words that had the same or similar sounds to the syllables. Working alphabetically, "astronomy" came first. It became a short list.
Coincidently, we were already thinking about the packaging of our CDs, looking through the work of Julia Margaret Cameron to maintain the mood established by the cover of Bound. I stumbled upon a set of portraits she took of Sir John Herschel, an astronomer (and son of the much more important astronomer, William Herschel – making Sir John sort of the Julian Lennon of the astronomy scene). Thus we hit upon an album cover, a theme for the record, and a setting for this song. The rest of the lyric was inspired by Darleen's nephew and his wife, both brilliant neuroscientists, who also do normal things like making coffee and taking the subway.
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I'm from Asheville, North Carolina, as is the author, Thomas Wolfe. This is my version of You Can't Go Home Again. The cosmic imagery comes courtesy of our Heavens theme. The lyric came quickly while sitting on a Cape Cod beach. Not sure why sunny spaces bring out the darkness in me – "Wishful Thinking" was largely written on a beach as well.
This song is one of my favorites as the lyric maintains the metaphor while fully setting down the elusive feeling I hoped to convey. As a recording, Darleen's guitar takes this performance to another world, and Greg's vocal harmony feels like velvet. So much warmth contributed to a song about being frozen.
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This song is about misplaced guilt and feeling responsible for things entirely out of one’s control. Inspired by a moment when I thought I might be witnessing the death of a friend, I’m pleased to see he made a full recovery, while I used this song to rid myself of the residual trauma of witnessing the accident.
As is often the case for me, the music grew out of some guitar ramblings and soon coalesced into melody and structure, alas, without words. I struggled with it for months until one morning after a strenuous yoga class, while lying on my back for a well-earned savasana, the complete chorus text came flooding into my now opened mind. I should lie around on the floor more often….
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For several years, I participated in a long distance bike ride (500 miles in five days) called Ride Far. This event benefited the providers of Hiv/AIDS resources, and a small group of riders and crew raised over a million dollars over the course of eleven rides. Because of the nature of the event, and the small number of participants, close, deep, and lasting bonds were formed. The first verse of this song was inspired by the sight of thin tire tracks, left on the pavement just after a light rain, 4 days in, at the 395 mile mark.
By this point, exhaustion left me fairly brain dead, and I would have followed those tracks anywhere. Of course they were left by one of my bonded brethren just a few feet ahead of me. But they led me safely home. Ok, not to home, but to a bunk bed in a campground – such comfort, such bliss. The second verse was inspired by the ending of the film, Children of Men. In such grey blankness, hope..
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About the inexhaustible search. Not a rebuke of belief, but a song in praise of unanswered questions. I'm content to leave the intangible untouched.
Not everyone in the band is a fan of the song, but for some folks in the audience, it's the main reason to come to a show. Who knows why this is. It's a mystery..
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Once the astronomical theme had been established for Heavens, we needed to find a cover song with cosmic imagery. I remembered this song from the Rolling Stones' Sticky Fingers – the hypnotic guitar part and gorgeous strings (and Nicky Hopkins' delicate piano work) has always stood apart from most of the Stones catalog.
When I was a teenager, I spent a long sleepless night listening to the radio after my true love introduced me to her boyfriend. At around 3am, this song came on the radio. Something about that guitar line just resonated, the closest I've come to God speaking to me. Let the airwaves flow.
Vigil (disc 3)
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This song was suggested by the specter of loss that follows Alzheimer's disease, as well as a cautionary tale for folks that move quickly through relationships without establishing real bonds. Who's going to remember you when you can't remember yourself?
When I was a teenager, I spent a long sleepless night listening to the radio after my true love introduced me to her boyfriend. At around 3am, this song came on the radio. Something about that guitar line just resonated, the closest I've come to God speaking to me. Let the airwaves flow.
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The guitar part suggests an Appalachian dulcimer, an instrument I remember trying to play with a Bic pen in a third grade workshop. The lyric was inspired by a series of photographs taken on the battlefields at Gettysburg, and I wrote it from the perspective of a soldier at the moment of his death, imagining his sweetheart.
The title comes from a quote in an Alex Ross story about the composer Aaron Copland, whose last instructions to a string ensemble in rehearsal were, "Very good. Now again, softly, like amen." Sounded like poetry to me, and I held on to the phrase until I could find a song to append it to.
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Formative years, formative years. Looking back, most of the cover songs we have recorded date from the years 1979/1980. Even the Stones cover comes from an album I bought in 1979, and played obsessively every morning before school.
This King Crimson song always captivated me with its ethereal beauty. Our setting attempts to capture that mood, established by Adrian Belew's heavily processed electric guitar, with acoustic instrumentation. The title is Japanese for, "please, wait."
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A song about alcoholism/addiction, a condition I am blessedly free from, as a number of sober friends would concur. While I can't know what that feels like, I can certainly describe what it looks like.
The last verse was inspired by a Raymond Carver story in which a young couple visits a yard sale, the detritus of a dissolved marriage scattered about the lawn. A record player. A dance.
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This is the oldest song in our catalog by several decades. Greg and I performed it in a different incarnation during our conservatory years. Our teacher, Ran Blake assigned us some summer reading – Willa Cather's A Lost Lady – and staged a fall concert to include our musical responses. I was very pleased with the verses, but the chorus was all ham-handed drum machine "rock."
Jump forward a few decades, and a different chorus popped into my head. Now I had a song, but no band to perform it. The seeds for our string section were sown here, and in many ways, Birdsong was formed so that I could perform a song like this. Maybe even this exact one.
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What happens when friendships fade? The song came from the odd coincidence of three difficult phone conversations in the same week, all unexpectedly distant where there had once been deep and easy connection.
Somewhere out there is a guy waiting to hear this over the radio at 3am.
Lumens (disc 4)
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This song is about the difficulty of writing this song. When we recorded most of the drum tracks in one two day session, a number of songs existed as barely more than fragments. This was one of them. I had no idea what the song was about, no words other than "go." We spent no more than 15 minutes recording the basic track, since it was unclear whether there was a song here at all. But Ben Wittman's drumming really brought the track to life, and it felt too good to drop.
Still, I couldn't for the life of me come up with the words. The more I tried, the harder it got, until the song so intimidated me that the very thought of it brought me to catatonia. Then one day, "Eureka!" I realized that the song is about this very condition. What have you got to lose, just finish the damned thing. Very post-modern, etc. So emerged a hymn to self-empowerment, written under intense deadline, and sung just days before mastering the last record. Take a running leap...
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Another fragment recorded in a single take with Ben. Can't help it, I love pop music. Catchy, sing-along choruses, nifty hooks, shiny surfaces and pulsing grooves. Not that I write those, but I do love 'em.
This song always envisioned the string quartet as the driving force, so it took a little encouragement to convince the rest of the group – "this will work, trust me. Once the string part is there, then it'll be clear." Not sure I won that argument, but I still get a rush out of the string part. Hey, at least it's not another song about dying.
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During the first year of Birdsong, I booked some solo shows out in the Midwest, spreading the gospel, so to speak. Visions of wheat fields for days, the train station in Days of Heaven, Dorothy's no-place-like-home-Kansas – it all screamed "America."
Almost a foreign country to me. What if someone ventured there and never came back? Whenever you go, something or someone is always left behind.
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An overlooked gem from Fleetwood Mac's Tusk, a double album from 1979 that has persistently insinuated itself into my stereo system. So unhip, but a touchstone nonetheless.
(Hey Matthew Sweet has championed it, and Camper Van Beethoven recorded a cover version of the whole album, so...) I love the ambivalence of the title phrase. Defiant, delusional, accepting.
You decide.
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When I was in graduate school, I played in a Middle -Eastern music ensemble, and became enthralled with Arabic pop music, especially the monumental, but incredibly nimble orchestral parts. Once this song came to me on guitar, the unison string counterpoint rang loudly in my head.
This one took everyone in the band, and the string players too, by surprise. But it was too much fun not to go with it. Conceived as an ode to Dick Cheney (echoing Neil Young's, "Even Richard Nixon's got soul"), the sentiment sadly remains relevant. Put down the gun, there's room at the table.
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A lullaby to fresh starts. Nearly left off the album because I was unhappy with the mix and my vocal performance. Re-recorded the vocal and remixed the night before the mastering session.
Thank God we don't work in studios, or many of these songs would never see the light of day.
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This song had been part of our live shows since shortly after the release of Bound. After all the morose navel gazing, it was a relief to have something upbeat to go out with. But by this time we had sketched out the rough outline of the remaining CDs, and knew the last one would be lighter in tone. So we held it back, even as people kept responding favorably to it in concert.
Somewhat written for that purpose, the not very deep lyric acknowledges the cliché of the easy, "I'm falling in love with you." But what if you are? Just because it's a cliché, it doesn't mean it can't be real. For such a romantic band, it's kind of impossible to sidestep love.