1. |
Book Of Clichés
05:22
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I wrote a book
It's a book of clichés
Each page grows more relevant every day
How could there possibly be any more
Words left that no one's put together before?
I took a look
A good look at my face
Bruised, beaten, my features so far out of place
Dollar bin knockoffs of Picasso prints
There's no abstraction for the accurate
I wish that I could keep my head above my heels
But I can't stop digging
To bury my ears in the ground where I can hear
All the wagons approaching
I guess that this is how having a conscience feels:
There's a big white van
With a satellite dish
That is park right in front of my heart tonight
I wrote a song
It was slow and long
I wrote all the words and the music wrong
That's something someone else wrote
Note for note
I wrote a book
Wrote a screenplay, wrote an opera
Wrote a concept album but then I shelved them all
Because I labored and labored but I couldn't make them
Any more than just a shell of what I wanted them to be
God, I hope you never have to feel the same
Like the worst is impending
Struggling just to make your lyrics rhyme again
Always fudging the ending
I hate the sound my body makes when it can't sleep
It's like a big white man
Hiding under my bed
With a microphone and he's sending out a signal to
The big white van
With a satellite dish
That is parked right in front of my heart tonight
And every beat is a beep of fluorescent green
On the monitor screens inside
Now I never wait for the phone to ring
No, I'm just waiting for my phone to get disconnected
Penalized for my sins
Ostracized from the grid
And eulogizing my water, sewer, trash, electric
Now the furnace is a freezer and the cold is biting
Now the furnace is a freezer and the cold has teeth
So I burn every single thing that I ever created
Just to warm up my body and my hands by the heat
But if a spark jumps out, if it lands in the house
And it if spreads to the curtains and I can't put it out
If I'm trapped in the attic and I'm screaming for help
Would the neighbors call the cops?
Would they just sit and watch?
And if the hoses and extinguishers and hydrants don't work
Would it be karmic retribution for the people I've hurt?
Because I labored and labored but I couldn't make myself
Any more than just a shell of who I wanted to be
Now my hands are tired
And my skin is cracked
And I don't think I'm gonna get my damage deposit back
My bones are tired
And my joints are cracked
And I don't think I'm gonna get my damage deposit back
My tongue is tired
And my lips are crackedAnd I don't think I'm gonna get my damage deposit back
And I don't think I'm gonna get my damage deposit back
The floor's on fire
And the plaster's cracked
And I don't think I'm gonna get my damage deposit back
I don't think I'm gonna get my damage deposit back
I don't think I'm gonna get my damage deposit back
I don't think I'm gonna get my damage deposit back
I don't think I'm gonna get my damage deposit back
I don't think I'm gonna get my damage deposit back
I don't think I'm gonna get my damage deposit back
I don't think I'm gonna get my damage deposit back
I don't think I'm gonna get my damage deposit back
I don't think I'm gonna get my damage deposit back
I don't think I'm gonna get my damage deposit back
I don't think I'm gonna get my damage deposit back
I don't think I'm gonna get my damage deposit back
I don't think I'm gonna get my damage deposit back
I don't think I'm gonna get my damage deposit back
I don't think I'm gonna get my damage deposit back
I don't think I'm gonna get my damage deposit back
I don't think I'm gonna get my damage deposit back
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2. |
Funk Songs About Funk
04:55
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Did you know that you're an architect?
The mastermind of a landmark to erect
A thousand business cards stacked proudly on your desk
I bring you coffee, massage your lower neck
I'm the intern and you're the internet
You're eternal, I'm eternally in debt.
I have dreams that I'm locked inside your trunk
It's cold and dark with the constant kicking thump
Of your car stereo blaring funk songs about funk
When you free me, I'm savoring the air
With strands of duct tape still streaming from my hair
I scream, "Let's crash the prom, let's crash the science fair."
So we made a volcano
Out of vinegar and baking soda
And it blew up, so we threw up our hands
And danced in the moonlight halo
And we tried to keep the night to
Ourselves, oh how selfish of us
If we did, then the sun wouldn't come up
And all the plants and the trees wouldn't grow up
So we had to let them die
I've never been a vegetarian
I've never battled the sword against the pen
I've never seen Titanic
Don't tell me how it ends
Because I have dreams of a ship that never sunk
Passengers dancing in the auditorium
And while the band played on
They're playing funk songs about funk
Give me slap bass and a steady pace
All the prerequisites to save face
From the gravity that is tragically
Pulling my feet planted in the same place
We can try to keep the light to
Ourselves oh how naive of us
How could we be so oblivious?
When speakers blow and strings rust
And all living things become dust
So let's all hold hands and discuss
What the good reverend James Brown taught us
May every drum fill fill us
With a pure percolating persistence
With the courage and with the defiance
To ignore all those who try to tell us
That our dreams are the things that will kill us
That our dreams are the things that will kill us
That our dreams are the things that will kill us
If we don't just let them die
Did you know that you're a metaphor?
For present future, and everything before
And I'm the castaway who washed up on your shore
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3. |
Blythe, California
01:45
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Blythe, California, is a broken place
At the far eastern corner of a broken state
And if you weren't born in Blythe, California
Then you only end up there by mistake.
Because there's a magnetic field at the edge of the town
That forces all of the cars on the highway to break down
And the people like comfortably from mechanic and towing fees
And I hear they have a Starbucks now
Somewhere in Phoenix or in San Diego
There's a venue that is dealing with a broken show
Because the scheduled van is in a broken down van
That's overheating in Blythe by the side of the road
There are places you want to be and some places you don't
And there are places you hate, but when you get there you know
That if it weren't for places like Blythe, California
Then where would all the broken things go?
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4. |
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I stumbled across words of love and loss
Fighting for air in the radio static
A man sang a song
He said his thrill was gone
I couldn't quite feel sympathetic
Because I've never been thrilled, captivated, or chilled
I try, I end up so empty
I turned off the dial, sat in silence for a while
Because the blues, they mean nothing to me
I had to get fixed or at least get my fix
So I saw my old family physician
I said, "Doctor, your patient is vapid and vacant.
Please give me your strongest prescription."
He said, "All the world's pills won't leave you fulfilled
I'm a doctor, I'm not a magician."
Then he ripped out a note from the pad in his hand
And scribbled words illegibly
And I couldn't read it but I'm sure that I need it
Because the blues, they mean nothing to me
I called the pharmacy, they put me on hold
To the voice of a sad southern singer
She moaned and she growled
She howled so loud she maxed out my poor telephone speaker
And I craved an epiphany but it just didn't happen to me
The pharmacist picked up the receiver
And I hadn't been made a believer
So I went to a festival down on the riverfront
Sponsored by a radio station
I was fenced in by signs, each one advertised
For a beverage supply corporation
And the band sang its rage on a hundred foot stage
Through a ten thousand watt P.A. system
I guess the first line was nice, because the band played it twice.
The third line wrapped up so neatly
The audience cheered and drank nine dollar beers
And the blues still meant nothing to me
So I tried my guitar and tried desperately hard
To play with some kind of conviction
But it was science, not art
All head and no heart
It was emotional exploitation
And I'm reminded of a man with magical hands
Who traded his soul off to satan
And I wonder how much a soul goes for now
When you factor in depreciation
All the devil can afford is twelve bars and three chords
It must be the economy
Demonic possession can't withstand a recession
And the blues still mean nothing to me
I wish I could say what I'm needing to say
Just by moaning and bending a string
But my voice is a joke and my strings are all broke
Oh, if I could say what I'm needing to say
Would anyone be listening?
When each verse and each chorus falls like trees in the forest
Oh, if I could say what I'm needing to say
Would the words even mean anything?
If the blues mean nothing to me?
The blues mean nothing to me.
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5. |
Ants!
03:24
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We've got ants in the corner
Of the bedroom where the nightstand stood
They're crawling up through the floorboard
Through the molding, through the cracks in the wood
I know they want to march to the kitchen
To swarm on something sweet, to pounce like a gang
So we suck them up in our vacuum hose attachment
It isn't humane but they do not die in vain
I hope this sends a message to your entire colony
I hope this sends a message to your queen
We've got moles in the garden
Digging tunnels down in the dirt
We must make them stop, must make them disappear
Even if it kills them, even if it makes them hurt
Excuse me for being curt
But I hope this sends a message to your entire mole populace
I hope this puts you in your place
As long as I don't see a panther
As long as I don't see a bear
I've got my place at the top of the food chain
And I like it there
We've got flies flying around us
Landing in our food, swimming in our drinks
So we made a trap of apple cider vinegar
And flush their dead, lifeless bodies down the sink
I hope your friend and family flies heed this as a warning
I hope they've all skipped town by the morning
As long as my two eyes don't meet up
With a prowling Siberian's stare
I've got my place at the top of the food chain
And I like it there
I've got hands
They're not the biggest hands, but I've seen smaller hands
I suppose they're pretty good sized hands
I've got thumbs
Yes, opposable thumbs
I've seen cats with thumbs
But they're not like these kind of thumbs
And I've got logic and language to use to my advantage
To tell all these inferior species not to inconvenience
The man with the thumbs on his hand because this land
It is simply just not your land
As long as I don't see an eagle
As long as I don't see a bear
I've got my place at the top of the food chain
And I like it there
As long as sharks don't emerge from the water
To walk through our land and breathe our air
I've got my place at the top of the food chain
And I like it there
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Ryan Wasoba Edwardsville, Illinois
musician
producer
engineer
microinfluencer
Tetris enthusiast
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