1. |
October
04:54
|
|||
|
There comes a time in Autumn skies
Before the wind or even clouds
When birds know
They know that soon a storm will break
Nothing moves but they know
There comes a time in lovers’ eyes
Before they kiss or even touch
When they know
They know the other loves them too
Nothing’s said but they know
And still sometimes in the dark
He sees her face again
From all those years ago
And all those years again
When she was someone else’s wife
And he was waiting for the rain
And oh when they kissed behind the chapel door
It rained rainbows on his head
And how the stones still echo every word he said
He said ‘I will love you till the day I die
I will love you like a hooligan
I will smash the windows of your heart
And steal your days away from him’
Do you remember him sitting there
In his room in that small hotel
Hearing footsteps climb the stair
And it could be
Marie Pepe or anyone
But he knows that it’s her
And they walk to that small cafe
Where she says ‘just speak to me’
And he says
‘The sun is out yet still it’s cold’
And they know they both know
And still sometimes in the dark
He sees her face again
From all those years ago
And all those years again
When she was someone else’s wife
And he was waiting for the rain
And oh when they kissed behind the chapel door
It rained rainbows on his head
And how the stones still echo every word he said
He said ‘I will love you till the day I die
I will love you like a hooligan
I will smash the windows of your heart
And steal your days away from him’
Do you remember him?
And my you’re looking well
The years have been kind
Since when your cheek once blushed
At the insistence of my kiss
Behind the chapel door as outside the rain
Began to fall
|
||||
2. |
The Great War
02:59
|
|||
|
It was a great war, the Great War
The greatest war there’s ever been
It was a war to end all wars
It didn’t but that's how it seemed
It was a great war, the Great War
With the bodies and the blood
The shell holes, the hell holes
The trenches and the mud
It was a great war, the Great War
The last war where no-one dared
To question the orders
No-one knew or no-one cared
And you stand there with your poppies
As a tribute to the ones
Who gave their lives for nothing
For the fathers and the sons
Then next day you go out
And buy your kids toy guns
Well go on and why not?
You've got to teach them while they’re young
It was a great war, the Great War
The greatest war we’ve ever seen
We killed their side we killed our side
We killed anybody in between
It was a great war, the Great War
Better still than Waterloo
Better yet than Agincourt
Better still than World War Two
It was a great war the Great War
The greatest chance we ever got
To die for our country
Or if not then to be shot
And you stand there in your silence
Just like we used to do
Like you were waiting for their whistle
For their orders to come through
Oh can’t you see you’re still doing
Just what they tell you to
Remember what they did to us
They could do to you
In a great war, like the Great War
The greatest war we’ve ever known
We took simple fields made them hell on earth
Turned a million men to stone
But it was a great war, the Great War
It was not our duty to survive
We weren’t idiots we were patriots
Come on boys keep the myth alive
It was a great war, the Great War
But you lead us up the garden path
And still you lead us every year
Up to the Cenotaph
And you stand there politicians
Wiping tears from your eyes
With the hands that shake the hands
Of the dictators you supply
Well I cannot see the honour
Nor the glory nor the pride
And I will not wear your poppy
And I will not stand silent by
|
||||
3. |
Geoff
04:04
|
|||
|
Geoff
You are my friend
And you will be
Till the end
But Geoff, Geoff, Geoff, Geoff
Sometimes, sometimes inside
I have these thoughts Geoff
I have to hide
Geoff, Geoff, Geoff
When I think of your house Geoff
That lovely country cottage of a house Geoff
And I know though it’s often been said
In jest but one blow to your head
And it could be mine Geoff mine
All of the time
It could be so simple Geoff
Oh and life could be fine
Ah but killing you Geoff and really what for?
Two floors and a roof, four walls and a door?
Isn’t our friendship worth so much more
Geoff?
And Geoff
You are my friend
And you will be, maybe
Till the end
But Geoff, Geoff, Geoff, Geoff
Sometimes, sometimes I find
I have these ideas Geoff
Come into my mind
Geoff, Geoff, Geoff
When I think of your car Geoff
That four litre two-seater dream of a car Geoff
And I know how quick it could be
If you, if you were run over by me
Then it could be mine Geoff mine
All of the time
It could be so simple Geoff
Oh and life could be fine
Ah but killing you Geoff and really what for?
A car I would love till the next one I saw?
Isn’t our friendship worth so much more
Geoff?
And Geoff
You are my friend
And you will be, maybe
Till the end
But Geoff, Geoff, Geoff, Geoff
Sometimes, sometimes awake in my bed
I hear these voices Geoff
Inside my head
Geoff, Geoff, Geoff
When I think of your wife Geoff
That smiling beguiling blonde of a wife Geoff
And I think, well we’ll all die one day
But if I could just show you the way
Then she could be mine Geoff mine
All of the time
It could be so simple Geoff
Oh and life could be fine
Ah but killing you Geoff and really what for?
A smile and a kiss from some bleach-blonded whore?
Isn’t our friendship worth so much more
Geoff
Yes killing you Geoff, and really what for?
I’m round at your house most evenings what's more
I’ve been in your car ten times or more
And as for your wife Geoff
Well what are friends for Geoff?
Say nothing more Geoff
What are friends for?
Oh Geoff
|
||||
4. |
Only This High
04:19
|
|||
|
I remember the taste of that silver spoon
That fed me and clothed me and kept me from harm
The fingers that wrapped me so tender and warm
In blankets of kindness lest I should fall
My days began in the light of the dawn
In the vastness of stillness that hung in the hall
When the sun’s first rays seeped soft over all
To colour the gardens and silence the moon
I was only this high and so proud of my years
I counted my age in quarters and halves
I counted the cares of the world on one hand
And counted my own in the tinsel of dreams
I was only this high when the tide first came in
On the castles I’d built on the edge of the sand
When the sea first decayed the walls that I’d made
And murmured the truths of days yet unseen
And of years in between
I lived in a house so white and so high
Like a ship that had stopped just short of the sea
And I was just a passenger there
Waiting impatient for that journey to pass
I ran on the Downs with a breeze in my hair
And dreamt in the flowers and swam in the grass
And splashed in the shouts of the wind through the trees
And floated in fields that stared at the sky
I was only this high and I wanted to see
My oncoming years before they saw me
I wanted to have much more than to need
To fight like a king and like a soldier to bleed
I was only this high and my eyes were so young
They looked at the sun and saw rivers of gold
They looked at the rain and saw the tears of God
And they screwed up and cried when the wind was too cold
I was only this high when I first spoke a lie
When I played in the woods and watched a summertime die
When I learnt how to laugh and was taught not to cry
Though I still don’t know why
And I was only this high when I first saw your face
When I first felt my world revolve in the arms
Of an eight year old girl when she smiled my name
When I knew that my life would never be the same
And I was only this high when I first burnt the wings
Of my angelic youth on a few simple sins
That Jesus forgave every sunday at ten
So that by twelve o’clock I could do them again
And I was only this high when I first felt the pain
Of a love that dissolves like snow in the rain
But still that lost love because it was not my own
Did not break my heart though it did break my home
I was only this high but this high was high enough to see
The curtain come down and the years give way
To the vagabond life that brings me here today
|
||||
5. |
Catherine
04:03
|
|||
|
When the frost is in my hair
And the baying hounds of verse abate
When the swallows of my songs
Fly away on careless wings
To the lands of better pay
When my brain is nought but clay
The seams of dreams abandoned in the pit
When my final breath is spilt
When I am cold and blind as salt
And the worming wheels are still
Carry me home carry me back
Through hawthorn winds and cuckoo spit
To where the cliffs chalk the seas
With seagull songs and jackdaw dreams
Carry me home carry me high
Bury my face into the sky
And tell them all I just called by
For you Catherine
When the scar of life is healed
The gape of flesh closed against the day
When I am nought that I have known
When I am thin as watered wine
And lost to time again
Carry me home carry me down
These run-rolled hills, this giant’s frown
The bramble blood, the earth cut vein
When I am gone take me back again
Carry me home carry me high
Bury my face into the sky
And tell them all I just called by
For you Catherine
Carry me home carry me high
Bury my face into the sky
And tell them all I just called by
For you Catherine
Catherine
Carry me home carry me high
Bury my face into the sky
And tell them all I just called by
For you Catherine
Catherine
Tell them all I just called by
For you Catherine
Catherine
|
||||
6. |
Ed Is At The Ritz
03:59
|
|||
|
Here we are in gay Paris
Harry, Marie-Antoinette and me
And for the moment I’m her king
Just while she waits for the real thing
And in the rain Place Pompidou
Harry and me we sing our songs
To a rampant crowd of one or two
When who but who should chance along?
It’s Ed, Ed is at the Ritz
With his perfect smile and his chiselled lips
Ed, Ed is at the Ritz
With his perfect shoulders and their golden chips
But we, ah we, we are much too poor
We spend our nights Hotel Belfort
We spend our days with one guitar
Between ourselves, between each bar
While in the Cafe des Artistes
Ed and Marie-Antoinette
Are talking Klimt and Toulouse Lautrec
And Monet’s Lilies and Rodin’s Kiss
But we are much too thick for that
We just sing ourselves as hoarse as hell
Harry sings Roy Orbison
And me, well I sing Jacky Brel
But Ed is singing songs of love
Strumming on his credit card
I’d like to sing those songs as well
But Dad’s fucked off and times are hard
But not for Ed, Ed is at the Ritz
Drinking champagne and eating caviar
Ed, Ed is at the Ritz
Drinking beaujolais and eating steak tartare
But we, ah we, we are much too poor
We spend our nights Hotel Belfort
We spend our days with one guitar
Between ourselves, between each bar
While in the Cafe des Poetes
Ed and Marie-Antoinette
Are talking Keats and Baudelaire
And such elan and quelle finesse
But we are much too proud for that
We just sing ourselves as hoarse as hell
Harry sings his ‘Unconscious Mind’
And me, well I sing Jacky Brel
But Ed is singing songs of love
Strumming on his credit card
I'd like to sing those songs as well
But Dad’s fucked off and times are hard
But not for Ed, Ed is at the Ritz
With its golden taps and its marble stairs
Ed, Ed is at the Ritz
With his mobile phone and his stocks and shares
But we, ah we, we are much too poor
We spend our nights Hotel Belfort
We spend our days with one guitar
Between ourselves, between each bar
While in the Cafe des Amoureux
Ed and Marie-Antoinette
Are talking love and holding hands
And dreaming nights of untold bliss
But we are much too shy for that
We just sing ourselves as hoarse as hell
Harry sings Cosi Fan Tutti
And me, I’m still singing Jacky Brel
But Ed is singing songs of love
About how much he’s getting hard
Now Marie-Antoinette has got
Her lips stuck round his credit card
For we, ah we, we are much too poor
We spend our nights Hotel Belfort
And times are hard and life’s a bitch
Now Ed and Marie-Antoinette
Are staying at the Ritz
|
||||
7. |
Say You Love Me
03:50
|
|||
|
A cold wind shivers through me
Like a cigarette when I was twenty-one
Freezing the breath within me
Catching the words on the tip of my tongue
I gaze on you as a wondering child
Gazes on his first rainbow
Say you love me, love me only
Take forever tell me slowly
Say you love me and I'll believe you
Tell me softly as I leave you
Say you love me like a raindrop
In the oceans of my dreams
And though these tides of reason
Have left me cold as the skies up above
Yet still with age this reason
Can reason not with the ages of love
And watching you sometimes I feel
I’ve spent my life just waiting for you
Say you love me, love me only
Take forever tell me slowly
Say you love me and I'll believe you
Tell me softly as I leave you
Say you love me when I am aching
Say you love me when I am shaking
Say you love me when I am breaking
And the dreams in my eyes all crumble away
When I'm longing and lost tell me lies but say
You love me in ways I’ve never heard
Say you love me, tell me dreams too absurd
To believe in and I'll believe every word
You’re saying
Then say it again
Say you love me in ways I’ve never heard
Say you love me, tell me dreams too absurd
To believe in and I'll believe every word
You’re saying
Say you love me
Say you love me
You love me
|
||||
8. |
London
03:36
|
|||
|
Ripping the hours from the mean of Greenwich
Running the ripples from shore to shore
Stealing the dreams from the eyes of the rich
Picking the love from the teeth of the poor
Forging the ranks of the cankered noblesse
Scratching the hands from the face of Big Ben
Kissing the walls with a tattooed caress
Touching St Paul’s with a fractured amen
Making a wish that you already know
Catching my breath watching as you go
From Heathrow
Pushing the bridges through bridges of rain
Bridging the bridges with bridges of grey
Sewing the new to the strings of champagne
Weaving the old with the threads of decay
Holding the clouds on the brink of their death
Holding the Palace the hands of St James
Holding the wind, holding my breath
Holding you close in my arms again
Walking in dreams through Hyde Park in the snow
Holding your hand laughing as we go
Down Rotten Row
Holding the days that the years postpone
Holding the leaves that the winters dethrone
Holding the lives that the gutters disown
Holding my heart London my own
|
||||
9. |
Madame
03:17
|
|||
|
They say the finer things in life
Are for the rich and well to do
But still poor as I am
I take one look at Madame
And I know it isn’t true
For all she sees in painting
Is the daubs of losers at a loss
For her artistic compulsion
Stops at two coats of emulsion
And the skirting board in gloss
Yes and me, well, I do the cleaning
Around her priceless art but still
When I talk of Picasso
She talks of Dulux vinyl
But she loves days spent in galleries
To recharge her artistic batteries
As she brays her mindless flatteries
Over Renoirs and Modiglianis
And when she says ‘oh how I love the Dutch’
I say ‘Madame these are not the Dutch as such
But more south and west of the continent’
She says ‘I know that’s what I meant’
They say the finer things in life
Are for the rich and well to do
But still poor as I am
I take one look at Madame
And I know it isn’t true
For all she sees in music
Is to be seen where it’s at
With her gaudy decoration
And Gaultier’s latest creation
She looks like a trifle in a hat
Yes and me, well, I do the cooking
Italiano pleases her
But when I talk of Puccini
She talks of Lloyd Webber
But she loves nights at the opera
It must be good for her insomnia
As she snores through Kiri Te Kanawa
As she soars through La Cenerentola
And when she says ‘oh how I love Verdi’
I say ‘Madame this is more Rossini
Although Verdi was also an Italian gent’
She says ‘I know that’s what I meant’
They say the finer things in life
Are for the rich and well to do
But still poor as I am
I take one look at Madame
And I know it isn’t true
For all she sees in romance
Is a swelling bank account
For she has in her possession
Photos of an indiscretion
Between a Count and his mount
Yes and me, well, I do the washing
All her fine and lacy things
But when I talk of the Romantics
She talks of Jackie Collins
But she spends hours in contemplation
Of the beauty of her reflection
But me I've found the explanation
Her eyes and brain have no connection
When she says ‘oh how I'm beautiful’
I say ‘Madame you are more neanderthal
Too rich too stupid and too arrogant’
She says ‘I know that’s what I meant’
|
||||
10. |
Beachy Head
05:05
|
|||
|
Charcoal thin
You wipe the wisps of windblown
Wishbone blonde from your face
Standing here
In the careless fearless
Crystal fountain of your youth
Here where once I ran
Glee-footed hill high and down
Over sisters side by side
The swan in my mouth still shabby and brown
Between these flaking hulls
Throwing stones and kicking gulls
Where first I held and kissed you
In the storming paunch of April
And I do believe no-one waits for me
And I do believe waiting is a sin
And I do believe there’s no God or king
Knows a majesty as pure as this
Looking back
My heart a box of worms to bait
The briefest silver fin of my youth
I gaze down
Upon these grave-cold flintlocked
Mussel-padlocked seaweed-fetlocked rocks
And here I will return one day
With priested lungs and rusting hands
To kick the gulls again
A vicious and bitter man
And all the wind-worn day
I’ll spit my teeth away
Singing songs of love about you
Telling lies and cursing children
And I do believe nothing waits for me
And I do believe that love is all
And I do believe across this slated sky
Giants fold their arms and gaze in awe
Stand upon this cliff top
This crown of seven kings
Throw your heart into the air
Upon a child’s wings
And I do believe you’ll see angels fly
You’ll hear a thousand horses crashing
White with rage and cold with dying
And I do believe those whose passion died
Once in the arms of failure might raise
Their eyes and see their wings again
With the sun in their hair
And the wind on their faces
Standing proud in this holy holy holy holy place
Where lovers come to die
|
||||
If you like Philip Jeays, you may also like:
supported by 6 fans who also own “The Widest Walk Volume 1”
Absolutely The album of the year
go to album
The debased street music of the vulgar
by Steve White & The Protest Family
supported by 5 fans who also own “The Widest Walk Volume 1”
Lyrically on point. And actually as catchy as f***! I can't get Han Solo out of my head. "Who's gonna tell Han Solo that no means no?" Love this! ("And don't get me started on James Bond.") 🤣
go to album
No Pasaran: Special Edition
by Joe Solo
supported by 4 fans who also own “The Widest Walk Volume 1”
It is a reality check. When everything seems to be going against us and we find ourselves under attack from ignorance and bigotry. It recharges my spirit to continue the struggle. I may never see the future I strive for. But I will play my part and build the next generation to continue the fight.
go to album
Les Fleurs Du Mal
by Francois Atlas
featured on Bandcamp Radio Sep 18, 2018
go to album
Recorded on the Grecian isle of Hydra, this is blissed-out psych pop with stacked falsetto harmonies and luscious arrangements.
go to album
This introspective debut by the Canadian indie artist encourages listeners to look inward.
go to album
Two dozen 12-string acoustic improvisations that feel undeniably haunting, like lost transmissions from ancient Appalachia, rediscovered.
go to album
