Corporate Cult: ‘Next’ - Lyrics:

Welcome to the REAL world:

Quarantined. The corporate cult has stolen our eyes, and left and emptiness that’s dying to be filled. Dying to be filled with marshmallow fluff. Dying to be filled with underarm deodorant. Dying to be filled with endless sitcoms about people just like you. Dying to be filled with frightening news reports about people who do not look like you… people who do wrong things… and exciting new offers for hair replacement. Welcome to the REAL world. 12 years of educational incarceration and the average genius will admit that his dreams are only dreams, and his nightmares aren’t so bad. 4 more years and the sound of the alarm clock makes Pavlov’s sheep drool, and dream of fast cars and diamond rings, payment plans, vacations to theme parks, jet skis, snowmobile, chrome rims, cosmetic surgery, recreational vehicles, and all the escape from humanity that money can buy. Endlessly dreaming of that proud slap on the back from on high…”congratulations, BOB, you’re our kind of guy.” (big toothy grin)

Welcome to the REAL world.

There is no soul in marketability. If you want a gold medal, then get in line. They’re giving them out at the end of the rainbow. If you want praise, adoration, if you want a blue-eyed blonde in a red convertible with a size 24 waist and a head full of rocks, get in line. They’re giving them away on channel 2012. Turn it up. Welcome to the REAL world.

Non-compliance will not be tolerated. Non-conformity will be systematically extinguished. All anxiety will be tranquilized. All boredumb will be amused. Paticipation is MANDATORY. Welcome to the REAL world.

That’s the lie:

We’ve all got A.D.D. That’s what my mother told me. Cos we can’t stare at the wall like the other kids do, we want it all. And I don’t like T.V. or what it’s doin to me. And I don’t wanna grow up to be a spaced-out slave to the bank with a brand-new truck. No, I… I just aint right. Cos I wanna run like hell at a red light.

So set me up with a cop-out. And remove my pain so I don’t drop-out. What a marvelous plan… drop a pill in my hand… I’ll go to work, come home, get drunk and watch T.V. That’s the lie for me.

I’d apologize, but it’s all right. You wouldn’t remember after midnight. You change your story like you change the channel on that glowin box o’ lies. And I just don’t wanna raise a kid to be a spaced-out slave to the bank till the day he dies. No, I… I just aint right….

So convenient to medicate, when your reflection makes you so afraid. So acceptable today, when the question makes you turn away.

Stimulant:

We’re disgustingly drunk on over-stimulation. Genetic time-bomb – television castration. Removed completely from the sense of what was- teleported to heaven and distracted by buzz. Bred under orders malnourished and fat – brainwashed to believe it was always like that. I’m a cripple with a half-a-mind gone from that crap – with the answers inside and a beer in my lap.

Surrounded by dragons surrounded by stuff – while the kids in the middle just can’t get enough. All the lights are still on in the capitol dome. If you write them a letter, there’s nobody home.

Casual cruelty:

Release your grip and talk to me. Our disease is a casual cruelty. Drop the blade and don’t look back. Still afraid you might attack me. Perspective is everything. Everything else is compounded by thoughts of inflating yourself. Reprisal, you change your name, and play God in your digital mind-game. With no consequence and your heart gone black, you can tear me apart, and never look back.

Double negative blues:

I don’t do nothing and you don’t know how I got this far. I’m a card-carryin nobody but I walk like I’m a big star. Every day you tow the line, I show up a 2 and go home at 4.

I’m so tired of feelin beat-down, washed up and left for dead. I’m glad you’re so inspired to pick apart everything I’ve done and I’ve said. If I wasn’t so busy wastin your time I’d probably go back to bed.

I don’t command respect, I’m waitin on the wayside. I don’t believe in what you believe is true. You’ve reinvented me, I guess I overestimated you.

I don’t do nothing. I don’t do nothing.

Rupert Murdoch needs a friend:

If you measure a man by accomplishment, in the eyes of a corporate state, then the media kings are in heaven. There’s no room for dissent or debate. With control of the common “reality”, the respect and command of his peers, how come the old man isn’t smiling? Do those cracks in his face hide his tears? The old man needs a friend who will give him good news to the end. It’s lonely up there in his big comfy chair, the old man needs a friend.

The old man died alone. He got rot in his brain from his phone. When the called up his friends and his family they weren’t surprised there was nobody home, and the old man died alone.

In the year 2010, they went right back at it again. There was a media scare when we ran out of air, they said: “dig him up. Just cos we can.” They said: “old man, how have you been?” Now the old man doesn’t complain, he’s got microchips in his brain. If things ever look down they just turn them around, “fair and balanced” is their middle name. And the old man doesn’t complain.

As humanity was gasping for air, they propped him up in his chair. They put him back on T.V. so that we all could see the report that he gave from up there, and it said that the weather was fair.

Paper or plastic:

I’m standing in the checkout line – waiting to pay for my pills and potatoes – the bag-boy is on crystal meth, and the tabloids are better than ever. I’m thinkin to myself, ‘beam me up’ but there’s a hundred-thousand ways to get lost and a hundred-million antidotes to the pain. Credit or debit? Paper or plastic? Credit or debit? One thing or the other.

[What we have here is evidence that the topology of the world is not the topology that we ordinarily see, that is, um, we see things as separated by a certain distance…]

I’m standing in the checkout line, one step closer to the end of it all, we all take one step, and one step back, and the tabloids are better than ever. I’m thinkin to myself ‘I wonder if Brad really did cheat on whats-her-name, what a bastard’, and I can’t believe that a culture like this put a man on the moon.

Dominate or submit. One thing or the other. Paper or plastic – credit or debit – paper or plastic – credit or debit – I can’t take it, I can’t take it, I can’t take it. I can’t fuking take it.

[Maybe things that, from our macroscopic point of view, appear to be widely separated in space… from a microscopic point of view might actually be contiguous in touching one another…]

Big spike hammer:

Can you hear the ringin of my big spike hammer? Lord, it’s bustin my side. I’ve done all I can do to keep that fair woman, lord, she’s not satisfied. Oh, she’s not satisfied. Hey hey Della Mae, why do you treat me this way? Hey hey Della Mae, I’ll break even some day. Well I’ve been lots of places, lots of things I’ve done. Still lots of things I’d like to see, but this hammer that I swing, or the woman that I love, one’s gonna be the death of me. One’s gonna be the death of me. Hey Hey Della mae…. I’ll get even some day.

Matriarch:

You’re a shining light of hypocrisy, delegating the truth to everyone, you blew up the worst parts of me, makin it seem like it’s never been done. Don’t repeat my words for the masses or pretend you know it all… you build your power on shaky ground and by your own words it’s gonna fall.

You said something about grace, and there’s not much time… if you’ve got it all in one place, why won’t we fall in line? There’s way to speak your mind without launching an attack, with regard for what you hope to do, cos you can’t take it back.

Where are your children bound, when they pack up and leave in the night? Those strippers and soldiers and washed-up warriors dyin to prove you right… there’s a way to speak your mind….

When your eyes go out, and there’s only thin air, and they sentence you to what got you there, will you change your mind, will you curse your own name, when they change your rules, when they rig your game?

Machines with teeth:

It’s all collapsing before us, civilization is not our friend. Greed-mongers and power-brokers out to destroy our Earth. Oust them – oust them- take it back –take it back – while you can – while you can – assimilation is imminent – they’re not your friends- they’re not your friends….

See where it gets you, if you run away. See where it gets you, if you don’t fight today. And see where it gets you if you refuse to play. See where it gets you. The powers will get you, if you try to run away, the kings will enslave you, if you don’t pay. The judges will judge you, if you don’t think their way. The masses will burn you, if you don’t act their way.

Machines with teeth: it’s people that they eat. Machines with teeth: homogenize the weak. Machines with teeth: They modify the meek. Machines with teeth: They crucify the unique.

Who owns your life? You better say you do. Who will think for you? They will if you won’t. They want you to think your mind cannot think. How do they function? They do if you don’t.

Machines with teeth: programmed to eat anyone who stands alone, anyone who dares to roam. Machines with teeth: programmed to eat anything that’s different, anything unique.

Circuits on, circuits off, hut one-hut two, simon says jump ,chump simon says don’t jump, chump. Buy this buy that, buy this buy that, consume crap, consume pap, tow the line, trash your mind, stay in line, you’ll be fine, hut-one, hut-two, hut-one, hut-two-

Who stole your dreams, the culture of greed? Who stole your life? The culture of power. Who stole your thoughts? The culture of death. Who stole your mind? The culture of make-believe.

Machines with teeth: They’re fukin with your mind. Machines with teeth: Keepin you in line. Machines with teeth: Keepin you in their debt. Machines with teeth: It’s a self-imposed prison net.

Who died and left you boss? I’m not your slave. You believe I should die for you… do you think I’m naive? Hey slugs! You’re not my masters, I’m not your slave… and all of your dogmas are simply INSANE!

Machines with teeth: Tell em to FUCK OFF. Machines with teeth: let them know they’re not your boss. Throw the evil bastards out no matter what the cost. Machines with teeth: tell em to go get lost. Machines with teeth: they’ll lobotomize your head. Machines with teeth: they’ll liquefy your mind. Machines with teeth: they’ll eat you till you’re dead. Machines with teeth: they’ll victimize your brain. Machines with teeth: refuse to play their fuking game. Machines with teeth: Don’t play their goddamn game the same. Machines with teeth: What more needs to be said?

Pull the plug today.

The best I’m in:

I wanna live where there aint no stoplights, I wanna breathe where there aint no smog. I wanna get up whenever I get up and have coffee by the river and pat my dog. I wanna give up and I wanna give in, I wanna get high and jump right in, but it’s so frustrating, that stupid situation cos that guy at the bank, he won’t cash my check. You can run me out of gasoline, you can scare me with that T.V. screen, you can burn my boots in effigy, but I’m a sovereign state as I walk away. I wanna give up and I wanna give in, I wanna get high and jump right in but it’s so frustratin, that stupid situation, cos that jerk at the bank he won’t cash my check.

So hooray! I guess I don’t fit in with that endless game that I can’t win. I guess I’m destined to be ignored by the plastic folks on the planning board , so I’ll just learn to love the best I’m in.

I wanna line where there aint no stoplights….

I wanna give up and I wanna give in, I wanna strip naked and jump right in but if you don’t pay attention everything they fail to mention is a length of new rope to wrap around your neck

So hooray! I guess I don’t fit in…

We’re all goin to heaven:

The world is full of questions that we shouldn’t even ask. It’s not our place to wonder why the Lord put us to task. So I don’t have to know about ozone holes or where my sewage goes, or anything about this world… cos I’ll be livin in heaven.

So fuck the flowers and fuck the trees, fuck the whales, destroy the seas. And fuck yourself, get on your knees, cos we’re all goin to heaven, yah we’re all goin to heaven.

Now I know that it’s not a common practice to believe - those tree-huggin types have all got Satan up their sleeve, but implore you all to gather ‘round and put aside the fight- and pray for their salvation – that they all might see the light. Fill the Earth with toxic waste- spray that lawn, there’s no disgrace… who cares how we leave this place? Cos we’re all goin to heaven! We’ll round em up and sit em down so they can take a look… and introduce their empty should to the one and only book. And if the word of God’s rejected, as we all are holding hands, then we’ll cut off all their heads- because the Lord says that we can.

Ecology is all in your mind. Your hell is what we leave behind. Our children shouldn’t really mind, cos they’ll be livin in heaven, yah, they’ll be livin in heaven.

So fuck the flowers and fuck the trees….

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‘The Distance’ - Lyrics

The Distance
(Lyrics by Gabriel and Celena Zacchai)

I do not stand alone, nor look back the way I came
I do not miss my home, that which gave me my name
The distance is my destination, the distance from where I began
The distance is my celebration, and the end I need not understand.

For it’s not the place I am going, that keeps me headed this way
I want love in the journey. I want to be alive along the way.

When I go
(The distance, pt. 2)

About three-thousand miles away, there’s another place called home
It’s twenty years in thirty days since I packed my bags alone
Now I can stand, and I can run to whatever suits my mind
From the freezing cold to the burnin sun, always one I leave behind

When I go- I leave behind no shadow when I go
No promises are broken on this night
And I can start all over with old memories of the distance left behind

Now I wish I could be there tonight, but if I were I know
That I’d be wishin I was here, and a dreamin I could go
That far away place I’m goin to aint the reason I can’t stay

I’m livin in the distance, wanna be alive along the way

When I go…

Objectivity

Man, don’t let me drive all night. Rearrange me, make these wheels decide
If one more pass around these words could steer me in and make me heard
Cos I can’t think when I go too far, I’ve been drivin in circles around
Wanna lay my head on the ground
And hope that by morning I’m found
By the angels of reason that left me alone, they’ll pick up my head and then I’ll cry
Objectivity risin

What I may think is a world too far, like a distant dream or a cloudy star
Remains to be seen when we spread ourselves so thin
And nothing is gained
Cos I can’t think when I go too far, I’ve been drivin in circles around
Wanna lay my head on the ground…

Stealin J’s Head

Don’t look back, cos I won’t be there, struggling to be heard
You can keep on screamin emptiness, you can choke on your last word
You’re callin me brother in between some other discussion about your fee
But I can’t see that you give two shits about me

And you know I’ve noticed that you’re growin old
And that conscience that begged at you to love has let go
I still believe there was a friend inside, if only you could cry
But I still expect I’ll be singin this when you go
And turn that final pint-glass over and say goodbye

You pissed your pants, and then you missed your chance to be locked-up at twenty-three
I remember your words on a greyhound bus: ‘Is this all that I can be?’
You were callin me brother in between some other discussion about your soul
Did you think this through? Did it creep on you? Or did the liquor just take it’s toll?
…and if I’m still singin this when you go, I’ll turn that final pint-glass over and say goodbye.

First Impressions

If I’m free- why are their so many places I’d rather be?
It aint me- that’s fillin in all the spaces in what you see
If you let go- one way or the other
You’d walk a fine line that separates you from your mother

Late in the night the haze was just right to see you standing there
In a circle of friends around a fire-light singin
I was just too drunk to care
I’ve learned my lessons well, and I walk them careful down the road
Seen the worst inside myself, and lightened up my load

I thought I’d found- a break in the clouds in my head this time around
I look around- I’ve been so high for so long, you let me down
If I let go- one way or the other
I’d speak my mind and get behind someone as a brother

Late in the night, the haze was just right to see you standing there
In a circle of friends around a fire-light singin
I was just too drunk to care
You tell me you’re tired, you tell me it’s hard
And you don’t know what to do
Well I’ve been around and I’ve been knocked-down
As many times as you

Me and the Dog

So much snow outside, so much ice
Three-thousand miles away, I’ll bet it’s pretty nice
And you’re so far away, it don’t seem right
That I’m writin songs for you and you’re tyin ropes tonight

Me and the Dog, we’ve got lots of things to do today
And we stay busy while your minutes crawl away

Sometimes I don’t notice you, and I drink too much caffeine
I don’t give you comliments, and I wear out all your jeans
And I get too excited, and you have to calm me down
I know sometimes I’d act completely stupid if you weren’t around
Nobody ever gave me this much space to learn to love this way
And I stay busy while your minutes walk away

So much snow outside, ten tons of ice
And twenty miles away, it aint very nice
Starin at a time-clock, so I can write a song
Lately forty hours never seemed to take so long

Me and the Dog, we’ve got nothing much to do today
And we stay busy while your minutes fly away

Release

Release me from this prison of fear, uncertainty and doubt
Release me from everything inside my soul that they told me can’t come out
Make me alive to witness the sun in the sky while nations crumble and fall
Make me alive to witness the changes in the Earth, the changes within us all.

Release me, as I release these words
Release me from anger and judgement and darkness and reasons to crawl
Release me

Angeles
(Words and music by Elliot Smith)

someone’s always comin around here, trailin some new kill
says I seen your picture on a hundred-dollar bill
and what’s a game of chance to you, to him is one of real skill
so glad to meet you, Angeles

Pickin up the ticket show there’s money to be made
Go on and lose the gamble, that’s the history of the trade
Did you add up all the cards left to play- to zero
And sign up with evil, Angeles?

Don’t start me tryin now, uh huh…
Cos I’m all over it, Angeles

I can make you satisfied in everything you do
All your ‘secret wishes’ could right now be coming true
And be forever with my poison arms around you
No one’s gonna fool around with us
No one’s gonna fool around with us
So glad to meet you, Angeles

Delicate Apathy
(Lyrics by Gabriel and Celena Zacchai)

Knockin em down, I could see the fragments fly
It all crashed to the ground in the blink of an eye
And they painted bloody pictures on the idiot screen
Stole away your eyes, and left you livin in a dream

You can put on a face, you can smile a lie, but the murder is madness
Your soul can’t deny- that priceless ‘freedom’ that they sold you
Aint quite all that it seems, and you find you’re starin down the barrel of the
American dream
And I can see these words in the hollow of your eyes
Delicate apathy, that you try to disguise

I can never give in, cos I know what is right
And all of you who refuse, all of you who won’t fight
You can’t convince me you’re legitimate, can’t convince me you’re blind
Stop livin a lie
You’ll be left behind
And I can see these words in the hollow of your eyes
Delicate apathy, that you try to disguise

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