Horseshoe Heart

From my band's 1993 album Fields of Addiction. Always a favourite of mine, particularly these lines:

"Stare softly at this sudden leap of faith,

watch as I catch the wind and fly away,

no destination, just a landing."

Paul Kimball

Blue Monday

Blue Monday

I sit with my drunken friends,
in a bar where the night never seems
to end,
we drink to the days of our lives,
even as another one just passes
us by,
on a blue Monday,
where everything is always grey
to me.

There is no happy hour here,
the liquor only serves to mask
the fear,
we try to hide behind our smiles,
but the safety only lasts for a
little while,
on a blue Monday,
where everything is always grey
to me.

"Elivis is alive, you know,"
I said as I looked deep into
her eyes,
her laughter tore through my soul,
but still I asked her to spend
the night,
on a blue Monday,
where everything is always grey
to me.

Paul Kimball

Shadows Grow

I can't believe that I actually called this our "pro-environmental" song... as if we might have had an "anti-environmental" song. Still, I think people knew what I meant, and I was young.

"The sun is gone

the shadows grow

our pockets kill the fields,

the rain it bleeds

through open holes

the wound that does not heal,

the wisdom falls from mind to mouth

to hands that will not feed you inside.

The mountains cry

the ground it weeps

we're tangled up in green,

the clouds that fall

from empty skies

silent and unseen,

the hands of time slip through the day

the grass beneath our feet turns to dust.

How much longer can this go on?

What we don't know won't matter...

4, 3, 2, 1..."

At the end of the song, we had a countdown of 4, 3, 2, 1... which was useful when performing it live, of course, but which was also symbolic of where we were heading in the destruction of our planet. Back in 1991 when I wrote this song, I might have figured that we were at a 3. Now, we're at a 2 and pushing towards that 1...

Paul Kimball

Pop Matters: Radiohead, "Videotape"

"No matter what happens now
I won't be afraid
Because I know
Today has been the most perfect day I have ever seen..."

The best lyrics are always tricky things, open to myriad interpretations, but in this song, which is one of my favourites by Radiohead, I think Thom Yorke is basically saying: "no regrets, because it was worth it."

Words to live by.

Paul Kimball

Turned

"Caught, in the undertow of today,
you start to drift away
got no place left to stay.
Turned, from that which you have known,
to that which you've been shown
your world's no longer your own.
Listen, when their words come out,
don't know what they're about
but you follow 'cause they shout.

You can't tell right from wrong,
you don't know what's going on,
You can't see wrong from right,
all you see is black and white.

March, just another face in the crowd,
you chant their "truths" out loud
while you wrap your mind in a shroud.
Raise, your hand up in a fist,
and yell about what you've missed
you're told it's time to resist.

You can't tell right from wrong,
you don't know what's going on,
You can't see wrong from right,
all you see is black and white.

Lift, their flag high in the air,
convinced that you are there
to fight for your fair share.
Darkness, creeps up on our fair land,
you grasp it with your hand
it's all you understand..."

For almost a decade now, we've been told that Islamic terrorism is the great threat to Western society, when in reality the real existential threat, as demonstrated before 9/11 in Oklahoma City, and this past weekend in Norway, and every day in between through the increasing rightist political radicalization of larger and larger segments of our society, comes from right wing extremists, just as it did in the 1920s and 1930s. Yes, there is a link between those horrible, violent attacks, and the rhetoric of the right wing politicians and demagogues - it's important to always understand that the foot soldiers carry guns, but the real right wing terrorists wear business suits.

Paul Kimball

Prospect of the Sea

"The air that you breathe

steals from my throat
you're drowning me
unreasonably,
cast me aside
adrift in the waves
I am merely
a prospect of the sea.

The October wind
punishes my face and my eyes
it's showing me no mercy
this time,
tears can't hide
the pain one feels
when you are merely
a prospect of the sea.

Nerves of cotton
has this sailor

the waves loom larger

than they've ever
fear is the clarion

call of failure

for a prospect

of the sea.

A child's lonely voice
stands locked behind my smile
it is straining
to be free,
from the darkness
from the lonely nights
it is just
a prospect of the sea.

Nerves of cotton
has this sailor

the waves loom larger

than they've ever
fear is the clarion
call of failure
for a prospect
of the sea.

The hope that you have
shines light a lighthouse
a beacon
that I can see,
but the rocks are waiting
close to you
for this prospect

of the sea."

We are all prospects of the sea, in one way or another.

Paul Kimball

Jefferson

One of my most overtly political songs.

"Half-turned sods of hallowed ground,

tabled, filed under lost and found,

weighted down and then strung up

a pleasant walk to the scaffold.

Hangman's noose on a threadbare throat

he mouths some words but none come out,

That's all right, no-one's listening

That's okay, no-one's listening.

Chorus:

We're all gone away, lost again

watching monuments twist in the wind,

Jefferson was a passing phase

now it all hangs on the turn of a phrase.

Placebo cure for the rotting ghost

those with the least told that they have the most,

bargained away and then discarded

a pleasant walk to the graveyard.

Chorus.

Open hole swallows fish-tail mind

deposits the same by the no exit sign,

entrance come and gone, no-one's here

entrance come and gone, no-one's here."

We don't even know what the real momuments are anymore (hint: they're not made of marble, and stone, or anything else we can see or touch), because we're so busy worshiping at the altar of the false ones that we've created to justify a society that's lost its way.

Which reminds me... I watched the excellent documentary Reagan this evening. If only every American would do the same.

Paul Kimball

It's All in the Hearing

"Mercy comes softly to those who will wait
but it goes by quickly you can't hesitate,
the dead can't speak, the dead can't sing
but they can tell you what mercy means,
'cause they've seen it, just listen to them,
'cause they've seen it, just listen to them,
'cause it's all in the hearing.

Picturesque faces locked in timless smiles
long hollowed spaces barren for miles,
searching for something, somewhere beyond
searching for someone whose already gone,
'cause they've seen it, just listen to them,
'cause they've seen it, just listen to them,
'cause it's all in the hearing.

Gods and goddesses they come and they go
and when they die it's painful and alone,
mercy...
mercy...
mercy...
mercy."

A song about modern celebrity, and particularly the "reality TV" celebrity in all its manifestations, more apropos today than ever, as "entertainment news" provides us with a constant parade of "picturesque faces locked in timeless smiles, long hollowed spaces barren for miles."

Paul Kimball

Let It Rain

Back in the 1990s, when I was in law school, and then a musician (and also in grad school), my best friend Peter Black and I used to drink "on occasion", during which time would discuss all things metaphysical, mystical and philosophical (we still do this, but far less frequently, alas). I wrote a song about our otherworldly conversations, called "A Drawing Down" (the title came from a line in the Wilfred Owen poem "Anthem for Doomed Youth"), and our view that society (and most of the people within it) had become  hollow,  too wrapped up in bread & circuses, and lacking a meaningful direction, or awareness of a "bigger" picture.  Peter and I weren't particularly settled on what that "bigger" picture should or could be, only that people should be looking for it in places other than those deemed socially acceptable by the powers-that-be, and that there was no one answer, or path, that people should follow - rather, there were parts of almost every path that could lead to insight and form part of the greater whole.

Accordingly, the conversation would range from Marxism to Christian mysticism to Aleister Crowley, and many points in between, off to the side, and over the proverbial fence. From time to time, we would light a little fire in the center of the room and try to commune with the elder gods, should they exist in some form and still be in the practice of accepting calls. To this day, I'm not sure that we ever got an answer, although we did have a pretty strange experience with a ouija board once, but I am sure that one should never attempt to put out a fire in the middle of a room with a glass full of vodka. I definitely consider that a bullet dodged!

Anyway, here are two versions of that song by my old band, Julia's Rain - the first is the original, harder-edged version (which we eventually released on an e.p. called "notes from underground"), while the second is a jazzier, more acoustic version taht we played at a live fundrasiing gig for radio station CKDU.

The lyrics were:

I read the news today -
I really thought it would mean something to me,
but stranger tales, well I have heard
nothing that happens seems to make me anymore,
just round and round it goes
through my revolving door.

I heard a song today -
I really thought it would mean something to me,
but truer songs, well I have heard
nothing they write seems to touch me anymore,
just the words going in and out
through my revolving door.

Candles burning on the floor
and Aleister Crowley is knocking at my door,
come around, come around
to this drawing down,
on this "unholy" ground
come see what I have found.

I heard a voice today -
I really thought it would mean something to me,
but stronger voices, well I have heard
nothing they say seems to move me anymore,
just the Word going in and out
through my revolving door.

As a lyricist, I looked to the Beats and various mystics for inspiration, as well as philosophers and poets such as William Blake - and I was never afraid to alter my state of consciousness to achieve a greater understanding, if not of the universe, then of myself, and my limits. 



As Blake wrote: "The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom; for we never know what is enough until we know what is more than enough." Or, as my friend John Rosborough once wrote in a song of his own - "within the fire, you find the rain."

My motto has always been to let it rain.

Paul Kimball

True Love Ways - Darkest Hour

Here I am performing my song "Darkest Hour" in Williams, Arizona, in September, 2007.

"There's a vision
from the edge
it comes to you
as you lie asleep
in your bed.

You feel alone
you're unable to move
you've been wounded
by the things
that he's said.

I wish I could share
this hurt
and take your pain away
or at least be your comfort
when you awake.

It's 3 am
still hours from light
the darkest moment
of the soul.

I want to be
with you tonight
to give you
to give you
someone to hold."

What is love, at its core?

Empathy.

Paul Kimball

Fall Well

"Ten thousand liars
tell ten thosuand lies
and then they whisper
silent goodbyes,
Ten thousand prophets
tell ten thousand tales
they put Revelations
on the auction block for sale,
stranged, stranged
we've been stranged...

Ten thousand saviours
on ten thousand TVs
offer salvation
for a nominal fee,
Ten thousand sailors
on ten thousand ships
out on the ocean
alone and adrift,
stranged, stranged
we've been stranged...

Ten thousand opiates
cloud ten thousand minds
never allowing them
to seek what they must find,
stranged, stranged
we've been stranged."

Of all the songs that I wrote in the 1990s, this is the one that seems the most relevant today. "Reality" television (or, as it's often known now, "factual programming"), "news" channels that don't tell us anything about what's really happening in the world, Michael Bay "filmmaking", conspicuous consumption raised to a virtual religion...  the opiates get more powerful and ingrained with each passing year, and we just keep falling for it all.

The only silver lining is that I don't think we've reached terminal velocity yet, but we're accelerating... and the ground is getting closer.

Paul Kimball