Get all 7 Wampeters releases available on Bandcamp and save 30%.
Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Murder Your Darlings, Hey Judas, Look What's Left, Bloodline, Pagan's Nest, Folk Medicine, and Screen Test.
1. |
Alternate
04:55
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turn my head
turn my head off
turn my head in
to the authorities
make me contemplate
my future and my fate
turn my head around
’til I alternate
flick this switch
turn me on
what's this current
what's this currency
are you currently
making a mint for me
chalking up your slate
while you speculate
on the profitable way
to alternate
gimme what I got
gimme what I already got
in my pocket
make me alternate
and despite all your rage
you alternate
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2. |
Sweet Overkill
03:05
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fumbling in the darkness
like a wino on a park bench
I just can't turn my back on overkill
and I know that it's strange
for you
and I want to tell you
stumbling through the darkness
like a wino on the park path
I just can't turn my back on overkill
and I know that it's strange
for you
play that part
break my heart
take me apart into
you
staring out your window
wearing out my welcome
I just can't turn my back on overkill
and I know that the rain falls
on you
I've got to tell you
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3. |
Hurry Up and Crumble
04:25
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there’s a silence in my brain
like the silence of a train
there’s a glacier in my heart
like a glacier that is part
of a volcano
and I don’t want to know
if you don’t want to go with me
hurry up and crumble
there’s a fire in the streets
like a blizzard on the beach
there’s a violence in the air
like a love that’s taking care
of everything
and I don’t want to see
if you don’t want to be with me
hurry up and crumble
if you’re gonna let me down
hurry up and wait
at the end of the line
hurry up and wait
maybe 'til the end of time
and I don’t want to know
if you don’t want to go
with me
hurry up, let me down
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4. |
Architect of Her Misery
03:18
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she's down, down
like a fallen tree
she surrounds me
with her leaves
and carved on her trunk
for perpetuity
are a pair of initials
belonging to me
architect of her misery
she's down, down
on a rainy street
her natural rhythms
lost in the beat
of her unchained heart
no more lock and key
finally rootless
without me
if I hadn't carved those letters
that cut right to her heart
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5. |
Velvet Clown
02:51
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you might laugh at the shape you’re in
you might mock it with a bitter grin
or you might cry at the passing of days
watching the sands as they slip away
you might hide inside a hillside cave
and shout from the mountaintops that you’ve been saved
or you might fall into a gaping hole
lost in darkness there until you get old
look in the mirror
is that a velvet clown
you might hope for a pristine day
when you can cope then with some brighter way
and you might wonder as you sleep at night
if by looking outward you’re gonna lose your sight
are you a velvet clown
velvet clown
it’ll knock you out
drag you down
collapse beneath you
while you hold your ground
and while you’re laughing
in the darkened pit
they’ll paint your portrait
on black velvet
well
you might run to a far-off land
you might think that running is a clever plan
but you might encounter some bumps in the road
rocks in your pack
they add to the load
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6. |
Anytime
05:12
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out on the open road
by the little villes
near the greener fields
by the dim-lit hills
'neath the starry sky
and I wonder why
I was going blind
in the anytimes
down by the riverbed
by the fishing stream
out where I was led
to an old porch swing
'neath the cloudy skies
and I wonder why
before you were mine
in the anytimes
and I don't have any time
anytime
but you can call me anytime
with this or that
or you
out in the countryside
wildflowers in the fields
highway keeping time
underneath my wheels
by the timberline
and the crescent moon
before you were mine
in the anytimes
I was running down
out in the all-too-soons
out by the timberline
out by the crescent moon
'neath the starry sky
before you were mine
I was going blind
in the anytimes
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7. |
Lee Jackson Hwy
03:32
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off of the Lee Jackson Highway
a motel in the weeds
a parking lot of pickup trucks
a highway gone to seed
when I go out driving
there is no call that I heed
the moonlight meets the highway
and that’s all that I need
and I don’t think it’s crazy
to love you like I do
I don’t think that it’s crazy
but maybe you do
your voice speaks a thousand lines
like echoes in the rain
the tracks are rattling in time
beneath your moving train
and I am tied down to the rails
I whisper out in vain
the night air swallows up my words
in a lullaby refrain
off of the Lee Jackson Highway
beyond my bright high-beams
there’s a dam behind the motel
holding up the stream
and I can’t help but wonder
if it might one day give way
to a sense of growing gravity
a sense of this decay
and if you do
then you do
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8. |
Bloodline
03:23
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if blood is the bond
that holds you to the rack
how can you march into the sun
and say there’s no turning back
say it’s all in the past
say that’s all over now
gonna get on with your life somehow
if blood is the oath
makes you loyal to the ones
who nursed your wounds
before you thought to run
why do you go
why do you leave
what more do you think that you need
is it in your bloodline
to find somebody
who says what you say
who does what you do
does that explain it all for you
if blood is the line
that links you to the Earth
how can you cut it in two
and rob it of its worth
deny what you were
disown who you are
do you think that that’ll take you far
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9. |
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10. |
Pretty Crooked Smile
05:46
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one night
’neath the light of some far-burning star
I said you know you got a pretty crooked smile
a pretty crooked smile
and she said
are you saying it’s a pretty smile
or are you saying it’s a pretty crooked smile
there’s a difference between those two, you know
and I said
I meant it exactly as I said it, you know
you smile like you know something nobody else knows
and it’s a pretty thing to see
and she said
well, maybe I know something you don’t know
and maybe that’s why I’m smiling this way
maybe that’s why I’m smiling at you
and there’s no end to a smile like that
the breezes subside
but they come back again
and that was where it began
and this is where
it's where it begins
she laughed and said
you’re just a little bit full of yourself
if I didn’t know better I’d say you were drunk
your eyes look like pinballs in the dark
and I said
I was just thinking of porch swings and wishing wells
and the rush of the river, the way that it swells
after a long South Virginia rain
and long lines of cars and things that have gone and appearances
and how little they really mean to anyone
anyone
there’s no end
the breezes subside
there’s no end
the return of the tide
there no end
the memories might fade
there’s no end
to what we have made
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