Get all 10 Wil Wagner releases available on Bandcamp and save 50%.
Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Live From A Beach House In The Rain, Spiralling Podcast, Spiralling, I Hope I Don't Come Across Intense (Demos 2009-2015), Laika, Winter, Live at the Goon Den, Mulder and Scully RRR set, and 2 more.
1. |
Eviction Notices
01:56
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And sometimes I worry I'm getting out grown by my friends,
Cause I still love drinking and I still love sleeping in.
And nothing ever changes unless you let change happen.
So we sit and brace ourselves till summer ends.
And we broke a couple laws that we never agreed with,
Held hostage by a landlord and an endless stream of shit.
Now judges are being summoned and juries are being called.
So I sit and wait for another empire to fall.
And eviction notices they don't get any less embarrassing.
They prove among other things that we cannot co-exist with them.
Like we ever fuckin wanted to!
And you could have stayed and been a friend, but you ran away instead.
Talking lies about brotherhood and your plans for what and when,
I would have hit you if I caught you, but you were always twisting and turning.
And we have all survived and moved on with our lives,
And we talk more about solidarity without you by our side.
And I would never hurt you but I've stayed awake at night,
Wishing you would die.
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2. |
How They Made Us
03:14
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It's a midwinter Friday and there's not a car on this highway
That wouldn't hit me just to get home.
I'm riding punch lines and dregs from the pouch that we split
somewhere back on Punt Road.
And the big neon signs they all intertwine
With the passing cars' headlights burning my eyes.
In this city of excuses, dead palm trees and useless transport,
I use my legs to get to you on time.
But silence speaks louder than words that we don't understand,
And I know the language is made out of
One upmanship and slight of hand.
But it's all we've got to explain how they made us,
Unable to explain how they made us.
Unable to explain how they
And I'm naked except for donations, rank revelations,
My own bad behavior, pissing off the neighbours.
Lying to colleagues about how interesting I am,
Just so part of me is nothing like them and
The clubs up on Swan Street pulse to the backbeat of violence and sadness and god awful sweat heat.
They tarnish reputations and they smash up train stations,
So angry they forgot what they were angry about.
This city is a punching bag for the punished to let something out.
But how can you stay mad when the red sun spits straight through the clouds like this?
And the cold bites my skin.
And you bit my upper lip.
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3. |
Laika
04:27
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From here in my cage I see them make plans,
Hear them reassure investors, shake presidents' hands.
The men with machines put tubes into me,
They measure my vital signs, my flight trajectory.
They taught me to sit, taught me to lie down.
Told me that a thousand years of wondering would end now.
They fed me my last meal, was the same as my first.
From here in my cage, I watch the men work.
And now it's a flurry of lab coats and hurry.
They talk about budgets and taxpayers' money.
And I wag my tail and I be a good girl,
They forgot to walk me this morning they were too busy changing the world.
And I'm out from my cage and I'm trying to be brave,
But the men they are sweating and now they're injecting,
And as I awake
I'm shocked and amazed.
At the sheer, crushing empty.
And I look down on men's little earth, sitting there quietly, wondering what it's worth.
And I drift away, but that's okay, there's more room to play out here than back in my cage.
And I know I will die, but that is fine,
Cause in some way I am helping mankind.
And I don't understand, cause I'm not as smart as them,
But even a parachute would have shown that they cared.
And so I float on, space's only dog.
Friend to the stars, pet of the sun.
From my little ship I dream of my bone,
A walk in the park, something comfy to sleep on.
And they call me Laika but I'd just like to say
That I was born Little Curly and I'll die with that name.
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4. |
||||
Fell asleep in my warmest clothes, safe in the knowledge it was summer back home.
Woke up next to a pile of rat shit, feeling like a pile of rat shit.
With my ears ringing from weeks of shows, cities I can't remember populated by people I don't know.
And I've never felt better or more full of hope, never been so competently able to cope.
We went for breakfast at your parents' house,
I felt inspired by everything we spoke about,
Electric letters for free I send you while you sleep,
Are all coming back to haunt me now,
I miss the little sounds you make when you wake up,
Miss the entire notion of waking up next to you,
With our knotted hair tangled on the pillows that we shared.
And from here I can see my high school
And I can see my parents' house.
Can see the people I grew up with
And the excuses I have buried them in now.
And I don't deserve anywhere near this much.
Sleeping in basements with all five of us, waking up under mouldy blankets to scratches and coughs
Remember where the van is, find the van keys and
Fuck off.
And from nowhere I can see myself taking insults and not playing with others well.
And first impressions run deep but your memories of me
Will always be as unhealthy as they are unclean.
And I say I don't mind and that everything's fine,
But it's getting so hard to get my nose over the line,
And I don't respect myself so why should anybody else,
Think that what I'm doing is right?
When it'd be just as easy to fuck around and get high for the rest of my life.
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5. |
Malt Memories
04:04
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I walked past cracked top-floor windows and boarded-up doors,
Past rubble and ruin and bits of the floor on the street.
Every blank brick tagged with huffers and heat,
And an overwhelming sense that you'd been beaten.
The air it hung heavy with humid humility,
Every half sentence inept of ability,
To properly explain the pain and the hurt.
The way things are now and the way things were.
And it's hard not to know when your time is up but it's harder admitting you've had enough,
And after everything we shared I still care so much about you.
But we've been watching something great bloat and stagnate,
And our best years liquor up and limp away.
As hard as it is now scrapping hope for this house and this family,
I'll always have your ink under my skin.
And on the dead grass and leaves and assorted debris,
I sit and I toss back some malt memories,
Of you calling my name from the top of the city,
Telling me when I tried to believe
That what still lives in me
Is selfless and sacred not selfish and mean.
So I slink back into the dark district, meet up with friends
And drink myself sick from the things that I've said.
And what passes my lips, what lives under my skin
How my left shoulder hurts when the temperature trips.
Our lives revolve around forged signatures and luck.
Our lives are funded by five-dollar door charges and love.
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6. |
Fuck You, Jackie
04:20
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So scared when I close my eyes of what I'll see when I open them.
But it's not a monster anymore, it's the worried face of a friend.
Wanna find my younger self, wring his little fucking neck,
For thinking it would impress Jackie if I dragged on her cigarette.
And I guess that it did.
Cause when we kissed her lips tasted just like it.
Walk in time with the rushing waitress just so I can walk with someone,
This pier's too pretty to be alone on.
And back home on the landlocked bed, between good loving and common sense
I realised I can definitely keep living like this,
I just need to quit.
The stale warmth of her mouth was dulled by far too many afternoons like this,
Spent posing round the car park half alive, half scared shitless.
The concerned consumers waddled on into the dull fluorescent throng.
I looked down and realised, I still had my school uniform on.
And the older kids had said, they'd have done it if she dared.
And I knew from that moment on that part of me would always be
Impressing someone or hopelessly scared.
I've just gotta get my shit together.
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7. |
I'm Not Gonna Lie To You
04:03
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And I sat by and watched as everything that I sat by and watched slowly fell to shit.
And you asked me who I'd been before as we piled towels against the door
To not let off the smoke alarm down the hall
And I said someone you never would have met.
And you asked me why I was so scared
As we set fire to our bed. It was something I'd suggested,
What I fear most is my own head.
We talked Bonnie and Clyde and about all the extra time we'd have to set up and divide ourselves.
But I'm not gonna lie to you,
Lately I've been thinking of giving up.
Using the gifts that I've surely squandered on something less reliant on luck.
And I haven't slept properly since 2006.
But I've had some of the most glorious moments of happiness.
And I turned off my phone again and let's get lost in what is left of memories and happy times,
We'll reminisce and not regret.
And your eyes can tell me everything and I hope you know I'm lying but when reality kicks in,
You know I loved you more and more.
But I am scared of what's to come and I'm so scared of what I've done
But I know I've done nothing wrong, since the night we met.
Because you kept me alive and gave me reasons to survive,
And I'll take you away from here by any means I can.
We scattered like cigarette butts in a sea breeze.
I wish I could inhale the ocean, make my body clean.
And the drugs they work,
It's just that I don't.
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8. |
Song About Why I Suck
03:23
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Before if I fucked up anything I only hurt me,
I never hurt anyone but now there are real people my actions affect and I cannot stand it,
I cannot handle it.
I smoke too much weed, watch too much TV, I always run out of cigarettes,
I lie about everything.
This used to be me but now it's feeling stale and friendly.
And I hate what I've become but I've never been so proud of what I've achieved.
And I steal from my friends, this is how I will tell them,
But sometimes I'm broke and when I am I I'll do anything.
And it's no excuse cause none of us have a thing,
But you are all honest I self-aggrandise my own bullshit.
Borrow money for food and I spend it on booze,
Eat bread from the dumpster and use anything I can use,
To block out my thoughts, quiet my brain,
I still jump when the pain comes.
And I just want my parents to think that I'm clever,
And excuse my lifestyle but my lifestyle has become an excuse.
Formed out of habit.
And I just want my friends to know that I'll never fuck them around again,
Cause people are everything.
And I sing these songs to sink up with the stragglers,
And I sing these songs because nothing else matters,
And I sing these songs out of fury and fear,
And I sing these songs cause without them,
I wouldn't be here,
With you.
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