Few And Far Between lyrics - 10000 Maniacs

Times are far between, and few I bet, when we can look upon our lives without regret.
Of all the things I have done, you think I'm proud of everyone without exception?

'Till you make your peace with yesterday, you'll never build a future.
I swear by what I say.
Whatever penance you do, decide what it's worth to you and then respect it.
However long it will take to weather your mistakes, why not accept it?

My hands, for now, are tied.
I'm a body frozen.
I'm a will that's paralyzed.
When will you ever set aside your pain and misery?
No matter how I beg, no matter how I wish or plead, you'll never be more than alive.
You'll never do more than survive until you expect it.
Do you want to build a world with our lives?
You better soon decide or you can forget it.

My hands, for now, are tied.
I'm a body frozen.
I'm a will that's paralyzed.
'Till you drop that heavy baggage you're dragging behind, there won't be room for us to both go this ride.

Stockton Gala Days lyrics - 10000 Maniacs

That summer fields grew high with foxglove stalks and ivy.
Wild apple blossoms everywhere.
Emerald green like none I have seen apart from dreams that escape me.
There was no girl as warm as you.

How I've learned to please, to doubt myself in need,
you'll never, you'll never know.

The summer fields grow high.
We made garland crowns in hiding, pulled stems of flowers from my hair.
Blue in the stream like none I have seen apart from dreams that escape me.
There was no girl as bold as you.

How I've learned to please, to doubt myself in need,
you'll never, you'll never know.
You'll never know.

Violet serene like none I have seen apart from dreams that escape me.
There was no girl as warm as you.

How I've learned to please, to doubt myself in need.
You'll never, you'll never know.
You'll never know.

That summer fields grow high.
We had wildflower fever.
We had to lay down where they grow.

How I've learned to hide, how I've locked inside, you'd be surprised if shown.
But you'll never, you'll never know.

Gold Rush Brides lyrics - 10000 Maniacs

Follow the typical signs, the hand-painted lines, down prairie roads.
Pass the lone church spire.
Pass the talking wire from where to who knows?
There's no way to divide the beauty of the sky from the wild western plains.
Where a man could drift, in legendary myth, by roaming over spaces.
The land was free and the price was right.

Dakota on the wall is a white-robed woman, broad yet maidenly.
Such power in her hand as she hails the wagon man's family.
I see Indians that crawl through this mural that recalls our history.

Who were the homestead wives?
Who were the gold rush brides?
Does anybody know?
Do their works survive their yellow fever lives in the pages they wrote?
The land was free, yet it cost their lives.

In miner's lust for gold.
A family's house was bought and sold, piece by piece.
A widow staked her claim on a dollar and his name, so painfully.
In letters mailed back home her Eastern sisters they would moan
as they would read accounts of madness, childbirth, loneliness and grief.

Jezebel lyrics - 10000 Maniacs

To think of my task is chilling.
To know I was carefully building the mask I was wearing for two years, swearing I'd tear it off.
I've sat in the dark explaining to myself that I'm straining too hard for feelings I ought to find easily.
Called myself Jezebel.
I don't believe.

Before I say that the vows we made weigh like a stone in my heart.
Family is family, don't let this tear us apart.

You lie there, an innocent baby.
I feel like the thief who is raiding your home, entering and breaking and taking in every room.
I know your feelings are tender and that inside you the embers still glow.
But I'm a shadow, I'm only a bed of blackened coal.
Call myself Jezebel for wanting to leave.

I'm not saying I'm replacing love for some other word to describe the sacred tie that bound me to you.
I'm just saying we've mistaken one for thousands of words.
And for that mistake, I've caused you such pain that I damn that word.
I've no more ways to hide that I'm a desolate and empty, hollow place inside.

I'm not saying I'm replacing love for some other word to describe the sacred tie that bound me to you.
I'm not saying love's a plaything.
No, it's a powerful word, inspired by strong desire to bind myself to you.
How I wish that we never had tried to be man and his wife, to weave our lives into a blindfold over both our eyes.

How You've Grown lyrics - 10000 Maniacs

"My, how you've grown."
I remember that phrase from my childhood days too
"Just wait and see."
I remember those words and how they chided me, when patient was the hardest thing to be.
Because we can't make up for the time that we've lost, I must let these memories provide.
No little girl can stop her world to wait for me.

I should have known.
At your age, in a string of days the year is gone.
But in that space of time, it takes so long.
Because we can't make up for the time that we've lost, I must let those memories provide.
No little girl can stop her world to wait for me.

Every time we say goodbye you're frozen in my mind as the child that you never will be, you never will be again.
I'll never be more to you than a stranger could be.

Every time we say goodbye you're frozen in my mind as a child that you never will be, will be again.

Candy Everybody Wants lyrics - 10000 Maniacs

If lust and hate is the candy,
If blood and love taste so sweet,
Then we give 'em what they want.
Hey, hey, give 'em what they want.

So their eyes are growing hazy,
'Cos they wanna turn it on,
So their minds are soft and lazy,
Well, hey, give 'em what they want.

If lust and hate is the candy,
If blood and love taste so sweet,
Then we give 'em what they want.

So their eyes are growing hazy,
'Cos they wanna turn it on,
So their minds are soft and lazy,
Well... who do you wanna blame?

Hey, hey, give 'em what they want.

If lust and hate is the candy,
If blood and love tastes so sweet,
Then we give 'em what they want.

So their eyes are growing hazy,
'Cos they wanna turn it on,
So their minds are soft and lazy.

Well... who do you wanna blame?

Tolerance lyrics - 10000 Maniacs

The still and silence is torn with violence.
A loud breaking sound in the night is made.
Hear it grow, hear it fade.
The sound you're hearing, the sound you're fearing
is the hate that parades up and down our streets, coming within bounds and within reach.

Now, inside the place we hide away, we hear it near and hope it turns away.
Turn away...

There's something seething in the air we're breathing.
We learn slash and burn is the method to use.
Set a flame, burn it new.
We're overpowered.
We kneel, we cower, we cover our heads.
Feel the threat of blows that will come and the damage that will be done in its wake.

Now, inside this place we hide away, we hear it near although it's miles away.
We hear it near and hope it turns away.
Turn away...

This house divided, we live inside it.
Hate's dwelling place is behind our door in fitful nights.
Hear it walk the floor and hear it rave as it moans and drags along its ball and chain,
as it moves through this house it can't escape.

Now inside this place we hide away.
We hear it near and hope it turns away.
Turn away....

Circle Dream lyrics - 10000 Maniacs

I dreamed of a circle, I dreamed of a circle round.
And in that circle I had made were all the worlds unformed and unborn yet.
A volume, a sphere that was the earth, that was the moon, that did revolve around my room.

I dreamed of a circle, I dreamed of a circle round.
And in that circle was a maze, a terrible spiral to be lost in.
Blind in my fear, I was escaping just by feel.
But at every turn my way was sealed.

I dreamed of a circle, I dreamed of a circle round.
And in that circle was a face.
Her eyes looked upon me with fondness.
Her warmth coming near, calling me "sweetness", calling me "dear."
But I whispered, "No, I can't rest here."

I dreamed of a circle, I dreamed of a circle round.

If You Intend lyrics - 10000 Maniacs

If you intend to live again,
then open your eyes and don't pretend you're feeling there's nothing worth believing.

God, if you persist you'll die like this,
and wither in the midst of your first season,
cut down with no reason.
How can you be so near and not see everything?

If you intend to live again,
then take the outstreched hand of the one that needs you.
It's been so long, we've missed you.
Why do you intend to speed your end?
Lie in the dark and let your limbs grow weaker, sinking low then deeper.
How can you be so near and not see everything?

Feel what might be. See what I see.
Again and again and again and again say you don't.
You say you don't, but you will.
How can you be so near and not see?

I'm Not The Man lyrics - 10000 Maniacs

It crawls on his back, won't ever let him be.
Stares at the walls until the cinder blocks can breathe.
His eyes have gone away, escaping over time.
He rules a crowded nation inside his mind.

He knows that night like his hand.
He knows every move he made.
Late shift, the bell that rang, a time card won't fade.
10:05 his truck pulled home.
10:05 he climbed his stair, about the time he was accused of being there.

But I'm not the man.
He goes free as I wait on the row for the man to test the rope he'll slip around my throat...
and silence me.

On the day he was tried no witnesses testified.
Nothing but evidence, not hard to falsify.
His own confession was a prosecutor's prize,
made up of fear, of rage and of outright lies.

But I'm not the man.
He goes free as the candle vigil glows, as they burn my clothes.
As the crowd cries, "Hang him slow!" and I feel my blood go cold, he goes free.

Call out the KKK, they're wild after me.
And with that frenzied look of half-demented zeal,
they'd love to serve me up my final meal.
Who'll read my final rite and hear my last appeal?
Who struck this devil's deal?

single: "Candy Everybody Wants" (1992)

Candy Everybody Wants lyrics - 10000 Maniacs

If lust and hate is the candy,
If blood and love taste so sweet,
Then we give 'em what they want.
Hey, hey, give 'em what they want.

So their eyes are growing hazy,
'Cos they wanna turn it on,
So their minds are soft and lazy,
Well, hey, give 'em what they want.

If lust and hate is the candy,
If blood and love taste so sweet,
Then we give 'em what they want.

So their eyes are growing hazy,
'Cos they wanna turn it on,
So their minds are soft and lazy,
Well... who do you wanna blame?

Hey, hey, give 'em what they want.

If lust and hate is the candy,
If blood and love tastes so sweet,
Then we give 'em what they want.

So their eyes are growing hazy,
'Cos they wanna turn it on,
So their minds are soft and lazy.

Well... who do you wanna blame?

Everyday Is Like Sunday lyrics - 10000 Maniacs

(originally by Morrissey)

Trudging slowly over wet sand
Back to the bench where your clothes were stolen
This is a seaside town
That they forgot to close down
Armageddon - come armageddon come armageddon come
Everyday is like Sunday
Everyday is silent and grey
Hide on a promenade
Etch on a post card:
How I dearly wish I was not here
In the coastal town
That they forgot to bomb
Come, come nuclear bomb!
Everyday is like Sunday
Everyday is silent and grey
Trudging back over pebbles and sand
And a strange dust lands on your hands
(And on your face)
Everyday is like Sunday
"Win yourself a cheap tray"
Share some grease tea with me
Everyday is silent and grey

Sally Ann lyrics - 10000 Maniacs

A woman of beauty, a woman of pain
In France or Jakarta, her shadow's the same

You go home with Sally Ann
You go home with Sally Ann
You go home

A woman of kindness with bracelets of jade
In China or Japan, her choices are made

You go home with Sally Ann
You go home with Sally Ann
You go home

A woman of chances, no family or friends
In Argentina, she knows only men

You go home with Sally Ann
You go home with Sally Ann
You go home

A woman of color, debts to be paid
In Trenton or Detroit, she lives by the blade

(Don't Go Back To) Rockville lyrics - 10000 Maniacs (originally by R.E.M.)

Looking at your watch a third time, waiting in the station for a bus
Going to a place that's far, so far away and if that's not enough
Going where nobody says hello, don't talk to anybody they don't know

You'll wind up in some factory that's full time filth and nowhere else to go
Walk home to an empty house, sit around all by yourself
I know it might sound strange, but I believe you'll be coming back before too long

Don't go back to Rockville
Don't go back to Rockville
Don't go back to Rockville
And waste another year

At night I drink myself to sleep and make believe I don't care if you're not here with me
'Cause it's so much easier to handle all my problems if I'm too far out to sea
Something better happen soon or it's gonna be too late to bring you back

Don't go back to Rockville
Don't go back to Rockville
Don't go back to Rockville
And waste another year

It's not as though I really need you
If you were here I'd only bleed you
But everybody else in town only wants to bring you down and
That's not how it ought to be
I know it might sound strange, but I believe
You'll be coming back before too long

Don't go back to Rockville
Don't go back to Rockville
Don't go back to Rockville
And waste another year

Don't go back to Rockville
Don't go back to Rockville
Don't go back to Rockville
And waste another year

album: "Hope Chest The Fredonia Recordings 1982-1983" (1990)

Planned Obsolescence lyrics - 10000 Maniacs

Science
Is truth for life
Watch religion fall obsolete
Science
Will be truth for life
Technology as nature
Science
Truth for life
In fortran tongue the
Answer

With wealth and prominence
Man so near perfection
Possession
It's an absence of interim
Secure no demurrer
Defense against divine
Defense against his true
Image
Human conflict number five
Discovery
Dissolved all illusion
Mystery
Destroyed with conclusion
And illusion never restored

Any modern man can see
That religion is
Obsolete

Piety
Obsolete
Ritual
Obsolete
Martyrdom
Obsolete
Prophetic vision
Obsolete
Mysticism
Obsolete
Commitment
Obsolete
Sacrament
Obsolete
Revelation
Obsolete

The Latin One lyrics - 10000 Maniacs

Bent double like old beggars in sacks
Knockkneed and cursing or coughing like hags
Men marched on sleeping some without boots
Fatigue drunken deaf still to the hoots
Of breaking gas shells
Dropping softly behind
But limped on bloodshod
All went lame all went blind

Gas gas quick boys fumbling helmets in time
Someone still screaming a man in fire or lime
Under a grey cloud dim dark through green light
In all my dreaming before my helpless sight
He plunges at me
Choking guttering drowning
Put in a wagon he had to keep pace
As his eyes melt to his face

If you could hear blood
Gurgling from ruptured lungs
If you could witness
Vile sores on innocent tongues
You would not tell me
Not with such pride and such zest
The lies of history
Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori
Some desperate glory
Pro patria mori
As witness disturbs the story
Pro patria mori
Stand firm boys breathe the glory

Katrina's Fair lyrics - 10000 maniacs

Greta's cedar hope chest
Is full of pamphlets
Glass shelves of romantic vignettes
A journal laced with sedimentary prose

Norma gathers and collects vintage photoplays
Hair combs valentines

Lillian allows the animals to scratch
Leather crack
Mail collect in the box coatings peel

Agnes veiled cathedral dweller
Smiles with benevolent pain
It's katrina's fair tuesday morning
As she with caution unlatches the flat door
She alone cascades to the basement
Careful not to spoil her
Calico printed pinafore
Composite traits mannerists
All others dissipate

Margauritte vigilant dwells upon frigid casements

Sarah's thoughts in the velocity
Accusations always pierce and pass

Clara abandons her passions for distastes
Miss lenora p. sinclair
Early for coffee in the pool
"i'm resituating all your words"
Capital
Space
Colon
Paragraph

Sylvia keeps beasts in jars labeled
Kingdom phylum class order family genus species

Poor De Chirico lyrics - 10000 Maniacs

Oh my dear friend
My dear friend Giorgio
How has this time Breton
Discouraged your liaison with the
Eye styled metaphysical
Incongruous scenarios
Dauntly jaunt about through nostalgic despair
Within childlike renderings
Of a nightmarish recall
"All my images Fragments
I've shored upon my ruins
Pictor classicus sum
I am pure"
Step solemn with the
Air of reluctant manes
As rod and hoop shadow children
Scatter through a henna arcade
Figures indentured to a windless landscape
Enduring silence and flame
Da Da da
No loyalty to the nonsensical
Scorned their nihilist pageantry

Grey Victory lyrics - 10000 Maniacs

There was light and atomic fission
Swelling wind
Rising ash
Tide of black rain
Cement seared shadow traces
Reminiscent of their last commands

Instantly one thousand flames arising
Ill scent the burning hides surrounding
A settlement debased entirely
Enola gay had made a casual delivery

Please build a future, darling
With our bomb
Cherish and love it
For the sake of
Earth bound kingdom come

The undersides of fallen metal trusses
Evil debris of human bodies
Each window's glass shards pelted
Secure confines
Brittle collapse

Neighbors lay beside
Each other unknowing
Faces scorched of all familiar bearing
Too few hands
Many wounds for closing
Marred by
Thirsting
Anguish
Fear lamenting

Here we stand
At the door to gold atomic age
Don't spoil your face with worry
Trust in
Earth bound kingdom come

National Education Week lyrics - 10000 Maniacs

Honor salute and speak
To the corner standing flag
Do you remember how the days of school were
Indivisible separate worlds
Compare contrast
These dreams absurd
Placid classroom faces
Breathe in the features
Of a demographics death map trilogy
Children read them well
Not to bury 3 of 4 sons
As the likes of chivalry
Not to take 6 of 30 bills
To manufacture corpus christi
And so you think it can be so serene
History's most intolerable famine
Has clutched our global tranquility
Reaped the lives of children
Maladies collaborate
With cyclic despair
Infanticide clamors to 20 times more
In 4th and 5th Worlds
The poor have always been
Beside us
Amid us
Death has always been
As million cease 15 million that's an annual reap
Add divide multiply sum 41 thousand!

Death Of Manolete lyrics - 10000 Maniacs

There were women holding rosaries
On the day manolete died
Teenage girls in soft white dresses
Standing silent peace respecting
Groups of boys held in their hands
The fragments of a shattered idol
The old men with their traditions challenged
Refrained from tears

Neck neck hook
Poles of wood
The picadores stood eyes ablaze
To view brutal contest
In the vale of years

Courage unfailing
Agility exhausted
Youth entered challenge
Reached for title shelved

Patrons in attendance
To disarm a common myth
Homage played to the victor of immortality
Cloaked in bold tones

In the stockyard the beasts
Did climb their barriers
Bid by a frenzied ring

Bred for one purpose only
To die in man's sport
Dash against his spindle

An instant fell to wounding
On the day
Swords penetrating
On the day
Torches igniting
On the day
Flower wreaths encircling
The day
On the day

Orange lyrics - 10000 Maniacs

Lineage closed
Dissolved
In its birth
Tragedy
Prelude a balance
Is a synergy
Of reason
Malicious hope
As techno atrocities
Lapse their effects
Associate these ends
Their clarity
Demands your revenge
Please compensate
Not deny

Jungle revenge
Infanticide
Crosses
Very thin walls
Latent casualties
Arrive
From fatal initiation
No longer recessive
Genetic aliens abandoned
Plain deceit
In the mirage of
A just one time cause
We'd all changed
The clocks

No ladies auxiliary to kiss
Their blistered cheeks
Gone

Tension lyrics - 10000 Maniacs

Frail hinges pivot
On a cases door
Commemorative
Souvenirs from places
Containers change
With each occasion

Cellophane encased
Displaying paper
Certificate
Credit years of service
A tool of
Central enterprises

The early hope
For permanence the
Words the rings
Consistency
And social security the
Miracles high tragedy


A thought mistaken
For a memory
Dress lengths
Assassinations
Fractured family ties
Christenings

Local posts they
List your friends
In order of
Disappearance
Lawn scattered tins
Feed birds the
Portion baked for
Absent guests

Mass edition icon
God sent comfort is
Your salvation
But who grants
Absolution for sins
That never were committed

Tension
Makes a tangle
Of each thought becomes
Inconvenience
Sound never penetrate
As servile edges
Break and faint

A thought mistaken
For a memory
Clear the dust from
Smiles in boxes
Cross a patterned floor
Recall the voices

Anthem For Doomed Youth lyrics - 10000 Maniacs

For whom the bells toll
When sentenced to die
The stuttering rifles
Will stifle the cry
The monstrous anger
The fear's rapid rattle
A desert inferno
Kids dying like cattle

Don't tell me
We're not prepared
I've seen today's marine
He's eighteen and he's eager
He can be quite mean

No mock'ries for them
No prayers or bells
The demented choirs
The wailing of shells
The boys holding candles
On untraveled roads
The fear spreads like fire
As shrapnel explodes

I think it's wrong
To conscript our youth
Against their will
When plenty of our citizenry
Really like to kill

What sign posts will lead
To armageddon's fires
What bugles will call them
From crowded grey shires
The women sit quiet
With death on their minds
A slow dusk descending
The drawing of blinds

Make the hunters all line up
It's their idea of fun
And let those be forgiven
Who never owned a gun
Was it him or me
Or the wailing of the dead
The laughing soldiers
Cast their lots
And you can cut the dread

Daktari lyrics - 10000 Maniacs

Like a weasel in the clover
You tilt toss pop turn over
Sit down!
Tremble and weave like a moth
By flame deceived
Sit down!
Spill with your words caught up
Dance in your room
Slide like you're buttered up
Roll back the tomb
Sit down!

Bolt scuff jilt chase circle riddle
Shake in haste
Sit down!

When the thunderclouds sound
Ants scatter to high ground

Groove Dub lyrics - 10000 Maniacs

Imitate that soured old song

There is no individuality
Only guises
Shades of
Nonconformity
There is no individuality
Selling vantage points
Low rate
There is no individuality
Questions ancient
No words claimed
Perform motions borrowed
Thoughts following
Ima tima ima tima intima
Dation
Respected
Head-he-go-round-men
Gesture display
Customer
Limits appeal
Media dictates the latest
Role
Totalitarian
Motions borrowed
Selling vantage points
Low rate
For you
Media begged
Suffered
Numbers
Pain

Pit Viper lyrics - 10000 Maniacs

In the cruel garrison of affection
If worth of lore is true
You know the face of a temptress
Pit viper

A witch or enchantress
Pit viper

With the malign venom of conceit
She tries
Civil men
Conceal fear
Misgivings
When night entreats them
A greater chill sustains
Stains her
Darkness
Shall not inhibit death blow

Know this skin does not restrict her
Tear and shed the coil
Fall of garland leaves
Below the soil

My Mother The War lyrics - 10000 Maniacs

She borders the pavement
Flanks avenues
Parades pass white glove attended by
My mother the war

She'll raise a shaft
Lift a banner
Toss a rose
My mother the war

She's made every effort
To salvage the few
Bought fourteen liberty bonds
My mother the war

Mother the war

She knows every neighbor
Chats at their doors
Compare econosize electric appliances
My mother the war

Share tea and a seat
By my cradle with
My mother the war

Mother the war

Caressing the globe
Touch on his isle
She wrings hands in pensive waiting
My mother the war

Haunts her doorway
Begs her postman
Is there word for
My mother the war

Moments of distant vigil
Three years each tour
"hands of god enfold him" prayed
My mother the war

Mother the war

In bitter defiance
She's spitting the corps
She's wet a brood short league for combat
My mother the war

Well acquainted with sorrow
Left millions in grief
My mother the war

Fold
Laced
Carrion
Blood
Soaked
Robes

Mother the war