Track 2.0

Welcome to government

by the stupid and intolerant

they solve the trolley problem adding homeless to the tracks

Unholy covenant

colour coded and indifferent

The devil's got the good looks and the sharpest goddamn suits

No answer to the queries

can this weariness endure?

Our hero took a potshot

but his stamina was gone:

he slipped and he slid and he swung and he missed

you slip and you slide and you swing and you miss

so swift we gurgle laugh

another vertebra has cracked

crumbled how and ever low

and ever so, o ever so

The grifters resonant

Impeccably elegant

No talk of revolution from self-immolating meffs

But it's significant

They're miles from the front:

Where better for a murder than the Orient Express?

Maybe the question ain't about which lever will you pull

but who it is demanding that you do it

Cause if they're not able to flick the switch themselves

then in our hands rests power over life - and over death

Yr Wladfa

Performance here

Clywais i am rhywle

O’r enw Yr Wladfa

Lle mae pobl yn hapus

Nac erioed teimlo'n boenus

Yn yr Wladfa

Mae gafr yna yn ddawnsio ar y fynydd

Ac mae Jarman newydd wedi gyrraedd

Mae o’n sgwennu ganeuon efo Astor Piazolla

Creu steil newydd o reggae a tango

A mae pawb eisiau gwrando

Yn yr Wladfa

Lle maer defaid yn dwyiethog Gymraeg a Sbaeneg

Mae 'na croeso siml yna a pawb yn pwysig

Yr gwynt moelus yn chwarae efo lleisiau melys

Does ‘na dim straen, dim rhaid a brysia nunlle

Yn yr Wladfa

Mae na pobl werthfawr yna yn gwenu yn yr heulwent

A pawb dan ni wedi golli dros yr blynyddoedd

Fydd pob un ohonyn nhw yna

I Oz, a Jonny, a Jon, a Dave, a Daz, a Duncan, a Daniel -

o, Daniel -

Fyddwn ni siarad eto

Un diwrnod

Yn yr Wladfa

Arhoswch yna

Yn fuan fydd hi’n amser

I finna deithio yna

I’r Wladfa

Yn yr Wladfa

Fydd pawb yna

Lle mae gariad

Byth yn marw

Yn yr Wladfa

Fydd pawb yna

Dwi bron yn deithio

Wela chi gyd yna

Dwi newydd wedi dechrau

Deithio yna

Yn yr Wladfa

Yn yr Wladfa

Man Down v.2

Man down, man down

The words die on my breath

There are no echoes in this town

Man down

Man down, man down

Crying out for justice

But there just ain’t much around

Man down

Prick up Lucifer

First lightgiver

A servile revelation

For the cretin congregation

No cackling witch

No lightning clouds

Tamper down the fire

Choked in filthy rags, man down

Man down

A corvid croaks decree

A ragged elegy

A barren landscape burns

A sordid message in the earth

An idiotic mutter

The fatberg gristles utter

A simpleton's lament

In gothic blunderment, man down

Man down

May ugly overtones

Play merry on their bones

Before their body's cold

Hyenas rip apart their soul

Ferocious vehemence

Without intelligence

Death to the debate

Where morons dominate, man down

Man down

Man down, man down

Hear the trumpets blow

For the walls of Jericho

Man down

Man down, man down

Everywhere I go

I bring the pyroclastic flow

Man down

Man Down

Man down, man down

The words die on my breath

There are no echoes in this town 

Man down, man down

There is no magic here

Such freedom lost in fear

Man down 

The devil's ears prick up

The priest has given up

There'll be no revelation 

For cretins congregating round 

Storm clouds are crackling

Witches are gathering 

A dark procession tramps

Stumbles in filthy rags

A corvid croaks decree

A ragged elegy

A barren landscape burns

A sordid message in the earth 

The fools are muttering 

Their brains are stuttering

A simpleton's lament 

In gothic blunderment

May ugly overtones

Play merry on their bones

Before their body's cold

Hyenas rip apart their soul 

Ferocious vehemence

Without experience 

Truth's bolted from the gate

When morons dominate, man down

Man down, man down 

Let my final days

Be righteous in my rage

Man down 

Man down, man down 

Won't you wait for me

Ill be there presently

Man down 

Another Rapscallion Ritual

Collectively, our dreams form the Dream of the World

interpolations from incomplete sensory information

dragging our feet through a graceless exposition

only functioning at all through an incomplete common agreement

How do you explain colour to someone blind from birth?

Could she be a Shaman? Or another fleeting irritant?

what we call love befuddles these dimensions

One day we shall die. But all the other days we shall be alive

All moments are always happening: time is of no consequence

Scribe my enervated back with a switch of burning sage

What energy it takes to construct another rapscallion ritual -

we must find places where we can find each other.

Yet simulacra abound, invariably symptoms of the same disease

Is it impossible or merely inadvisable to unravel our illusions?

What does it mean to dream that you cannot awake

The Song of the Sea

A sailor was I from the day I was born

On a ship listing mercilessly

With the salt in my blood , my head filled with storm

And my heart singing songs of the sea

Of the sea, of the sea

My heart singing songs of the sea

With the salt in my blood from the day I was born

My heart singing songs of the sea

For years did I travel this beckoning world

Strong winds in my soul did blow me

Restless I was for adventure and grog

My companions the storm and the sea

And the sea, and the sea,

My companions the storm and the sea

Restless I was for adventure and grog

With my heart singing songs of the sea

We stood once together, I recall your touch

As you cuddled ere closer to me

Your sweet cherry lips in the briefest of kiss

And my heart sang the song of the sea

Of the sea, of the sea

As you cuddled ere closer to me

Your sweet cherry lips in the briefest of kiss

With our hearts singing songs of the sea

My soul swam with angels on waves of pure love

On a voyage toward ecstasy

On a tradewind of happiness sent from above

As the gulls circled triumphantly

By the sea, by the sea

Where the gulls circle triumphantly

My soul swam with angels on waves of pure love

My heart sang the song of the sea

For a week we were lovers, my sweet Juliet

Unravelling the world’s mysteries

But every day must have its crimson sunset

As the night closes over the sea

O’er the sea, o’er the sea

As the night closes over the sea

Yet every day has its crimson sunset

Then the dark shrouds return o’er the sea

And as time creaks his weary bones, so we must go

Tumbling blindly on life’s cruel journey

A year I returned to the salt and the storm

All the while I was yearning for thee

On the sea, on the sea

Stumbling blindly through life’s cruel journey

Those months far away on the salt and the storm

All the while I was yearning for thee

I came back, though grizzled and scarred O I was

From a voyage through hellish high seas

I espied you a-draped over some salty sea-dog

Where once you were draped over me

Over me, over me

Where once you were draped over me

Laughing and kissing some salty sea-dog

When once you were happy with me

In the tavern the rum flowed, and I fell to thought

Of the ere-changing moods of the sea

And I smiled though my tears, though I was distraught

The solution smiled clearly to me

Clear to me, clear to me

The solution smiled clearly to me

Two pistol shots, and I never be caught

As two bodies are drunk by the sea

Originally a song, music by me. Flute arrangement by Russ McMahon.

Drums: Mike McMahon; Guitar: Dave Taylor; Flute: Russ McMahon; Me: Bass; Vocals: Owain 'Oz' Wright

x

Soundtracks and Sweat (2009)

 

AKA: What it was like to try and work remotely reviewing records for UK mags, whilst living in the Caribbean.

__

Here in front: My Heart Rate Rapid by Metronomy. Doctor Who noises and vocals from Carmina Burana, also known by Google and now by me as the Old Spice music. Behind: the whirr of the fan.

A taxi beeps. You don’t hear many of them, not in this part of town; everyone’s got two, three SUVs against the H-day of H-2Ohshit puddles and driving storm. And there, in the distance, behind Metronomy’s stereo call, grumbles the very soul of the sky. Something is waking up through the heat haze.

This ten minutes it’s descended; perspiration from above and now inside, a sauna sans smoke, sticky, humid, heavy. The skies have swarmed and lower themselves. There’s nothing here as gauche as a cloud; I’m within the rain now, within the mugginess and deliciousness. The sweatlines drip down my face, teary with the heat; the trees shimmer and tremble as they await what may bring them life, but what has often brought destruction. The rumble comes closer, louder, a lion roaring over its territory: it spits and the sky breaks, finally. Huge drops hammer down and the sand-strewn roads are puddle and mudful.

The advance of the beast has begun.

All else seems silent: the birds have stopped singing, the cars have stopped fizzing by, the chirping insects disappeared somewhere safer. They won’t take this one on. They’re burying themselves in anticipation.

The lion passes by. It shakes its mane and a craggled coconut nearly – but not quite – thuds down. The tension remains. Metronomy sing Holiday, Kraftwerk gone Devo, disco bent sinister. The sky still sweats; the electricity is not yet visible.

Maybe not today, says the driving densensess. A minute passes. In the midst of this brine another tune insinuates: tinkling, trite, out of kilter. Hilariously out of place, the ice-cream van’s tune shatters the moment. After a beat three kids shout and jostle for position. The world snaps back into place.

The lion goes back to sleep.

For today.