Get all 89 Bill Mallonee releases available on Bandcamp and save 25%.
Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of NORTH, SOUTH, EAST, & WEST, ABOVE, BELOW & WITHIN (free single from Orphan Songs 2018), Here It Opens With A Prayer, But It Closes With A Song, A CLAMORING OF GHOSTS (2021), STUNNED (an anniversary song), "Lead On, Kindly Light" & "This World & One More" 2020, ORPHAN SONGS (2018), NEED TO BLEED (expanded version) Bill Mallonee & Vigilantes of Love, FOREST FULL OF WOLVES (2018), and 81 more.
Excludes supporter-only releases.
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Carolina, Carolina Words & Music: bill mallonee
Time, ah, she’s such an elusive girl
she makes such bad eye contact
seems to move you by waves and circles
just to bring you back
to that line of demarcation
where you straight paths got a little bent
right back to that place of new beginnings
just like where all the old ones went
Chorus:
Carolina, what am I to do?
Did I fail to render all that was your due?
Could heaven ever be more blue?
No, I didn’t think so...
No, no, no, I didn’t think so...
And your eyes were never sharper
than when you got born again in spring
and winter takes you by the hand just to make you a little older
but that’s not such a bad thing
Repeat Chorus
If you’re caught out there on life’s wasteland borders
with all your immigrant deficits in tow
you swim the river to a deeper truth
and the searchlight shines through your ghost
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2. |
THE SHAKERS & MOVERS
04:24
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The Shakers & Movers words/music: bill mallonee
Well, the phone?
it ain't rung that much today
and those darker things?
They’ve had too much to drink and say
There's a phrase the shakers and movers
like to throw around
Yer either on the way up...
or on the way down
There are knives you must twist;
There are morals to kiss...goodbye
There are stories you must spin;
All this snake skin to hide.
There's a phrase the shakers and movers...
like to throw around
Yer either on the way up...
or on the way down
All these whispers behind closed doors;
All this ink dryin’ on the page
All these principles to compromise;
All these promises to break
There's a phrase the shakers and movers...
like to throw around
Yer either on the way up...
or on the way down
Bridge:
Once my conscience was my sweetheart...
Hell, it was all over town
I told I’d marry her in a heartbeat...
if she'd put the weapon down
But there are hard ladders to climb;
there are soft hearts to resist
There are souls to be traded;
and so many asses to kiss
There's a phrase the shakers and movers...
like to throw around
Yer either on the way up...
or on the way down
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3. |
JUST TO FEEL THE HEAT
04:18
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JUST TO FEEL THE HEAT words/music: bill mallonee
Mighta known I’d find you here
just you and all those regulars
and all that sadness you gotta protect
and that nameless thing breathin’ down your neck
the trains you missed or were long over due
the orbits we fall so easily into
and you’re wandering the city tonight
and you’re trying to say the words to an old prayer just right
CHORUS:
You never told me your house was haunted
and it’s cold in the places you sleep
And I dunno if I'm just what you wanted
I burned it down...just to feel the heat...
Mighta known I’d find you gone
no goodbye note, no “farewell” or “so long.”
It’s hard choosing the spaces you wanted
when all of them are equally haunted
mighta known I’d find you there
last place to look in 1000 years
funny how when the die is cast
what you thought was 1st is pulling up last
So basically, when push comes to shove
nobody knows what they’re made of
and there ain’t no foolin’ yourself this time
you’re the cruel joke and the bad punch line
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FROM THE BEATS DOWN TO THE BUDDHA
words/music: bill mallonee
there's always time to do in Denver...
and note books to fill up
and tea to get you spaced...
when the mountains aren't enough
these asphalt vibrations...
that call so loud and long
that lead to a lover's bed...
or another town alone
chorus:
It's one step at a time...
when yer heart's crossing the center line
with your knapsack dreams and ragged elements in tow
and the mystery that pursued ya'...
from the beats down to the Buddha
and the things you never could let go of...
and the things you could quite let go of...
running ink horn lines in red wine;
big sur sea sounds losing yer mind.
the bitter toll and burden of the miles
But something pretty close to love...
musta filled those bigger skies above
and keep your words all fractured and colliding
Lowell’s lonely factories...
post-war America gettin’ free
leaving all the brightest and best
you n’er felt that understood,
bangin’ on the Underwood
puttin' all their alloy to the test
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5. |
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GO TO SLEEP WITH THE ANGELS
music/lyrics: bill mallonee
It’s good to see you old friend
I couldn’t track you down for days
I heard you disappeared for spell
just outside Santa Fe
Did you go there for a new scene?
Did your train tracks get all crossed?
Did you go there for mystics?
Did you go there to get lost?
Chorus:
and burn out like a sunset
o’er high deserts out west
burn out with every colour
leaping from your breast
and go to sleep with the angels
sleep with the secrets they tell (sell)
burn out like an old star
...and collapse on yourself
25 North and the snow cascades...
and for a moment I forget
just how good I had become
at dealing from the bottom of the deck
there’s a well I almost drowned in...
and were it not for love
you can fall pretty far and pretty hard...
but there’s always blue sky up above.
Idle hands are the devil’s workshop....
I was employed there every day
sifting through those sad remains...
for a lil’ something I might save
So, I stole what there was left to steal...
from an altar made of bones
took back all those gifts I gave...
they were never your’s to own
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6. |
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THE GHOSTS THAT I RUN WITH
music/lyrics: bill mallonee
I’ve been hiding in these hills
for a long, long time
among the sun and the rocks and the wind
a lot time to do me some thinkin’
about how all this got started
about where ya’ going...and where ya’ been
CHORUS:
you might think I’d let ‘em
put the shackles on my hands
but the ghosts that I run with
Honey, they got other plans
my get-away was fantastic
and my heart was all a-raptured
shook off all their dogs
I eluded every capture
when my parachute it opened wide
I still see blue sky in my dreams
now it’s mysteries left unsolved
on your TV
No, it ain’t how mama raised me
And it ain’t what daddy did
It ain’t what the preacher
taught me at all;
So, it coulda been the drugs
it coulda been religion
Coulda been the voices
that made me feel small
Now, here’s what happens to you
when you commit the perfect crime
when I say what’s yours is mine
and it all gets tragic
here’s what happens to you
when you come face to face
ya’ disappear without a trace...
without a trace
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7. |
STOP BREAKIN' DOWN
03:49
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STOP BREAKIN’ DOWN Music/lyrics: bill mallonee
This is gonna be short
This is gonna be sweet
this gonna be tidy
this is gonna be neat
like a deal gone bad
like the hand you’ll fold
when the cards hit the table
and the truth gets told
chorus:
Stop breakin’ down
Stop breakin’ down
Stop breakin’ down
Stop breakin’ down
Stop breakin’ down
...on me
I remember when
when we first met
nobody now
plays that hard to get
I forgot just where
where my solo was
when I looked in your eyes
and the monitors buzzed
Is it gonna be just?
Is it gonna be fair?
I wonder where you got
got that idea?
It’s a glass that’s broken
and these shards of trust
baby, all that’s golden
gonna turn to dust
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8. |
BRING YOU AROUND
04:33
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BRING YOU AROUND Words/music: bill mallonee
Show me your cards....
yeah, show me your hand
Give me the sales pitch and all the fine print
of your master plan
I ain’t bringin’ you much...
Call me the “hold out kid”
I found the waste places and the empty space...
And lost every friend
CHORUS:
It’s always clear...it’s always clean
I don’t care what you say...come whatever what may
If you’ll just say what you mean
and the Love that waltzed in here...
without a sound
It’ll whisper you name...
It’ll take all th blame
It’ll bring you around
Yeah, behind the lies...
you tell yourself to get
between the tears you can’t cry and the wings that won’t fly
and the audible sigh
You gotta throw off the veil...
throw open the door
away with the fears, announce a new year
where mercy is born
Somewhere the sky’s always bright...
Somewhere the sky’s always blue
and that Love that you found, you know the one where you drown?
It’s now living in you
If all hell should break lose...
if it should thunder and storm
You know these vagabond hearts,
they were lost from the start
they will find their way home
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9. |
SPRING IN YOUR SPIRIT
04:27
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SPRING IN YOUR SPIRIT words/music: bill mallonee
I could see the sunlight...
playing on your walls
it looks like she might
get here after all
chorus:
And this dark night of the soul
trade your grieving for some rock n’ roll
There’s Spring in your spirit
and everyone can hear it
Maybe God’s face
has smiled upon us
look at that morning...
filling up with promise
(chorus)
Oh, the ledger sheet of the years
It all dissolves...in a single tear
Baby, you be the diamond...
make all those people talk
I’ll be that blade of grass growing...
from a crack in the sidewalk
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10. |
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KEEP THE HOME FIRES BURNING
music/lyrics: bill mallonee
S’a long way through a rock wall
and to pick through all these seams
and the drill bits of progress
are always and ever turning
I’ve gotten pretty good, as you’d expect
in this sarcophagus of Russian roulette
just to keep the home fires burning
chorus:
Burning bright.......burning through
whatever darkness befalls, (besets, bedevils) you
burning ever a new
burning ever so true
It’s a world with no air
and it’s a world with no sun
It’s a tomb for the living to plunder
it’s two bellows of thinnest skin
breathing the dust of quick end
in a world that’s long lost it’s wonder
wait for me where it’s always spring
honey, wait for me where the air is clean
while I become one with our mother
dearest wife, and faithful friend
I carried your smile as that cage descended
just to keep the home fires burning
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11. |
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12. |
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WIDE AWAKE WITH YOUR ORPHAN EYES
muisc/lyrics: bill mallonee
Poor kid’s wound...opening up...
under a big sky town
air to breathe.....
space to fall down
yeah, the wind has a voice...
you came to adore
and about that wound?
Well, I’m to blame for...
(Subchorus)
and it costs so much...
It costs so much
to keep it all hid
(chorus)
wide awake with your orphan eyes
blinking wondrous in the Autumn light
that passes right through you
standing by a barbed wire fence
at the scene of the accident
and your skies are cobalt blue
And your skies are cobalt blue
faith, she’s a woman...
and to her I am bound
Honey, I’ll treat you well....
considerin’ what I drag around
It was nearing Christmas...
when you bade it all goodbye
I know those loneliness songs
are gonna need a bigger sky
It’s a far cry from the backyard...
of laughter and cartoons
to winter that glazes everything...
under a mirror ball moon
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13. |
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Bill Mallonee
Bill Mallonee is an Americana artist w/ 80 plus albums over a 30 year career. Voted by Paste Music Magazine #65 in their
"Top 100 Living Songwriters" poll. He was the
founding member of Vigilantes of Love. He has worked with Mark Heard, Buddy Miller, Emmylou Harris, & Peter Buck from REM.
His most recent work, "Lead On, Kindly Light" is a 23song double Cd released Feb 2020.
... more
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