Get all 10 James Morse releases available on Bandcamp and save 35%.
Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Hourglass (Van Markiton Radio Remix), Camera Obscura, The Song of George Bailey (Demo) c. 2017, tokos, Arms of Grief, Silent Night, Fiction Facade, Corazón, and 2 more.
1. |
Arcades
03:07
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All my strength
Derive from pain
God forsak-en
World in chains
Weakness is
Salvation’s shape
Not a meaningless
Or a blind arcade
Seven stories
An ugly glory
Cerberus woke from sleep
Ouroboros keeps my sin close
Concupiscence bends my frame
Now I
Can do nothing anymore
Now I
Am waiting broken
To be poured
Into Your shape
One stone I’m placed
In an endless arcade
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2. |
tokos
04:06
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(Offering
All of me,
I’ve had more nervous breakdowns
Than I care to count
Incarnate
In bloodstained veins
Ruah, shake,
My soul) <from single version>
You said,
“I just need some clarity”
I said casually,
“All we need is some honesty”
And that night we laughed,
North Highland
Walking towards Washita
All the way downtown
To the heart of the city
Where the wicked wind
Flies through the aisles
In the quiet of the street
Where the light turns green
Vagabond dreams
Westside
You’ve been alright
I’m headed eastbound now
Standing on my own two feet
Missing M and D,
T’s growing up so fast
And I’m paralyzed
Terrified
Looking up I
Realize
Oh, and I realize,
She’s standing right next to me
All the way downtown
To the heart of the city
Where the Holy Ghost
Crowes in the aisles
In the quiet of the street,
Where the Five Points meet
Vagabond dreams
Eastside
You’ve been alright,
I’m headed West again
You bear…
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3. |
Hourglass
03:19
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Sometimes I really wonder,
Why do I seek Truth?
Not a day goes by
without a memory reminding me
Is it a kindness to be hiding
Between the lines of wrong and right?
Can I reconcile the signs?
Haven’t got a clue
God, I’m feeling blue
God, I’m feeling blue
Don’t your life move so fast?
It turns over like an hourglass
I play the records I remember from yesterday
Growing older in the mirror view
Don’t your life move so fast?
It turns over like an hourglass
And the moment don’t really last
I met John up on the corner
Cross from Corporate along North
He said, “I’m beggin all to Heaven
Wanna get my life together
Would give anything to see my son”
It’s been a long time coming
Been a long time running
I’m still running
Life flies faster as I think of you
Faster as I think of you
Don’t your life move so fast?
It turns over like an hourglass
I play the records I remember from yesterday
Growing older in the mirror view
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4. |
Babe, Don't You Know?
02:40
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Babe, don’t you know?
It’s better when it all falls apart
Better when it all falls down
House of cards
Babe, can’t you see?
We’re living as known enemies
Driving on a road that runs between
Wrong and right
And I just don’t know,
Sometimes,
Underneath all of
My feelings
What’s right
Saint Clarity
I’m praying to be better
to the ones who need me
An effervescent vessel
Of something that they can’t see
And I just don’t know,
Sometimes,
Underneath all of
My feelings
What’s right
Babe, please, what I mean,
Is not all of these vague pageantries
Not so many words,
Why can’t I speak
Clearly?
My love, I don’t,
Ever wanna grow
Apart
Ever wanna forget
where we started
And I just don’t know,
Sometimes,
Underneath all of
My feelings
What’s right
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5. |
Third Fool
02:43
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I could be your lover,
Or I could be your friend
You could be my wife, dear,
I could be your husband then
Show me all your colors
I’ll give you my intent
We’ll set an incandescent lamp
On the window
Subtle smoke rolling
Like incense, yes
Rolling, rolling,
In the arms of thee,
I enter the temple
Where you’re holding me
Combust in the rust
of an ancient machine,
Respawn in the dust
as an immortal being
“Well, maybe I’m pretending,”
Doubt says as he walks in
With a sly grin
And a melancholic
Curvature to his chin
“Love is just an abstract
You’re feigning with a pen
I don’t believe in your
Impassioned thoughts
And romantic visions”
Well, you caught me, Doubt,
Now, I’m a fraud
Of feelings on a wall
Now I’m naked as a dog caught up
In a Southern winter’s fog
If I die, it’s not in vain
For Hark! My lover calls
To the mountains of September
To remember the blessed Fall
Under the surface,
It gets hard to see
Past the blindness,
The niceness
Of fallacies
Saltiness shattering
Duplicity
I’m a Triple Fool
For loving thee
has made me three
Rolling, rolling,
In the arms of thee,
I enter the temple
Where you’re holding me
Combust in the rust
of an ancient machine,
Respawn in the dust
as an immortal being
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6. |
Blue Smoke, Red Clay
03:07
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There was blue smoke
Rising up and over your head
As you spoke in tones
of gray as stone
Can we talk, love,
On an island in of the moment
When we stood above
The thieves’ encampment in the cave
Down by the bay
In a wordless, still embrace
The more, the rush,
The core, the crush,
Like clay we’re spun
Into forms of what
The Maker molds the shape of us
I said it’s all straw
Just some threads upon
The walking way
Engraved
We didn’t have a chance to save
So carefully paced and staid
Now I’m immersed
In the convalescent turn
Of tide
Your hands
They hold
My body nigh
So near to the incandescent light
Off the rolling fields you cried!
The more, the rush,
The core, the crush,
Like clay we’re spun
Into forms of what
The Maker molds the shape of us
To the earth
To the earth
from morning
Until dusk
To dust
We shall return into
The earth
from morning
Until dusk
To dust
We shall return into
The earth
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7. |
Camera Obscura
02:03
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Everything I once knew
seems turned upon itself
Reflections inversions
Paint my bedroom wall
Youthful
Ignorance is bliss
Judas
Betrays with a deathly kiss
Kindred my affliction
Savior in my sin
Callous contradiction
Mixed with fiction
In my fate
Say
To the rising sun, “don’t shine”
Make
Asynchrony
A lie
Metaphor is useless
poetry unkind
The members of the body
Existencia realized
Youthful
Ignorance is bliss
Judas
Betrays with a deathly kiss
Kindred my affliction
Savior in my sin
Callous contradiction
Mixed with fiction
In my fate
Say
To the rising sun “don’t shine”
Make
Asynchrony
A lie
Whenever it is all
A riddle
That is when I fall
into your arms
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8. |
Original Love
03:32
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I don’t know
Where it went
Or where I last saw it
I don’t know
Where it went
Or where I last saw it
I don’t know
Where it went
I can’t recall
Took the last train out of Chicago
Lying on the station floor
Cold landscape frozen over
And the lights glowed upon the snow
Where do I go from here?
Where do I go from here?
You need stability
And I’m not sure I’m strong enough
No, I’m just an amarillo
Light in the night
No, I’m just an immolation,
Not a sign
Where do I go from here?
Where do I go from here?
Where do I go from here?
I don’t know where it went
That spark that lit the elements
I don’t know where the child went
Need to find him again
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9. |
Arms of Grief
04:23
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The arms of grief
are all around,
and I can hear you, daughter,
as you're calling out.
After work I turned the keys,
but the car just wouldn't start,
so Julie helped me jump it,
kept it running
'til Josh and I took it apart,
replaced the ancient battery
took it back to the apartment lot.
When it rains,
it pours,
all Hell breaks loose,
and the Devil has his hey dey
while we're waiting on a Wild Goose,
and the Queen of the South
will rise,
meanwhile the cat's got fleas,
hanging out around his
eyes.
Got back to the apartment,
found Syd swallowed up with tears
the weight of knowing someone's past,
not knowing time-worn years,
so we held a ceremony,
sealed the small remains,
ate and
drank and
washed the cat,
tried to chase away the pain
Singing Lord,
Is this what it means to die?
Lord
Lord
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10. |
Marking Time
04:24
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12 sharp I headed out
Took the metro on the red line
Down to union station
Forecast said it would be raining
But the sky is so bright
Next I’m standing, waiting
In the mcDonalds line
around 1:39
Tried to grab a mocha
But my card got declined
The 2:20 train is heading out
As I watch the apartments go by
The siloes and the junkyards
‘Neath a September sky
2:35
is when Rosemary died
Trying to keep balance on a bus
Like a vagrant
With a group of tourists from Slovakia
On their way to Vegas
‘Fore I know it I’m through security
At the gate with a bit of time
So I stop by the Greene Turtle
Take a Glenlivet and
some crab soup, her favorite
Then catch my flight by 5
High above the Potomac the sun’s shining through the window it’s 6:00 on a Tuesday the 6th day of the 9th month
I’m on my way back to Atlanta
Remembering her smile
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11. |
A Greater Love
03:43
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The slant of my shadow falls before me
The crook of my brow gives away a cynic’s conceit
My message is in vain if all I seek is glory
It will burn up beneath the summer heat
“I shall not fear the terror of the night,
Nor the arrow that flies by the day”
Yet here I am shivering before you
Afraid of what you think of me
Afraid of what you think of me
No greater love,
No greater love has a man than this,
No greater love,
No greater love has a man than this,
No greater love
No greater love
has a man than this
To lay down one’s life for one’s friends
I cannot live alone,
I cannot seem to be
Content in what by most accounts is community
Still I sense disunity
Still I sense disunity
Then where do I belong,
Except out on the road,
To venture on into the great unknown?
I guess that’s where my heart was all along
Yet somehow, I still feel I’m with you
Somehow, I still feel close to you
No greater love,
No greater love has a man than this,
No greater love,
No greater love has a man than this,
No greater love
No greater love
has a man than this
To lay down one’s life for one’s friends
If I claim to be
Self righteous where I stand
That’s the moment solid confidence
Loses hold
And I return into the sand
I return
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12. |
Waiting For To Bloom
03:04
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Everlong
Was the promise of my youth
Got lost and then confused
At last the sentiment’s diffused
Shaking my fists
At the chemistry within
How I wished my mind were thin
Oh if I only knew back when
God made man
I sure could use a friend
Who knows what a wretch I’ve been
Depth over
Distance as it’s said
Could never say just what I meant
Paint a picture instead
I chose you
On a silver afternoon
In a gothic arched room
Waiting for to bloom
Waiting
Waiting
I loved you
Broken, love you still
There’s so much more to fill
And I promise you I will
Son made flesh and bone
Reflection of the love,
The love that we have shown
The love that we have shown
The love that we have shown
Footsteps without a sound
Like a rush of wind coming down
Or a lighthouse in the background
Black silhouette with the lights shining out
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13. |
Alyosha
02:26
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James Morse Atlanta, Georgia
singer-songwriter, sound-maker, ad-hoc arranger, painter
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