We’ve updated our Terms of Use to reflect our new entity name and address. You can review the changes here.
We’ve updated our Terms of Use. You can review the changes here.

Not Listening

by James Wood

supported by
Chris Dooks
Chris Dooks thumbnail
Chris Dooks A young, Northern Laurie Anderson
/
  • Streaming + Download

    Includes high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more. Paying supporters also get unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app.
    Purchasable with gift card

      name your price

     

1.
2.
3.
I couldn't help but look at the sky Bluer than Hugh Edwards's eyes Yeah, maybe for the first time in our lives There won't be any bad news on telly tonight.
4.
5.
6.
Yeah well f**k Veolia and f***k G4S Why don't you tell them where the prisoners are kept? Stay out of my country I don't want you people going through my rubbish I don't want to see you on my roads Imma build a wall in my back garden so I don't have to look at you
7.
8.
Intermission 01:21
9.
Fairuz 02:52
I love her and I never met her, but her voice I live with and I can not hide from. She sings and I can't help but smile. She makes me happy. And then she sings and I can't help but cry. She makes me sad. She captures my free flying soul and fills it with feelings I've never known. She will always be unrivaled for me. When I listen to her sing, her voice penetrates my body and it fills me with this strange chill. I love her to the extent that I wish I was born in the 30's to have grown with her songs; to the extent that if this time of ours was to be set hundreds of years ago, I'd travel through the days and the nights to reach where she is and live there for the rest of my life. I listen to her sing about this place that I've never been to but to which I feel I belong. Out of time and out of place, in a past that's so far but still so close. She is singing and I am there with her, sitting right there on the roof of the house watching her awaiting the moon to descend from the sky. I am there with her fetching for the loved ones who left their village and went away beyond that faraway mountain. I listen to what the doors are saying and to what the birds are praying for. I see the falling petals and I feel the empty hollowed tables. I am there, walking with her in the dying roads of Jerusalem. I am standing on the hills of El-Janoub. I am beholding the blood flooding down the hill of the martyrs. I hear the cries and the sighs of agonizing souls who got ripped off their lives, their homes, their sun and their moon. No matter how divided we have become, or how old we have grown outside our bodies and our homes, it only takes one song to listen to, before we regain our powers and forever get full of pride. The love I have for her is not that of an admirer nor that of a son, a husband or a worshipper. It's a strange love which I can not explain or define for these could not be the only kinds of love.
10.
My best mate played bass in a band with Johnny Marr's son. Doesn't mean she was any good mind, or even that she had fun. It was more a case of looking the part, being told what to do by a spoilt sod for the sake of art. Still, it's a story to tell, something to break the ice. And if I'd have had any advice, I'd have let the whole thing die down, And wait for Johnny Marr's son's dad to give her a call.
11.
Wine 01:29
Thanks for saving the best wine for me But I'm finding it quite hard to breathe And if it was only me you had to please I might still find you good company. And I know you've got work at 8 And you don't always like staying out too late But it's not really a case of just letting you wait Till you find out this is your biggest mistake. There's always someone round the corner. Some poor bastard you know who would adore ya And while you pick who you please I think I'm gonna leave.
12.
13.
Voicemail 02:34
14.
Please do not place glasses or cups on the piano Please do not place glasses or cups on the piano Please do not place glasses or cups on the piano Please do not place glasses or cups on the piano etc.
15.
16.

about

Songs about politics, Palestine, middle-distance runners, unnecessary signage, loveable newsreaders and my failed attempt to live up to my hero, Eric Dolphy.

credits

released June 1, 2014

Recorded at the Dairy in Brixton without anyone knowing and at home.

Don't eat Nestle!

license

tags

If you like James Wood, you may also like: