The second single from Two Dark Bird's Fifth Album "Dreamers of the Golden Dream", due out early 2025.
This epic opens with a hungover caveman in prehistoric France and ends inside a Bob Seger fever-dream. In between, over the course of nearly ten minutes, it covers a lot of terrain -- the Newark Airport, 80s shopping malls, Brighton Pier, the US Capitol, the Wailing Wall -- and aims to capture the anger, absurdity, and general (dis)spirit of these times...
LYRICS
1. Here I sit so broken hearted
Came to spit truth but only faltered
Came to it beside the Lascaux fire
The party’s long dead and dearly departed
Or maybe this ragers not yet nearly started
But I’ve got yak in my hair and a spear here at my side
I lay my head down near these ashes
The smoldering embers of last night’s clubs and bashes
I dreamed up this final moan
I made a knife out of this bone
I carved these words in the cave wall
This is the song to end it all
2. Here you hide in the airport bathroom
They came for the black folks and you said nothing
Or you said something but does Facebook really count?
Then they came for the women and you still didn’t say shit
Sure some that came for the women were also women, but still bitch
That doesn’t excuse your silent mouth
With head in hands behind closed door
The fourteenth throne, Gate C, Newark Airport
There’s a ringing in your ears
Someone scrawled their greatest fears
It’s the ink smeared on the stall
It is the song to end it all
3. Here I spin at the Merry-Go-Round
At the Bayshore Mall moving to the sounds
With zippers in my pants and parachutes on my mind
There’s a girl right there with the feathered hair
And bombs are exploding in the air
It’s a checkered future for a checkered time
Is this the song sung by The Fixx
Red skies at night and sweet suburban bliss
We should have heeded all those warnings
They said that we’d be dead by morning
We should have answered to the call
They sang the song to end it all
4. I came down from London Town
With hat in hand and face full frown
I guess I was born with that old blue gene
But I stayed out late, wore my dungarees
I brought that skeeze town to its sleazy knees
Sure Brighton rocks, but not as hard as me
I spent the night out on the pier
Blinking arcades and a head full blind with beer
When dawn broke on that gray beach
I cursed into the breach
I screamed my lungs into those squalls
I sang the song to end it all
5. You clean up the waiting room
Make the rounds with your mask and broom
There’s people coughing up the end of days
Some of these sick folks could be your neighbors
Some plead Jesus some consult the other saviors
Everybody’s phones lights up their face
It’s going down in the ER
We need a triage, we need some tramadol
I didn’t sign up for this bit
Page someone else to take care of it
Is there a doctor here on call?
Play him the song to end it all
6. Now here I fold this holy paper airplane
Like some origami decoration/devotation
You know I’m rocking hard at the wailing wall
They’re supposed to be prayers or invocations
But mine are more like accusations
Like “where the hell did you go? I think you left us all.”
I stuff my piece between the stones
And raise my voice shalom aleichem shalom
The holiest of holies
Can’t be meant for your eyes only
Let us mount the temple wall
and sing the song to end it all
7. Here I am at the insurrection
Red cap on in the nosebleed section
I can barely see those guarded doors
So I shimmy down the scaffolding
To get up close and see what I’m now holding
Wait, is this a spear in my hands and who’s it for?
I take up the tune now with these good people
It goes “Fuck you fuck you fuck you oh and stop the steal”
There a cloud of gas and tears
There’s a buzzing in my ears
Is this the worst song ever LOL
It’s less a song and more a brawl
This is the song to end it all
8. Now Jesus came and Jesus went
Jesus wept, all through this year’s lent
Then he promised us he’d be back real soon
He knocked the dust off of his robe
And headed off to the great unknown
And left us only with this simple tune
Which I whistle now into the dark
The drying thistle awaits the master’s spark
He sang go and love ye one another
Put your arms around your brothers
He sang “listen fools, this is the law”
He sang the song to end it all
9. Woke last night to a flash of lightning
Which I have to say was rather frightening
Since there wasn’t a storm cloud in the sky
The distant rumble of jet-fueled thunder
How far off I sat and wondered
Starting humming a song I’d first heard back in 1985
Ain’t it funny how the night it bends
Wraps back around, was there a reason we were sent?
I should have called you there and then
I should have spoken out loud when
I saw you curl into a ball
And sang the song to end it all
CREDITS
Written by Steve Koester © Herr K Songs 2024
Produced by Steve Koester, Alan Weatherhead, and John Caselli.
Recorded by John Caselli, Alan Weatherhead, and Steve Koester
Mixed by Alan Weatherhead
Mastered by Justin Perkins at Mystery Room
Steve Koester - Vocals, guitars
John Caselli - Guitars, keyboards, bass
Josh Roy Brown - Lap steel, mandolin, banjo
Jason Mills - Percussion, loops, drums
Matt Meixner - Pianos, Keyboards
Alan Weatherhead - Additional keyboards, drums, guitar
Cover - Photo by Sam Erickson of The Weather Project by Olafur Elaisson