Get all 25 Bob Drake releases available on Bandcamp and save 50%.
Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of The Room in the Tower, There Was Once a Road (two minimalist pieces), Legendary Lore Of The Holy Wells Of England, Planets and Animals, Two Tales of Uncanny Visitations, Suite for Notation Software, What Day Is It? (Expanded Edition), 2 Improvisations dans une Eglise, and 17 more.
1. |
Lawn Ornaments
02:27
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I won’t invite you to come and see my etchings
most people don't like those
but I've got the best lawn ornaments anywhere!
Each of them was sculpted in commemoration
of some extraordinary event I'd heard of
or in which I played a part.
So come up to the cottage
listen to the stories of the ornaments
(and maybe later have a look at the etchings)
Here are the ornaments, let's hear what they have to say.
I've heard it a few times so I'll just leave ye here,
have a nice time now, and don't get lost...
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2. |
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What's happened to your meerkat, why does it glow like that?
You ought to send it back.
Leering at us belligerently, sharpening its claws and teeth...
I think we're in trouble!
Where did it get that Crooke's tube it's pointing at us now?
Yes we're in trouble!
The people at the petshop seemed unusually glad to see it go
on the day that you bought it...they must have known
it was abnormally smart and strong
for a member of the meerkat race
and would use its superior intellect
and strength for evil purposes
lock your doors because we don't know where it's gone...
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3. |
To The Sphinx
02:09
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Puttering in the piazza, heterogeneous deities
flocking around balustrades, lingering in the porticus
and wandering for eternities on the way to their sphinx
to add the fractal fronds, fractal fronds, magnificent rack of.
Wandering deities pass through
spectacular colonnades
flying foxes.
And after the fronds are carved
we'll meet upon the bemarbled belvedere
and we will go flying foxes
yeah we'll go flying foxes
bring a libation and sunglasses.
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4. |
Park of the Mysteries
03:56
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This one commemorates the Park of the Mysteries
somewhere in Italy, or is it in Kentucky,
you will never find it marked on any maps
or listed in guidebooks, cameras don't work there
and satellites can't see it...
Threads of mineral water trickle onto statues in the grotto
(onto their heads)
vases have no niche, niches haven't got a vase in the rotunda.
On the distant hills, gigantic iridescent urns scintillate in the Sun.
Cerberus is fatter than the bear of stone reposing in the roses
(holding a rose)
Is it just a trick of light or did that dragon statue alter its position?
Towers list among stones, words carved upon them, no longer legible.
The patch of fog far across the valley
emanates from the poisonous Hyena Hot Spring
and at times from the wild canyons around us
echoes a deep-throated, unknown titanic animal's call
but don't worry, the park is fenced in.
(NOTHING TO WORRY ABOUT!)
Around the outdoor ampitheatre
carvings of fantastical animals overlook the venue
which has never known an audience or an actor
but on some mystic summer evenings
they clamber down from their pedestals and their plinths
and get up on the stage where they clumsily dance
their clumsy midsummer dance.
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5. |
Elsie
02:34
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(Well, ah...it's too hot and it's too bright
and I have trouble breathin')
'Cause she's not from around here.
(You tell em pal!...tell ‘em...
well, say somethin’! )
Elsie's not a cat, I'm pretty sure of that
and I'm really not so sure she's not a dog
(nope not a dog)
She doesn't want to play
(nah!)
and sure does likes to lay
(oh yeah!)
curled up in all her arms and legs and tails
(I got a million of 'em)
with the yellow eyes always watching
while the blue ones are all closed.
(-yawn- I'm goin' to sleep)
And she stays inside until it's dark and cold.
It's the color of the Sun
and the blend of gases in our atmosphere
she's not accustomed to.
Or maybe Elsie had enough for the day
and doesn't really want to play
maybe Elsie had enough for the day
and doesn't want to play...she doesn't want to play.
And she's not from around here.
maybe Elsie had enough for the day
and doesn't really want to play
maybe Elsie had enough for the day
and doesn't want to play...she doesn't want to play.
‘Cause she's not from around here.
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6. |
Fix my Machine
01:16
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Is anyone left who can fix my machine?
It's there dripping grease on the floor
The malfunctioning meters and flickering displays
confuse me, and I feel faint.
Corrosive gases hiss from the pipes and the tanks
all fissured and crumbling with rust.
The Crookes tube is missing, the thief left a trail
of little pawprints in the dust.
No please don't tell me that it can not be repaired
I'll lapse into ennui and despair
I need it to carry on with my research
which I've never understood at all.
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7. |
The Lonely Manor
02:44
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Here in this lonely manor you can see an old skull
perched on a cushion in a cabinet in the attic.
Legend says if it is removed from the house
it returns on its own.
How could a skull move, you might ask,
it's just calcium phosphate, an unliving thing
without any means of self-propulsion
I asked myself the same questions
and I went there myself to see...
if it was true...could it move...
I went and booked myself a room
and one sunny afternoon crept up stealthily
into the attic, to the cabinet
secretly hid the skull away out upon the lonely moor
then went back to see if something would happen...
if something would happen...
That night a petrifying fear petrified us all until
I went back and got the skull and returned it
to its cabinet in the house.
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8. |
Hyena Hot Springs
03:00
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The dictates of good taste do not permit me to
reveal the location of a rare group of springs
emerging from a rock formation
the age and composition of which make scientists shudder.
The Hyena Hot Spring and Hot Sulphurous Wolverine
flow into a basin never fashioned by humans
valetudinarians beware!
I've been soaking every day there for years now
so there's no turning back
and even if there was some way to stop it
I'd go on till the end (he'd go on to the end)
"yes yes, very lovely...excuse me, I am a scientist...
I have personally analyzed and examined these waters
and find them to be limpid, saline, chalybeate and remarkably zoomorphic."
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9. |
Perpetual Lamps
02:39
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Perpetual lamps are classified as a wonder of antiquity
and it's no wonder, as we're about to see.
Tales are told of lamps sealed into crypts
where they glow, apparently, perpetually.
Undisturbed and unimagined as the centuries pass
till uncovered by accident or by chance.
The secret of these lamps has been kept from discovery
by ingenious mechanical means
by which the lamps destroy themselves
if an intruder approach to closely.
Descending into the opening which appeared in my field
after a flood, guess what I saw...
at the end of a narrow passage of stone
a statue of an armored bear
one massive paw above an ever-burning lamp.
When I stepped into this passage
a system of springs in the floor
caused the mechanical figure
to raise its mighty paw
and smash the lamp!
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10. |
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Let the special animals I told you about show you the way,
they'll lead you through the trackless woodland
and leave you in the hidden meadow deep in the forest
where you'll have to sit and wait for a while.
Soon you'll hear the heavy tread and snuffling
which tells of the approach
of what's to be your guide for the next phase.
Try not to be alarmed at its appearance and manor
after all, soon you'll be meeting
much, much, much stranger things.
Listen to your guide and it will teach you
the things you'll have to know
to prepare for the permanent
physical transformation
required for admission
to the Wondrous Land to come!
Let's go to the Marvelous Land
gimme your oops I almost said your hand
it's gonna be really fabulous
first you'll have to wait in the meadow a while.
While you wait in the summery meadow
you'll have plenty of time to stroll about
the architectural folly, and admire the obelisk
which is older than the very stone
from out of which it's carven.
Yes...I see...this architectural folly is...quite nice...
and this obelisk...oh, that funny noise...and...remarkable odor...
that would be my guide coming! Oh how unspeakably wonderful!
Even...marvelous!
Let's go to the Marvelous Land
as the name implies it's really fine
gonna be really fine
scientists have never heard of it yet
The Marvelous Land The Marvelous Land
gimme your oops I almost said your hand
it's gonna be so fine
("Yes it's FINE!")
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11. |
Agents of Decay
02:24
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Taking things apart to simpler forms of matter
Taking them apart to soil, verdigris, rust and dust
working all day and night it’s the
business of the Agents of Decay.
You got your algae and your fungi,
the yeasts and protozoa and bacteria
breaking everything down into
component parts to be recycled.
They are the Agents of Decay
and the oxygen and sunlight also help them
disassembling everything into constituent components.
Water is also required for the process
and there’s a load of it in plants and animals
in the rivers and the lakes and that’s what it takes
for the Agents of Decay to do their:
(Breaking everything down into components)
(They’re breaking everything down)
(Continuously working)
The Agents of Decay are always working.
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12. |
X-Ray Fruitful Plain
01:24
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X-ray sunrise on a plain
seen through the compound eye of a lost world
so far away from here
would you rather go have a beer at the pub
or just stand around here and contemplate ridiculosities?
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13. |
Why Why Why Not
01:03
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Why why why
not?
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14. |
Wolf Nose Knows Nose
01:45
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Philanthropy phosphate freeze-dried friend,
pulsar puppeteer.
Cat-scan chrysanthemum disc-brake dinosaur,
fiberglass forklift fox
No we don't know what they are
but here's a wolf to have a sniff
their olfactory sense is terribly advanced
because a wolf nose knows
wolf nose knows
wolf nose knows
knows nose
a wolf nose knows
Yeah, knows where you been
can you identify the
yours truly Yemen-yammering wildcat?
Yeah, nose, where you been?
Chop-suey cookie colossus
Indo-European dealership dolphin
Because a wolf nose knows
knows nose
wolf nose knows
wolf nose knows
knows nose
wolf nose knows
Yeah if you don't know what they are
you get your wolf to have a sniff
and you'll probably get your answer in a flash...
their olfactory sense is terribly advanced.
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15. |
Our Expert's Advice
02:41
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Here is our final ornament, glassy and prismatic
obtained by my private contact at the Park of the Mysteries
it's always a little warmer than the surrounding air
a thrilling sensation emanates, like hissing cicadas
On hot summer nights it attracts magnificent
be-robed be-snouted figures
silently circling around and around and
we have never seen a bug nor bird alight upon it
no we've never seen a bug or bird alight upon it.
The figures depart at sunrise, here you can see their tracks
smell the peculiar fragrance they leave behind
and that's one reason why we keep it locked up
in this private court and only show it
to our special favored guests LIKE YOU!
We believe it could be a shortcut
to the Marvelous Land that we've all heard of
And that's why we're meeting at high noon
to soak in the Hyena Hot Spring
and once the waters have taken effect
we'll come back here and wait
for further instructions from our experts
who have assured us: "IT'LL BE FUN!"
Our experts assure us: "YOU CAN BE ONE!"
Our experts...our experts...
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16. |
Don't Worry
01:29
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You won't have to sit in the piazza and cry
no you won't have to worry anymore.
Forget about the vapors and the wanting of breath
no you won't have to worry anymore
no you won't have to worry anymore.
The languishing in dank dismal chambers is done
no you won't have to worry anymore.
Come on and help carve the fractal fronds on our sphinx!
yeah you won't have to worry anymore
yeah you won't have to worry anymore
Now that you've got a fox you can fly!
no you don't have to worry anymore.
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