words to selected songs from andrew jackson solo albums

Is there something to be done
Is there something I can do
To help you understand
But no, you never do
I try to explain
But the words all fall away
I try to get closer
But you just run away

In the game that is my life
It’s a wonder what gets done
It’s a parking lot of dreams
It’s a shopping mall of fun
I wish I could make it clear
But the clouds are drawing near
I want to communicate
But you just don’t participate

I wish I could help you
understand
I wish that you would
take my hand
It’s not impossible to see
You are not listening to me

Is there something to be done
Is there something I can do
To help you understand
But no, you never do

I try to explain
But the words all fall away
I try to get closer
But you just turn away
I try to explain
But the words won’t come out the same
I try to make it clear
But you don’t even know my name

I wish I could help you
understand
I wish that you would
take my hand
It’s not impossible to see
You are not listening to me

My life is a parking lot of dreams
My life is a shopping mall of fun
My life is shot behind the scenes
My life is a pilot in reruns

(from the album Songs From The Silicon Underground)

Everlasting punishment
Is good enough for me
A love that lasts eternity
Cannot be swayed so easily

Talk to me sweetly...
I want to hear your voice
Talk to me as if i had a choice
Talk to me and tell me all about you
And on the way i’ll learn about me too

Alone among eternity
We are all that lives and breathes
With a million souls surrounding us
And a million more above and underneath

Everlasting punishment
Is good enough for me
A love that lasts eternity
Surviving my own sanity
Surviving my own sanity

The sun shines over the buildings
And the lake
The child wakes from her sleep
She has too much at stake

The woman-child is trying to explain
But there is no reason
To believe in anything again
It’s the only thing to do
In times like these
Rise up from your knees
Walk out of the place
The rhythm comes first
And then the rhyme
We don’t know
Where they came from
But we know they took
All time to arrive
Mocking all we feel we know inside
Turning out the light
Singing me to sleep
Goodnight…
Goodnight

Everlasting punishment
Is good enough for me
A love that lasts eternity
Surviving my own sanity

(from the album Sanity Is A Thing Of The Past)

We're force-fed popular culture
We're faced with the daily news
We're given unlimited freedom
And it's taken away just as soon

We're enveloped in time-space-matter
We're wasting time in gridlocked traffic
We're wasting lives in dead-end jobs
We're on a road that's going nowhere

But we can't break out until we see that we're locked in
No we can't be free until we see that we've been duped

We're force-fed advertising
Which encapsulates all we need to know
We're drying up
In these images locked in frozen time

Recognize your situation
Create a new one in its place
Seize control of the moment
It's all you truly own

But we can't break out until we see that we're locked in
No we can't be free until we see that we've been duped
No we can't break out until we see that we're locked in
Yeah, yeah, yeah
No we can't be free until we see that we've been duped

We're in a prison without walls
A prison without walls
Set yourself free from the prison without walls
Prison Without Walls
Prison Without Walls

(from the album Prison Without Walls)

So much for pleading
Now what will you do
When what you want
Still stubbornly won't come to you

So much for wanting
Now what will you do
When all that you want
Is pulled away from you

Who will you be and
Where will you be if
None of your dreams comes true
It's not my prediction
But I couldn't help wondering
What would you say if I asked you

Well, so much for
Creative Visualizing
When what you see and what you have
Just refuse to come together

And so much for
All the pretty words
And all the pretty pictures
In all the pretty books

Who will you be and
Where will you be if
None of your dreams comes true
It's not my prediction
But I couldn't help wondering
What would you say if I asked you

(from the album Choking On Mochi)

I only hope I can surmount my fear
I only hope I can survive my death
I only hope I can find peace of mind
I only hope I can recover from my past
I only hope I can let go of fear
I only hope I can remember to forgive
I only hope I can find a way out
I only hope that I’m not really boxed in

I feel so claustrophobic
The walls are too close
The demands are too great
My conviction too weak
My power too lost
My will too deceived
I want to be freed
I want to believe

Is there a light where this tunnel ends?
Is there a God where this road bends?

(from the album Choking On Mochi)

In the prime of my life
I'm absolutely
In denial of everything
I ever thought I knew
There's a face in the crowd
Smiles at me sweetly
Just like someone I'd known before
When all the world was new

I will never forget what's-his-name
He's driving down the highway
in an angry wilderness
He is there in my reflection
And he's there in your embrace
And his name is in the embers
Nearly lost without a trace

I will never forget what's-his-name

I am passing in time
Surface in memory
I follow in the footsteps
Of the man who fell from grace
I am passing my prime
Lost in a desert
Where the wind is so hot
That I'm afraid to show my face

I will never forget what's-his-name
I will never forget what's-his-name
I will never forget what's-his-name
I will never forget what's-his-name

(from the album Sanity Is A Thing Of The Past)

I encountered here a mystery
on its way around the world
It was stopping for a visit
with a small enchanted girl
I awakened and enlisted
in that bright cerebral moment
in the work that will forever be unfinished

And I hailed it as a most unnatural
perfectly sensual
highly improbable moment
in which everything was as it should be
(and isn't it always, actually)

I imagined here a piece of something larger than myself
And that it wasn't all me after all
But then an angel came along and placed the lock inside the key
As if to say I'd had it all completely wrong

And I hailed it as a perfectly natural
highly sensible mostly common moment
in which everything was as it shouldn't be
(as always, naturally)

(from the album Sanity Is A Thing Of The Past)

I'm facing my reflection
And I'm scared of what I see
I know that what I'm seeing isn't me

And over there across the room
A feeble light still glows
That something lost so long ago
Only heaven knows

I'm carving my own image and I'm finding what it means
To rediscover long forgotten dreams
The flickering reflection of a face I used to know
Has gone in search of memories lost long ago

Time has come to show my hand to the stars
Welcome to your new home land
Right where you are

I'm looking at the past
And now I know it's gone
It's washed away, gone out with the tide

The moon is here to comfort me
The starts are here to guide
To lead me on, on into the night

I listen to the voice, I listen to my heart
I try to make the choice that grows inside
Wake up to the voice, I hear it in my heart
I try to hear beyond the noise inside... me

(from the album Songs From The Silicon Underground)

It should be so simple
To remove every trace
To disappear entirely
From this time and place
To retract each and every mistake
To recollect everything lost
To rectify all past regrets
To venture back all rivers crossed

Intensified Madness
Is all that it takes
To drive away sadness
In case your heart breaks
To elevate everything you feel
To nullify all that's been spent
To permeate everything real
To straighten out all that's been bent

But your mind is so beautifully decayed
Your thoughts are so strangely delayed
The ashes you rise from so black
From now on there's no turning back

A morning of cruelty
And everything's right
To set the stage for one more
Performance tonight
To intensify everything fake
To turn back the clock in your head
To make one last dreadful mistake
And forget every last word you said

Your mind is so beautifully decayed
Your thoughts are so mercifully frayed
The ashes you rise from so black
From now on there's no turning back

Your mind is so wonderfully demoralized
Your body so oddly intact
The infant you carry so innocent
From now on there's no turning back

(from the album Songs From The Silicon Underground)

He said, Today is the first day
of the rest of your life
She said, What’s so great about that?
He said, A brand new day to make new choices with each waking breath
She said, Nothing could be further from the place where I am at . . .

The world extends as far and wide as a plummet into the depths
Of pain and suffering, sorrow, humiliation, and eventually, death

He said . . . he said . . .
How can you be so cruel to yourself
She said, What do you mean by that
He said, Trust in what you feel in your heart
She said, Everything I know
I learned from my cat

She said, my hopes extend as far and wide as the space between my breasts
With pain and suffering, sorrow, humiliation, and eventually, death

He said, Life is a wheel and death is a mask
And the truth lies somewhere else
She said, That may be all well and fine
But just keep it to yourself . . .

The world extends as far and wide as a plummet into the depths
Of pain and suffering, sorrow, humiliation, and eventually, death

She said, my hopes extend as far and wide as the space between my breasts
With pain and suffering, sorrow, humiliation, and eventually, death

(from the album Sanity Is A Thing Of The Past)

Oh babe, you didn’t make me who I am
But you taught me all I know
Well maybe you didn’t teach me all I know
But you showed me who I am
Or who I could be
Oh babe, just listen to me
Carrying on like this again
Carrying on like this again

Oh babe, I was all alone
But you came along to take my hand
You showed me what it means to be
A poet in a rock and roll band
Or just who I am
Oh babe, you must understand
It’s me carrying on like this again
I’m carrying on like this again

And even though I never met you
You still meant so much to me
You represented something
That was possible to be
Everyone needs a hero
At least one, maybe two or three
I let you touch my heart
With your sweet voice and dark poetry

You were there in this same street
In this hotel lobby, maybe in this room
In my teenage fantasy, you were my sweet dream
And not a minute too soon

And my banal life took a turn
That changed me permanently that year
I could never be the same after that . . .

(from the album Songs From The Silicon Underground)

When there’s nothing new under the sun
When there’s nowhere left to turn
When everything’s been said and done
When there’s no more money to burn

When every dog has had his day
When every stone’s been turned
When all ideas become clichés
When there’s no more lessons to be learned

When we’ve been there and we’ve seen it all
When the last song has been sung
When they’ve made the final curtain call
When the old is now forever young

When there’s nowhere on earth you can hide
When all your race is run
When you feel you’ve found the other side
Then you find you’ve been there all along …
all along

When there’s nothing new in all the world
When there’s nothing new under the sun
You will wake one day to find
It doesn’t matter, that you’ve just begun

When there’s nothing new in all the world
When there’s nothing new under the sun
You will wake one day to find
It doesn’t matter, that you’ve just begun

Let my love set you free

(from the album Songs From The Silicon Underground)