Get all 12 Doug McKean releases available on Bandcamp and save 35%.
Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of The Stars Have All Fallen from Your Sky, Wildfire Sun, Kissing Booth, Mutatis Mutandis, The Second Golden Age of Piracy, Between Gray and Silver, The Sprinkler Song, Dear Santa, and 4 more.
1. |
The Last Time
02:40
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Your light shines brightly
But nothing reflects it
You're sitting here nightly
So fucking dejected
Times are gettin' rougher, situations gettin' tougher
You've followed every rule to the letter
Times are gettin' strange and the times are gonna change
For the worse before they change for the better
I can't tell you a single thing
I don't know what tomorrow will bring
I can't even tell you who my enemies are
And you're sick to your stomach
Cause you told yourself it was the last time
If it seems unsightly
That's neither heads nor tails
While you're sittin' here nightly
On a bed of nails
Your lips are sealed but I can tell
That inside you're throwin' fits
But the whole thing's got an appeal
I can't bring myself to dismiss
I can't tell you a single thing
I don't know what tomorrow will bring
I can't even tell you who my enemies are
And you're sick to your stomach
Cause you told yourself it was the last time
Close your eyes and turn away
Just start walking...
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2. |
Tears of Satisfaction
03:50
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You left me with no memories
Just a dose of disease
And you rear your head on summer nights
You give something away
They always come back to pay
I call it retribution and that sounds just about right
You've got me crying tears of satisfaction
You've got me crying every time I start smiling
Curse myself just lurking around here
Singing blues of regret
Or just shortness of breath
The care you gotta take
For your heart not to just break
Is easily burned off or locked right out of sight
Kick me any time I start talking courageous
You've got something that everyone finds contagious
You throw yourself away
Come back to yourself some day
I call it a waste and that sounds just about right
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3. |
Searchlight
02:08
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Searchlight, I don't wanna hear about it
Don't you knock on my door if you don't want me any more
She never kissed me like she did when I was leaving
She never kicked me like she did when I was down
Now I've been holding back just to get even
She still acts like she wants me around
She's been testing my will, she's been testing my mettle
Testing out the fire under my kettle
For the first time I thought I had it settled
Based on equal parts famine and fear
Now it's gone on to another level
Searchlight won't find me back here
She never kissed me like she did when I was leaving
She never kicked me like she did when I was down
She never kissed me like she did when I was leaving town
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4. |
Keeping Misery Company
04:26
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Holing up and I'm bouncing off the walls
Phone's ringing off the hook, I'm holding all my calls
Picking up for tips on horses
Gossip on the latest divorces
Keeping misery company
Down the road they're waiting to play ball
You and me are waiting to play what don't matter at all
These things can be short and futile
But you make them so long and brutal
I always know I've got a friend
If you were my one and only
Wouldn't we both still be lonely?
This feels like a sad excuse for being free
It's raining on every word I say
Hold my tongue on promises I can't keep anyway
I'm waiting for the windup
For you to make your mind up
Trying to put the hair back in my head
You can kick and claw at will
But you know I ain't breakin'
You know these are only games
That I ain't got no stake in
If you were my one and only
Wouldn't we both still be lonely?
This feels like a sad excuse for being free
All my favorite things in life
Come in on the satellite
Just keeping misery company
I ain't gonna get bent out of shape
I ain't equipped to wait, I can't anticipate
If everything should fall apart
I'll be back here with my drinking partner
Keeping misery company
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5. |
Poison
04:34
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There are chains around my ankles
There are shackles on my arteries
There's a roadblock in my bloodstream
There's just poison
My new friends have all told me
What the old ones never figured out
"You'll grow into it, no doubt"
There's just poison
Architects are building shrines
To ideas whose time has gone
You move over one shade of blonde
There's just poison
I'm filling up with gall
As I'm staring down the belle of the ball
Breaking her down into smaller and smaller pieces
Events come non-sequentially
Like snow knocking leaves from the trees
They come down together, falling into the creases
Ears are bent toward the East
They're marching in from the West
To take the wrong pound of flesh
There's just poison
I took up residence in her head
Despite all prior convictions
She won't hand me my eviction
There's just poison
The wind blows through your windows
You've got a faucet for a roof
You've got four walls and the truth
Is there's just poison
Everything there is to know
Is less than everything that's been written
You've gotta bite before you're bitten
There's just poison
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6. |
Like Wilkins Micawber
02:39
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If we were put here for a reason as I've led you to believe
We've got no time to squander while we're searching for reprieve
Dip your toes into a powder keg
If things get hot you might come up missing a leg
So please don't remind me of the smell of your clothes
Or your third degree every time I rub my nose
I told you to hide but you couldn't be bothered
I'm taking you down with me like Wilkins Micawber
Extract what you want, it doesn't seem hard
At 6 AM you can catch me off my guard
With invitations to the far east or the moon
Supplications to my back seat or bedroom
You gave me chase, you made me rush
But make no mistake, the undersigned is crushed
Love, Doug
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7. |
One of These Days
04:34
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You wake up in the afternoon the day after your birthday
You're back in the fetal position
Chalk up another useless year, an empty celebration
How can you stand the repetition?
Was it circumstance or just dumb luck?
You turned outside in as you grew
One of these days it's gonna catch up with you
Started off the day by stalling, finished off the night, you were crawling
Your fate seems nothing less than fitting
Never took no aim, never took no blame
You bear a cross that's only made of pity
You wake up every afternoon in a lopsided bed
Wish the day further away
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8. |
Twenty Nine
02:07
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Twenty nine, out of time
Still a kid but past your prime
You used to look like someone famous
Now you're twenty nine
Out of line, out of time
And now you're wasting mine
You used to feel like someone famous
Now you're twenty nine
Spent all your nights in the bars and it shows
Spent all your days on your cars and your clothes
You look in their eyes, they give you no alibis
And now you're twenty nine
They used to tell you life was oh so short
You know, they might have lied
Life is just as short as you make it
And every day feels like a suicide
When you're twenty nine
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9. |
Postcards from Home
02:52
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Unpack my bags, hit the bed with a sigh
Forgetting hellos, remembering goodbyes
You float across my memory like shadows on moonlight
As I lay my head down for the night
I took down your name, I took down your address
You took my hand from your face
Held it close to your breast
If one last farewell is all we have left
Hear my voice in the curve of my lines
I've thought about you wherever I've gone
From the big city lights to the temple of dawn
I drank in your eyes like heart-shaped souvenirs
I can see them now though it's been so long
Tonight I'll write from wherever I roam
Tomorrow I'm sending you postcards from home
There's something about those letters you write
Conceived of in color, put down black and white
I'll put up my stamps and turn in for the night
There'll be news from the coast in the morning
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10. |
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Dateline: Goodbye Café
She drifts in like a storm, all eyes veer
There's a thirteen heart pile up
A baker's dozen faces and one thought between them
They focus on the same point
Footage at eleven
Vandals put the flowers out
Kick the cans, bring rats from the canals
There's laughter from the cellar, can the city survive?
She rides off with a printer
It's heartbreak internationale
Every face is a headline
Every moment a deadline
Meanwhile it's martial law in empty beds on both sides of the pond
Skip a tab, grab a cab
Call out the cops
Call off all bets
Mute man walks into girls' night out
Orders a round in a new tongue
He begins to croon, they begin to swoon
Before the night is over a star is born
And the kids up the street join in with a song for the occasion
Teach them young
Singing for supper will rot their teeth
Until the next cliffhanger
Dateline: Goodbye Café
Eyes pulled from the wreckage have all turned blue
She has floated in past lives, floated in past tense
They believe that she will float again
Up the road there's a con man without a con to his name
People don't move laterally on these streets
There's a light coming on in the window
Has the scenery disappeared behind you
Do you dare look back?
Do you dare look back?
Blood runs thinner and young hearts race
They beat it down to the marketplace
Leaning into a predestined demographic end
Does the past foretell an ending?
Our astrologer will answer this and other questions
In the midst of this wreck I would not hold my breath
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Doug McKean Cleveland, Ohio
Catchy songs and biting lyrics with a variety of sounds ranging from punk to soul to folk.
New single 'The Stars Have All Fallen from Your Sky' out now!
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