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 Ghosts of Downtown
03:12
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You hit the ground, you hit the ground running
First one to the emergency room
Around the corner you never see them coming
Until the day, the day they show up too soon
You hit the ground, you hit the ground running
They sweep you up with a pan and a broom
Past tense starts to lose its meaning
Sure as daylight gives way to the moon
They're the ghosts of downtown
They tell tales of when they were incarnate
Reminisce about disasters they caused
You're feeling young, like you ain't bought the farm yet
Hoping to just put everything on pause
They tell tales of when they were incarnate
And head back to a watery tomb
You're living with a foot in the future
Sure as nightfall gives way to noon
They're the ghosts of downtown
When flesh and blood held them in check
They placed some limits on what they could wreck
Every now and again
You see them waiting on the bus in the rain
They go right through you, yeah you're so headstrong
They only show when you're alone in the dark
The only fear that you've known you faced head on
Nightfall comes, you realize they left their mark
They go right through you, yeah you're so headstrong
Until the day your patience weighs you down
They'll be there to be good and certain on the day
The day you just hit the ground
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2. |
Learning to Say No
05:24
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We used to throw words like love and hate around
We used to set 'em up and knock 'em right back down
Didn't matter who we hurt, especially ourselves
Got knocked in the dirt and put up on a shelf
But I'm learning...
Held your hand on a hike across liquid planets
You and I were surrounded by January and madness
Now there's no solid ground anywhere to be found
And you're watching from half a cigarette away
Now I recognize sincerity by the fear with which it's uttered
I see through condescension by the effort with which it's covered
Make a feast of me with your eyes, pretend not to know
But I will not be surprised I am learning to say no
Walking God-like across the fruited plain
Coming down the mountain to level the terrain
Purposeful as an amoeba behind her laughter
With reins on the thunder, control over disaster
When you change forms in my dreams
And I'm looking for a shape for the truth
You're casting spells, turning lead to gold
And I'm trying to sublimate you
Now I recognize sincerity by the fear with which it's uttered
I see through condescension by the effort with which it's covered
Make a feast of me with your eyes, pretend not to know
But I will not be surprised I am learning to say no
Echoes make the only sounds that register now
Burglars leaving traces behind, evidence points to how
Casting pearls before pig-tailed girls
They say "you Catholic boys make fantastic noise"
But inflection points change whether you spill or you hold
And you reached one of those a long time ago
And I'm learning...
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3. |
Poor Old Poseidon
04:14
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Blue skies, it may have been unwise
To use you as a cover
I should have picked another
Something with more clouds
A more effective shroud that I could hide in
While waiting for this narrow path to widen
Blue eyes, you use them as a guise
To show me my reflection
Offer me protection
So take me in your wings
I'll promise anything but tomorrow
I've already promised more than I can borrow
Blue sea between you and me
It's measured in our minds
It marks off 5 years' time
And you're waving from the shore
And I'm beseeching poor old Poseidon
Asking him for something I can hide in
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4. |
Down to Nothing
02:20
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Gonna sell all of my possessions
Cut off all my hair
I'm gonna give away all my clothes
Lay myself bare
I'm sweeping the dust out of my front door
Forgetting everything I ever knew
I'm gonna take myself down to nothing
Just to show you, baby, I love you
Take me down to nothing, take me down to nothing
I won't keep it if it isn't true
Take me down to nothing, take me down to nothing
All I need is some room in my heart for you
Gonna throw away my little black book
My guitar and my records too
I'm gonna strip away everything
That's kept my heart from getting to you
I'm gonna shave my face, there won't be a trace
Of the hair that once there grew
I'm gonna take myself down to nothing
Just to show you, baby, I love you
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5. |
Witchcraft
04:48
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You used to warn me against growing old
With too much to remember
Too little to hold
I felt your advice and I took it to heart
But there was no place in myself
For it to reside
I swallowed it down and tried to hold it
Reached for elixirs
While real life unfolded
Family and friends offered perfect intentions
But it came to an end
As I stood on my feet
I reached past my grasp for a face-saving gesture
And left you behind
To surmise and conjecture
Those stains on your pillow buy time when you flaunt them
But you were just practicing witchcraft
On me
There was a time when
You breathed out, I breathed in
And so much hung there in the balance
But now that you've got me on needles and pins
You get under my skin
From afar
Oh how you smiled with that ring on your finger
But I could not give you the license
To reel me in, see through my plans
Baby it's just witchcraft
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6. |
Stone and Brine
05:05
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Tell me what I've tasted on your fingers
Words I've never felt upon your lips
You were never one to just sit around and linger
Once the town has fallen from your grip
In the tales of epic battles
She is the space between the lines
She's everything I've felt but never known
The shadows and the spells she casts
Turn water into brine
Just one look turns bread back into stone
Lazy days of picking wildflowers
Have gone the way of all that she's held dear
Sweet words from her fingertips go sour
Once they make their way into the clear
Softly if not gently, quiet if not demure
Indolence erected like a wall
Warning signals flashing "This is no place for the pure"
Intruders are directed to their fall
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7. |
Trouble-Guiding Breed
05:01
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They pound upon your doorstep
They beckon at your hearth
On twilight's thoughts they dance and march
To all corners of the Earth
They summon you on tempter's wings
To journeys far and near
And fill you full of pictures
Lascivious and queer
For every fact and mirror
They've found themselves a creed
Feel their footsteps getting nearer
They are the trouble-guiding breed
Smiling and seeking refuge
In the solace of duress
They offer up a lantern
And cartographies of flesh
For every route they do not own
A thousand more appear
There are directions that they do not know
But none of them lead here
When pressed upon for intentions
They grab you by your lead
Offering whisky and vice and everything nice
They are the trouble-guiding breed
They crawl out of dark corners
Seeking something they can grasp
Something they can prey upon
Some vision of collapse
The prophecies are written
In every lost soul's eyes
They are merely conduits
For man to meet his own demise
When pressed upon for intentions
They issue indecipherable screeds
And follow their vision with singular precision
They are the trouble-guiding breed
They've led you through the ages
Through lifetimes short and old
They are shelter from the storm
They are haven from the cold
When guard dogs of eternity
Bare their teeth and howl
They offer tidbits of time, future and past
And steal the present with a scowl
They tempt you with an old song
A thought or memory
And claw at your senses, circumvent your defenses
They are the trouble-guiding breed
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8. |
Angel Tears
03:42
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Sentences are tightropes
Paths without room for error
Facial expressions dirt on a grave
Covering up our terror
Wandering through tornadoes
Until tapped on the shoulder
You can go which way the wind blows
But each footstep makes you older
Clocks tick in the distance
She is coming up the road
Lions wait with jaws outstretched
Further on the roosters crow
Dawn appears shining light on promises
Made the night before
She draws nearer, draws her dagger
You do the same to yours
With your sabers you proceed to rattle out a melody
With your ploughshares you turn over
The dirt you could not see
You turn away with appointments
For where you shall meet next
She says "I'll see you next week
In the place the blood collects"
This was all too much to fathom
As you stood there stupefied
Having just been dared to either swim
Or drink the ocean dry
She's been wearing different hats
From each pulled the same rabbit
When asked how she accomplished that
She shrugs and mutters "habit"
"Have I met you before?" she says to you
As she walks into the room
"You look like someone I used to know
Before I sent him to his doom"
What happened next was beyond reproach
You couldn't touch it if you tried
The surroundings flew right past you
Into her mouth which was ten miles wide
Put a frame around the future
Locked upon a hill
Fighting fate with one arm bound
Like every victim of the swill
We've gone on this way forever
Only now it becomes clear
The fires are blazing, we're waiting for angels
To put it out with tears
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9. |
Once and For All
04:08
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Made a list of everyone whose hero I could have been
Got out the globe and pondered which way things could have gone
I wondered if they think of me with curiosity or disappointment
Then I stopped daydreaming cause they've probably just moved on
If I had duller thoughts or a sharper tongue
I could have had it all
And gave us both some semblance of satisfaction
The universe expands while your life gets small]
Wake up and say good morning to the wall
And once and for all is right there for the asking
She used to look me in the face and inquire innocently
Over time it turned into interrogation
She was only trying to measure what she meant to me
The only answer I could give was abrogation
I've got karma in flux, airplane luck
Too little to lose
Not to call every bluff I see
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10. |
Good Luck Girl
04:18
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Runnin' from the girl of my dreams
She's traded faces and we've traded places
And I woke up today with a burning urge to go outside
When the dust settles I'll be gone
I'm not hanging around to let it weigh me down
Or to wallow in the scent of everything that's died
There's an old dollar bill lying tied in a knot on my nightstand
And today's the day I'm gonna go and spend it
Good luck girl, my good luck girl
A charm around my neck, my good luck girl
Good luck girl, my good luck girl
The queen of all my dreams, my good luck girl
If you can make yourself forgive
You'll get gifts in your sleep and things you can keep
You can't walk when you're using your feet to kick yourself
I've packed my bags but I'm leavin' em behind
On January 22nd she was my favorite present
The rest of it can all just go to hell
I'm gonna go buy a kite and fly it
Just like I've been told to do
Watch it float away from this Earth
Tethered to a picture of me and you
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11. |
Trail of Crumbs
03:30
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Since you left, baby it's been a struggle
To make my trail one of more than just tears
And when I look back over my shoulder
Things are starting to disappear
You treated me good when you met me
And I took you for granted back then
So now I just wander and tell myself
How I'd never let it happen again
So I'm going back to the safety
And the warmth that I can't find out here
Cause I know I've thrown away everything
That makes me feel anything other than fear
Right now I think that it's best for me
To get back to where I started from
Before the birds eat
Before the birds eat my trail of crumbs
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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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