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MAGELLAN LYRICS
"Impending Ascension" (1993)
1. Estadium Nacional
2. Waterfront Weirdos
3. Songsmith
4. Virtual Reality
5. No Time For Words
6. Storms And Mutiny
7. Under The Wire
1. Estadium Nacional
"These are my last words, their treasonous hands
have us all under siege, now do you understand?"
Gossens ministers - all at hand
will take up final stations
as the coup hunts a single man
No offer of exile did he take in his last trial...
Covert action - Santiago
The U.S. denies it but the president knows
Broken fathers, strut of the guard
see cruel opportunists where the losers die hard
Seeking refuge from this "land of fire".
Allende supporters are gathered
ESTADIUM NACIONAL
They disappear, ask them how the tortured shall
dispatch a message to loved ones now
Their photographs worn by survivors
ESTADIUM NACIONAL
A swede is the only trace of redeemed grace
as Edelstam prepares a place
of asylum but without "sanction".
Fleeing persecution - visas feigning new
identities
So they wait there at the embassies...
Labor takes a fall (IMPENDING ASCENSION)
The White House seems appalled at the disgrace
They toast a secret cheer in executive session
and keep it going strong (wear a gameface)
Hunter Hawker dive (IMPENDING ASCENSION)
Superiors decide it's a rat race
It's all about control (IMPENDING ASCENSION)
See Nixon take a hold from his powerful place.
How much terror for five thousand?
How many others suffer on the outside of this stadium?
Is there no end?
These are my last words-treasonous hands
have us all under siege, now do you understand?
Hear my last broadcast-mic in hand
Workers rise up-bear arms-the coup rapes its own homeland
Hold on th your memories ("disappeared families")
What justice befalls our enemies?
Allende supporters are gathered-ESTADIUM NACIONAL
They disappear, ask them how the tortured shall
dispatch a message to loved ones now
Their photographs worn by survivors-ESTADIUM NACIONAL
We pray just to turn the page upon this stage
of human suffering-a world enraged
Now there must be a new resistance!
Cardinal commission, extraordinary will/solidarity no wish to kill
Am I dreaming? How can all of this be real? Will I wake to see
these horrors still?
2. Waterfront Weirdos
We are the misfits with a broken horizon
Like Keats or Hemingway, survive with poets defiance
Christmas at the Martinique grieving for a home
Three generations tough it out on the big street all alone...
Rank of the privileged on the evening commute
Don't want to be bothered, don't want to be used
booming in suburbia, shuttle's on the way
A beggar asks for money. It's a dollar you don't want to pay-
To the Waterfront Weirdos
For the Waterfront Weirdos
Who are the Waterfront Weirdos?
Many live on the edge, keep them out of sight out of mind
In our midst a disgrace-answers are elusive yet we find
It's so damn hard to conceive `till it looks you straight in the eye
Just take a walk on West 32nd Street or pick up a New York Times
and believe it...
Up in an ivory tower it's hard to see, hard to feel, hard to be
homeless and one of the outcast-Waterfront Weirdos.
Who are the Waterfront Weirdos?
Many live on the edge, keep them out of sight out of mind
In our midst a disgrace-answers are elusive then we find
Powerless is a child in the wake of hunger at night
Giving up-giving in
Can't we hear their screaming from within...?
My life spent standing here in the back of a line
I'm living for the moment-yes, I'm living by the hour
in a game of survival
In a mood of resignation I'm not the man I am-
meal ticket, waiting for a handout
Things will change and somehow I'll get out
I keep telling myself it won't last forever
Adversity closing in, my sanity lapses, I'll rise again
Resisting the end
Only 22 as my apprehension seques into an IMPENDING ASCENSION
I could not fake this for long
How long am I supposed to take it lying down?
I will not take this lying down!
Many live on the edge
Keep them out of sight out of mind
In the end it is us
picking up the pieces that we find
On the path of least resistance evidence is loud and clear
When will we wake up?
Failures are mounting as the underclass grows
every year and believe that-
Up in an ivory tower it's hard to see, hard to feel, hard to be homeless
and one of the Waterfront Weirdos
It's so damn hard to believe `till it looks you straight in the eye
Shake the hands of losers lost on Broadway who remember a
nostalgic time and believe that-
Up in an ivory tower it's hard to see, hard to feel, hard to be homeless
and one of the outcast-Waterfront Weirdos.
3. Songsmith
A writer like a blacksmith-forging works of iron
The jagged edges tempered into solid scripts for hire
Solitary craftsman at his console merging audio discrete
An ever changing soundscape sets the stage; the twains shall meet
in a union strong
Just like a working stiff
He is a Songsmith
In a strange synthesis
"Restoration" announced
It's the new riffs that count (no mainstream bore playing 13/4...)
Break out of silence-complete the curve
The Songsmith maintaining his avant-garde nerve
Innovation his palette-the urge and the test
Adrenalin flowing, he can't even rest unless-
Harmonic elements and special fx
conform to all his whims, an interpretive text
But he'd sing for the masses if he just had the time
with a vocal ideal and a long lyric line
He is a Songsmith
Break out of silence-complete the curve
The Songsmith maintaining his avant-garde nerve
Innovation his palette-the urge and the test
Adrenalin flowing, he can't even rest unless-
Harmonic elements and special effects
conform to all his whims, an interpretive text
And he'd sing for the media if he had equal time
with a vocal ideal and a long lyric line
He is a Songsmith
It's not too late for the Songsmith
The curtain opens for creativity
Give a backseat role to conspiracy
Hear the signature and the melody
of the author flow in polyphony
Will the writer last?
Will his trade survive?
In a world of commerce
Can he hope to thrive?
If his final sequence is not contrived
Keep him honest now
just to keep him alive
We need the Songsmith...
4. Virtual Reality
Experience machines that know your thoughts and know your dreams
a better way of seeing things you won't believe it's real
Interact, you and I-there's a feeling lost we can't deny
I've opened up. We never tried to simulate it all.
Our love-it can be a virtual reality.
If we learn by degrees that the place you stand I may not be
in human change it's hard to see which barriers divide
What appears to be real is just the thing we want to feel
technology our saving grace-a guiding hand to touch the face
Our love, it can be a virtual reality
Our love could go far if we just admit the truth of what we are
Matters of perception making all of the difference now
It's not the real world
So take a harder look at compromise-for there is nothing to lose
In our own image we can't create what we want to be
I want to know if there's forgiveness within a virtual reality
Our love, it can be a virtual reality
Our love, it can be a virtual reality
Our love could go far
But we have to face the truth of what we are not...
Could we see clearer in a virtual reality?
Could we be together in a virtual reality?
Matters of perception making all of the difference now
It's not the real world
So take a harder look at compromise-for there is nothing to lose
In our own image we can't create what we want to be
I want to know if there's forgiveness within a virtual reality......
5. No Time For Words
6. Storms And Mutiny
Crossing the line of demarcation
They took a passage to the west
Dead reckoning they doubled back
Into the north they anchored for bad weather
San Martin and Magellan almost lost sight of the flagship
The Santiago and Victoria led
No sign of land altered the course
Why not return for winter?
No violation of direct royal orders
The men, the officers, all cried "return"
No captains that had discipline-
rode the high seas in storms and mutiny (with the enemy)
Desperately they sought a haven in an age of discovery...
Extra precautions, setting anchor as they did
Terrified, the crews made pledges back to Spain for pilgrimage
Lighting fires at night to signal shipmates-at last deliverance
from the fury of this godforsaken place they named the "bay
of travail"-
Ride the high seas in storms and mutiny (with the enemy)
Desperately they sought a haven in an age of discovery...
Genius or madman? So elusive were the straits
Battered were the ships and men
A stop for repairs in St. Julian
The crew wanted to know the route they'd begun
despite stirring exhortations for loyalty from Magellan
Onboard Concepcion there was mutiny in demand
And they moved to take the fleet at night
with the knowledge there was blood on their hands
But the tables turned-the remaining crew blocked the exit
to the sea
A sudden advantage for the general using ruthless strategy...
Target chosen shrewdly of three vessels controlled by the
mutineers
High numbers of neutral foreigners on Victoria would not
rise up against him.
Pulling hard against an ebb
Rebellion muted the message read:
"No mistreatment, I'll do what's right"
No heavy hand will rule the night
On the mainmast high, we'll raise his flag
court martial pending on Trinidad
Condemned to death were forty more
Mendoza "quartered" upon the shore
Poetic justice coming swift and severe
But how could he lose so many men?
Commute the sentence for the sin
Confined to quarters and distasteful labor
Convicted conspirators fallen in his disfavor
Philosophers and scholars began to challenge
The true dimensions of the earth (new evidence uncovered)
Finding the straits Magellan died triumphant
but no vindication came in time
No statesman, no royalty-
Rode the high seas in storms and mutiny (with the enemy)
Desperately they sailed the globe in a voyage of treachery
Circumnavigation returning Victoria with twenty-one
Determined by storms and mutiny
he conquered the sea
Though honor followed, a witness he would not be......
7. Under The Wire
Language and meter
Tools for a task
Structure and movement
There's logic at last
Critical rave
Misanthrope hired
Humans want quickness
So keep it under the wire
"The pit and the pendulum"
"The man of the crowd"
"The tell tale heart"
His characters move
Baptism by fire
The poet's survival kept under the wire...*
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