Soul Amp -- " Strip Mall Heaven" -- lyrics
All songs © 2005 amber soup records
(mike fisk,
brad odland,
mike nettesheim)
133 fourth st. waukesha, wisconsin 53188.
management 262.513.1964
Songs:
1. She Slit Her Wrists
Again
2. Touching in a Modern Way
3. Throwing Rocks At Cars
4. Johnny's Wife
5. Seeing Jimmy
6. Turn Out the Morning
7. Shove
8. She Walks On Up Ahead
9. Flowing On
10. Trip Down to Dallas
11. Spinning Things
12. Division
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by Mike Fisk and Brad Odland
Cool breeze on this summer morning
July something thinking of you
Wood creaks so pleasantly and musically
Beneath the skids of your rocking chair
Sun breaks its way through the drizzle cloud
The sky opens up to the dew
Rocking to the feelings of early morning
Joy here all because of you
It's a beautiful life and you're ok
It's a beautiful life and you're ok
Just a couple no longer together now
Hard to take but you're moving on
Crazy thing you slit wrists again
That's why I wrote down this song
It's a beautiful life
It's a beautiful life
It's a beautiful life
It's a beautiful life and you're ok
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by Brad Odland
Take a drink from your spiritual mouthwash
It's a seamless case in point
Why you love someone but look to another
For what you want
Chorus
Seems like our souls are seated back to back
In hardwood chairs
Straight back and uncomfortable
Yet touching in a modern way
So hide your eyes from what's inside
Make peace with your own God
Seal the lid on our life
And hold on my dear
Hold on my dear
Take a drink from your spiritual mouthwash
I spit it back into the sink
Cleanse the patterns of social behavior
Our last missing link
Chorus
Seems like our souls are seated back to back
In hardwood chairs
Straight back and uncomfortable
Yet touching in a modern way
Recreation playing out of place
Of all our past mistakes
Life and love is fun and shouldn't require
All these godd*mn takes
Many times we clasped hands in the darkened living light
Skin on skin together forever
It's where we began
It's where we'll end
Chorus
Seems like our souls are seated back to back
In hardwood chairs
Straight back and uncomfortable
Yet touching in a modern way
Chorus
Seems like our souls are seated back to back
In hardwood chairs
Straight back and uncomfortable
Yet touching in a modern way
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by Brad Odland
here in my yard I'm throwing stones
hoping to it some glass hear it smash
stones arch through the air
a sound of shattered rain comes back... in the air
Chorus
we live in a tube shaped life
waiting for a strip mall heaven to arrive
seated on a couch drooling at the screen
bikini wax drips and tears out the hair
police came to my house again tonight
ask if I was outside the night before last
shake my head no, slowly close the door
a bucket of rocks waits on the porch... for me
Chorus
we live in a tube shaped life
waiting for a strip mall heaven to arrive
seated on a couch drooling at the screen
bikini wax drips and tears out the hair
I threw some more stones at cars this time
sporting the mark of America's shame
glass piled in the street, crippled mini vans screech
shattered, dented trucks, rednecks rage and security moms wail
Chorus
we live in a tube shaped life
waiting for a strip mall heaven to arrive
seated on a couch drooling at the screen
bikini wax drips and tears out the hair
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by Mike Fisk and Brad Odland
verse 1
For blocks to the station, on every phone pole
Flyers of them, told of the story he sold
Of how they had sinned, the cop and the wife
They got carried away in the passion of night
The morning awoke to the story he'd told
They caught up with him at St. John's crossroads
Threw him in jail for slander and lies
The call to your cell was the first one that night
Chorus
It was Johnny's wife
That drove Johnny crazy
It was his wife
That made him insane
Now he's crazy
With someone to blame
verse 2
He took the kids and moved them into your house
He took the guns and looked for his ex
You took it all, right upon yourself
To hunt him down and save his sad old life
You found him shaking, in the alley off on 6th
He told you how he'd been beaten near to death
He called them bastards and spit up a tooth
You took him home and filled him vermouth
Chorus
It was Johnny's wife
The drove Johnny crazy
It was his life
That made him insane
Now he's crazy
With someone to blame
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by Mike Fisk and Brad Odland
Jimmy lived his life out
In the Sunset Ranch motel
Just a bit off Prospect
With the pavement for a view
Surrounded by his litter
Of magazines and trash
TV always on
Smoke streaming from the ash
It's not easy
To talk to Jimmy
It's not easy
To drink his beer
Always you wondering
What the h*ll you're doing here
A military veteran
Maybe never went to war
Crippled by dementia
Or dreams of something more
Mary comes on Tuesdays
To bring him his hot meal
She yells a little at him
Makes him feel real
It's not easy
To talk to Jimmy
It's not easy
To drink his beer
It makes you wonder
What the h*ll you're doing here
It's not easy
To talk to Jimmy
It's not easy
To drink his beer
Always you wondering
What the h*ll you're doing here
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by Mike Fisk and Brad Odland
Listings and yearnings with laughter from the pain
Teaching me nothing but yesterday's just the same
Leaves floating nowhere with the sunrise on your face
Mocking and turning as we're heading out to your place
Pleading and begging, I'm melting into slush
Both of us fight it, yeah we're throwing up on trust
Turning and reaching to waste it on a plan
Burning and etching at the words I'd understand
Chrous
Turn out the morning
Whatever happened happened
Time to realize
That you never know
You've got the objects... oh... the flotsam of our love
Twisting through mazes, the memory of us
Breathing and knowing to finding I'm alive
Learning and growing as I seek before I try
I'm wasted and wanting and wonder how you are
Rebuilding bridges before it's goes too far
Tragedy follows the simplest of our lives
But we are built on a pyramid of lies
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by Mike Fisk and Brad Odland
verse 1
Part of the flood, the smell of the rot
Rain doesn't stop it's cold and then hot
Chasing the carrot, feeding emptiness
Veins swelling up, all summer long
verse 2
Fixing unbroken and jonesing for comfort
Feeling the pressure, think what you got
Part in a bin, mouse with a cage
Running in circles, this door has no lock
Chorus
Keep it together
Give it a shove
Step off the barge
Give it nudge
Verse 3
Lizard brain of deep darkest regions
Standing alone and taking a walk
Let loose control, decomposition
Enter Lock 1, free at the top
verse 1 (repeated)
Part of the flood, the smell of the rot
Rain doesn't stop it's cold and then hot
Chasing the carrot, feeding emptiness
Veins swelling up, all summer long
Chorus
Keep it together
Give it a shove
Step off the barge now
Give it nudge
Chorus
Keep it together
Give it a shove
Step off the barge now
Give it nudge
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by Brad Odland and Mike Fisk
Verse 1
She walks on up ahead
To see where we are
She turns around the fence
To see where we've been
I watch her from afar
Waiting for her to turn
You see I can't escape
From the love I feel now
Verse 2
As she walks ahead
I want to hold her again
The path curves and then she's gone
ooh...but not for long
She walks on up ahead
To see where we've been
I hold back to keep her long
For the time she'll rejoin
Chorus
It's like I'm lost at sea
Floating alone and free
Waiting for her to rescue me
Verse 3
She walks on up ahead
Fabric snapping in the wind
Salt wounds and salad days
Bent grass and glassy waves
Armed with her easy laugh
Smarting all those things that she said
All that talk in those orange tones
Now are just sun bleached bones
Chorus
It's like I'm lost at sea
Floating alone and free
Waiting for her to rescue me
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by Mike Fisk and Brad Odland
Sun baked clay on a summer's day
Can't calm down 'cause I'm not OK
Brian came home with blood all over his face
Crying for his Momma with little...little to say
Timmy smacked Brian square in the face
Brian's half his size on any given day
There wasn't much reason for him acting that way
But Brian said you f*cker right in Timmy's face.....and that's all it took
Johnny stole my football on the very next day
Raymond stole it back and threw it out ... out of the way
Johnny took that badly and he started to cry
I couldn't understand it, I guess I shouldn't try...
Chorus
And I guess that's why
I think I'm still flowing
Through all this sh*t that seems unreal
Brian got stiches and a crazy sort of gaze
Took a shine to drugs and guns, kind of works that way
Johnny killed a guy and ended up put away
Haven't heard of Timmy, I guess that's just as well
Chorus
And I guess that's why
I think I'm still flowing
Through all this sh*t that seems unreal
Kind of miss the absurdity of it
It sure did have a crazy kind of feel
Sure had a crazy kind of feel
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by Mike Fisk and Brad Odland
verse 1
Well our trip down to Dallas crossed the lines of our times
Turns you'd left only two years of life
And now you are gone leaving three little kids
The wife that you loved and your bottles of gin
verse 2
We stood on the spot, looked out at the night
Imagined the shots that took Kennedy's life
You told me your theory of how everything changed
11-22nd, then nothing was sane
Chorus
Well I wrote you a letter
Wrote one for your wife
I never sent either, on the night that you died
I wanted to call, I wanted to cry
Still we went on... like you said that we would...
We went on...
verse 3
You told me about Nam and those dark deadly times
Of men killing men with tombstones for eyes
We spoke of the Beatles, of times that might come
You snored through the night like so many guns
Chorus
Well I wrote you a letter
Wrote one for your wife
I never sent either, on the day that you died
I wanted to call, I wanted to cry
Still we went on... the way that we should...
We went on...
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by Mike Fisk and Brad Odland
Humming goes the spinning things
Of blurry roads and distant trees
Feeding on the miles passing
Fast food stops and unseen tears
lines on maps, and gasoline
Dropping baggage on the way
The one you loved is
Miles away
The spinning things
Take you away
The perfect dream begins to fade
The one you pushed, pushed you away
Moving through the windswept days
Hanging dice and changing fate
On a road that might have been
Shimmer in the asphalt waves
Coffee stains and guilty haze
Of all the things you might have said
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by Brad Odland
It's another stab in the back
It's another wound left to weep
It's another choice left unmade
It's a bed set out in the street
In our time, the divisions deep
no love is made, but floor escape
Hold yourself in place
make no waves or loose face
talking heads are bloated and false
are tearing down every grace
The powers that be are lost in space
no cause is laid to take the place
for why we are like we are
Single thread of hate we gather
to form the shaft that conquers all
the hopeless and the destitute lead to
drifting ghouls and prostitutes
In our time the battle's on
a soldier's blood runs in the sand
A child's hand gathers a fist
It's another stab
It's another stab
It's another stab
It's another stab