| This album is due for release on August 23, but was
released in the Netherlands on the 20th. If you can't
wait to hear the complete new album, just go to the
Jethro Tull Listening Party at Broadcast.com
and enjoy yourselves! A song-by-song review was written
by Laufi
and really is an interesting read. 
Bonus
track: The Secret Language Of Birds
Kilometers from nowhere on a scented avenue -
Lined with poppy girls.
I didn't stop, stop to say hello.
Curious vendors - waving bric-a-brac -
Looked me over -
Thought it best, best that
I should go.
Don't wake me: I'm falling.
Slow spiral into morning.
I waited tables - I was tipped in roubles.
Wine to water
Was the best that I could do.
Wild office parties split the silence.
Loaves and fishes at an
empty table laid for two.
Don't wake me: I'm falling.
Slow spiral into morning.
Who's out there? Can't hear
you.
Ears covered - early warning.
Alarm bells ringing.
Time to make my peace with
the dreary day.
Spiral, spiral, spiral.
Down the spiral, spinning
madly.
Gathering momentum
On a disneyesque adventure
ride.
I fly in colours from richer palettes.
Famous artists running scared as worlds as worlds collide.
Don't wake me: I'm falling.
Slow spiral into morning.
Who's out there? Can't hear you.
Ears covered - early warning.
Alarm bells ringing.
Time to make my peace with the dreary day.
Spiral, spiral, spiral.
It's a wide world out there
So much wider than imagined
I can't quite put my finger on the pulse
Of your heart softly beating
Just beneath the raw silk sheen
That reflects the tints of autumn from the hills.
So punch my name.
And in case you wonder -
I'll be yours - yours, dot com.
Executive accommodation
Bland but nonetheless appealing
Waiters discretely at your back and call
Place the tall sun-down potion
Lightly by your velvet elbow
While you compose a message on the wall.
So punch my name.
And in case you wonder -
I'll be yours - yours, dot com.
With your handmade leather valise
Packed and ready, ready waiting
Showered and dressed down lightly for the heat
Give a clue; leave a kind
word
Hint as to a destination
A domain where our
cyber-souls might meet.
So punch my name.
And in case you wonder -
I'll be yours - yours, dot com.
Stormy-eyed on the edge of dawn:
nose pressed against the triple glaze.
Floor to ceiling, wall to wall,
silent traffic streams both ways.
Along the fussy freeway drivers
dream of sunday barbecues.
Of a sudden, seems I can
barely
face my self: no face to lose.
Call the bosses. Call supervisors.
Won't be in today to work for
you.
E-mail that girl who's
working nights.
She can dress down for this wind and rain.
Leave her new Korean compact:
let some cabbie take the strain.
Take a shower. Take big espresso.
Take to the hills, and take a view.
Little black dress stretching over
hard crystal peaks: soft valleys too.
Call the bosses. Call for nurses.
Unfit today to work for you.
No wet excuses. Absent without leave.
I'll be her dayshift driver: exotic engineer.
Stormy-eyed on the edge of night:
(December, eastern time: late afternoon.)
Atlantic City tight behind.
Trump Casino calls
pontoon.
Gristle-burger, frazzled fries
end this romantic interlude.
Tomorrow morning's sweet awakening
could hardly prove to be as rude.
Make the journey. Make amends.
Work some hasty overtime in lieu.
No wet excuses. Absent without leave.
I was her dayshift driver: exotic engineer.
(Andy Giddings) - Instrumental
I review my past through
wicked windows framed in silver
and hung in toughened glass, upon
my face, around and over.
Now and then: memories of
men who loved me.
No stolen kiss - could match their march on hot coals for
me.
I have walked a line both
faint and narrow, hard to follow.
Caught up in circumstance. Harsh truth for history to
mellow.
Through my eyes:
loyalties and obligation
magnified. Obedience: the better fellow.
Better not remember me.
Don't miss my passing.
Fierce winter fails to
ruffle my icy sleep.
We never quite vanish. No wet soft surrender.
Still waiting: bad blood running in close families.
I laughed like any child -
although you might find that strange
and christmas was my favourite holiday.
Christmas was my favourite holiday.
I am not alone in seeing the world through wicked windows
while others hide likewise behind this vulnerable squinting.
It's in the stare: it's in the silent scrutinizing.
Strip you bare: I offer you no more disguising.
Better not remember me. Don't miss my passing.
Fierce winter fails to ruffle my icy sleep.
We never quite vanish. No wet soft surrender.
Same bad blood running in new families.
Hey little buddies:
soft and silky night walkers.
Dangerous species -
Tiptoe menace long grass stalkers
on my bed:
no butter melting in your jaws.
Bonding monster -
Lethal weapon wearing claws.
Let's go out to hunt by numbers.
Tabby, spotted, black as coal -
Serval, Margy, Caracal.
Moggie in the moonlight listens:
whiskered sensory miracle.
Felis, befriend us -
Egyptian Mau - Freya's familiar.
Long in the future -
Cloned disciples, the castle guard.
Now, let's go out and hunt by numbers
Hey little buddies:
soft and silky night walkers.
Dangerous species -
Tiptoe menace long grass stalkers
on my bed:
no butter melting in your jaws.
Bonding monster -
Lethal weapon wearing claws.
Let's go out to hunt by numbers.
(music: Martin Barre, lyrics: Ian Anderson)
Hot mango flush.
Ladies with ice cream hair
-
Gyroscopic pink neon beams -
Everybody's happy about
something.
The crowd moves like a flock
of starlings:
they switch direction as one.
Jive on the jukebox - Jack and Joker
split the night air with whoop and holler.
Faint aroma - wood smoke,
old fish,
diesel harbour, roadside mongrel,
painted man with buttons barely
holding, bursting belly bulging.
Hot mango flush.
Doe-eyed ragamuffin mumbling -
Scolded for some vague infraction.
Stole a penny candy-coloured
sweetheart kiss down at the market.
Down at the market all the
world
seems to simmer:
Hot mango flush.
Hot mango flush.
Ladies with ice cream hair -
Gyroscopic pink neon beams -
Everybody's happy about something.
The crowd moves like a flock of starlings:
they switch direction as one.
Jive on the jukebox - Jack
and Joker
split the night air with whoop and holler.
Stole a penny candy-coloured
sweetheart kiss down at the market.
Down at the market all the world
seems to simmer:
Hot mango flush. Hot mango flush.
As one, wet merchants turn their eyes towards the
west.
Trade winds falter as if in
dire consequence.
Freezing fish to fry, fail to
materialise.
Christ-child, blood-warm current sends to
touch the skies.
El Niño. El Niño.
Bathing in uncertainty,
another age
seems to wing from T.V. screens in weather rage.
Savage retribution makes for a headline feast.
Planet-warming, opinion-forming headless
beast.
El Niño. El Niño.
Cold thrust tongue extends
its dark and watery touch.
Forces gather, martial stand against the rush.
Wily child in mischief here
to make his play.
Leaves toys for little
sister on another day
El Niño. El Niño. El Niño. El Niño. El Niño. El
Niño.
Hand in the snake pit -
black mamba chase.
Head through the lion's cage - head on a plate.
Two feet on the hot coals - last dance at the ball.
Blindfold on the
tightrope - whenever you call.
Be my slippery slider. Black Mamba crawl over me.
Dark thoughts of the
sleepless - hung out to dry.
Slip through the bedclothes - unblinking eye.
Long tongue flickering - fixed
stare grip.
Sweet venomous potion, held
to my lip.
Be my slippery slider.
Black Mamba crawl over me.
A tropical whisper. A sibilant kiss.
Soft strike teasing.
Dangerous bliss.
(Instrumental - well, sort of ...)
She's catching the wind: the gentlest of breezes.
It's a sensitive passage
she's sailing -
Through stormy straits, navigates my unfathomable failings.
She rises before me, reading
me clearly.
Empty nest left pressed in
the pillow.
She can shift, she can sway
and bend like a willow.
I'm swept in the riptide,
caught in a fish trap.
Gift-wrapped in my soft self centre.
Summer sun leaves me as one
who can only taste winter.
She's a good, a good
God-send: she can bend like a willow.
She bends like a willow. Oh, she bends like a willow.
With a fully armed angel to cover me quickly.
I'm cool under enemy fire.
If I fall, she can crawl right under the wire.
When I'm caustic and cold,
she might dare to be bold -
ease me round to her warm way of thinking:
fill me up from the cup of
love that she's drinking.
And I find, given time, I can bend like a willow.
She bends like a willow.
Bends like a willow,
like a willow,
a willow.
Placing people in their dreamscape
with fantasies of
foreign fields
Lofty spires all well appointed
In off-season special deals.
To far Alaska: down to
Rio in the Carnival
Norwegian fjords in the ever-light of Solstice call
A part of me might travel
with you
in a freebie bucket seat for one
Business First - at last, forever
Hopeless thoughts of flying fun
Now get me out of here I cry in air rage psycho-doom
I'm only dream-arranging from the safety of my room
Pick a place or stick a pin in
any corner of the sphere
Post me cards and tell me
nicely
Say you wish that I was here
To far Alaska: down to Rio in the Carnival
Norwegian fjords in the ever-light of Solstice call
Rusted and ropy.
Dog-eared old copy.
Vintage and classic,
or just plain Jurassic:
all words to describe me.
Relaxed in the knowledge
that happily present
are all things to sustain me,
nurture and claim me:
roll back the mileage.
You have settled beside me.
To the far and the wide of me.
A matter of choosing,
of finding and losing
on the rough ride with me.
Take whisky with water,
kick stones down the gutter.
Think back to long days
with
stale breath recycled in my face.
Rattling through airways -
plastic on cold trays.
Watching through windows,
deep landscapes below
(await) another time and space.
There must come some time
to walk through the night line.
Hands tight: heads high.
These are the dog-ear years.
Don't turn back. Don't
linger.
For God's sake keep moving.
Primitive shadows sidle beside.
Rusted and ropy.
Dog-eared old copy.
Vintage and classic,
or just plain Jurassic:
all words to describe me.
Relaxed in the knowledge
that happily present
are all things to sustain me,
nurture and claim me:
roll back the mileage.
Take whisky with water,
kick stones down the gutter.
Think back to long days with
stale breath recycled in my face.
Rattling through airways -
plastic on cold trays.
Watching through windows,
deep landscapes below
(await) another time and space.
The dog-ear years, the dog-ear years.
I count the hours: you count the days.
Together, we count the minutes in this Passion Play.
Walk dusty miles. And I ride that train
on a first class ticket, just to be with you again.
Picking up tired feet. Back from a far horizon.
Cleaned up and brushed down. Dressed to look the part.
Fresh from God's garden, I bring a gift of roses:
To stand in sweet spring water and press them to your
heart.
Like the Kipling cat, I
walk alone -
Never inviting trouble, never casting the stone.
But this badge of honour is of tarnished tin.
Light your guiding beacon to bring this fisher in.
Picking up tired feet. Back from a far horizon.
Cleaned up and brushed down. Dressed to look the part.
Fresh from God's garden, I bring a gift of roses:
To stand in sweet spring water and press them to your
heart.
I count the hours: you count the days.
Together, we count the minutes in this Passion Play.
Walk dusty miles. And I ride that train
on a first class ticket, just to be with you again.
Picking up tired feet. Back from a far horizon.
Cleaned up and brushed down. Dressed to look the part.
Fresh from God's garden, I bring a gift of roses:
To stand in sweet spring water and press them to your
heart.
Picking up tired feet. Back from a far horizon.
Cleaned up and brushed down. Dressed to look the part.
Fresh from God's garden, I bring a gift of roses:
To stand in sweet spring water and press them to your
heart.
The Secret Language Of Birds
(bonus track)
|
Next: The Secret Language Of
Birds