Get all 29 Walter Ehresman releases available on Bandcamp and save 35%.
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1. |
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Saying No to the Question Unasked
(©1999 Walter Ehresman)
[chorus]
Don't want adventure;
Don't want adventure;
You don't want adventure, saying "no" to the question unasked.
There's too many choices in the world today--
don't want to look up to the left or the right;
I got no time for the different or the new, I gotta
gather up the family and protect them from the voices in the night;
[break]
Oooooh, something's grabbin' hold of me;
Oooooh, something's got a'hold of my toe;
Oooooh, baby, there's a stranger knockin' at my door,
tryin' to tell me things that I don't want to know.
I don't like to call it "conservatism";
Don't like to call it anything at all;
There's a portion of my brain that I don't want infected
with the sound of the tree in the forest, ooooh baby did it fall?
[break]
[chorus
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2. |
Kismet? (cante hondo)
06:47
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Kismet? (cante hondo)
(© 1998 Walter Ehresman)
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3. |
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I Know How The Anarchist Feels
(© 1997 Walter Ehresman)
Crouched down in the shadows, fedora pinched narrow, a bulge in the waistcoat concealed;
The flappers are flapping, the cops they are napping, while the Hearsts and the Fords are off making the deals;
Constructed in basements, one bulb and a squint, where the fear and the anger congeal;
The blast and the dust may not change things that much, but I know how the anarchist feels.
In old China they said "if you raise up your head from the rut that now passes as real--
in that violent Zen moment your vision can reach to the truth that's so hard to reveal."
So you search for a catalyst, something so big that the shock won't let anyone kneel;
But the rank and the file misinterpret your smile, and I know how the anarchist feels.
And those who are with you may feel that it's true 'til the Golden Goose pecks at their heel;
Once richer and fatter, they'll pull up the ladder and vote for the gentry next year;
Well, it's naked self-interest, it's leaving the ship first while women and children they squeal;
When the system is broken, can chaos be chosen? I know how the anarchist feels.
[mandolin solo]
When the power's entrenched, and you choke on the stench of the vipers who act so genteel;
And an army of one can't get anything done if he lacks that financial appeal;
And your screams of outrage are not heard on the stage as you twitch on the catherine wheel;
And the backroom to-do is not open to you, now you know how the anarchist feels.
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4. |
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Asleep at the Switch of Life
(© 1998 Walter Ehresman)
Stolen days, and wasted nights--
one day, there will be no more.
People sleepwalking from place to place--
the gift to them is one they do not earn.
We’re the only creature walkin’ ‘round with the power,
so how come you never use your head?
Imagination is bread on the table,
so how come you never break your bread?
[chorus #1]
Asleep at the switch of life (my family),
asleep at the switch of life;
Asleep at the switch of life (my father),
asleep at the switch of life.
I see you every day, driving in the city--
don’t you know you’re going to kill someone?
There is a vision that transcends the space around you--
yet you scream to keep those blinders on.
Strange things are happening just around the corner,
so how come you don’t look past your toes?
Fantastic creatures dance ‘round inside your blindspot--
you just say “That’s just the way things go.”
[chorus #2]
Asleep at the switch of life (my brother),
asleep at the switch of life;
Asleep at the switch of life (my sister),
asleep at the switch of life.
I see you every day, staring down the tunnel--
praying that you don’t see nothing new;
When you are old and your memories circle ‘round you--
sad to say, you’ll find they’re all too few.
[chorus #3]
Asleep at the switch of life (my good friend),
asleep at the switch of life;
Asleep at the switch of life (my good friend),
asleep at the switch of life.
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5. |
I've Been In This Line
02:11
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I've Been In This Line
(© 1998 Walter Ehresman)
My toenails have grown through the tips of my shoes;
My back is getting bent and my teeth are loose.
I couldn't even utter a sound,
and my smell could knock a bird down--
I've been in this line for so long.
I think I had some friends once upon a time;
My wife and dog done left poor me behind.
I'd find a way to shoot off a flare,
if I thought there's anybody who'd care--
I've been in this line for so long.
Goin' (goin' goin') where the water tastes like wine--
a dream I had standing here just the other day.
Waitin', hopin', prayin' that my life won't end this way,
but if I leave right now, it'll all have been a waste of time.
I guess I ought to give them just an hour or two--
"you see that guy up there, you know I think he moved!"
This place has the reek of a tomb,
and my armpits are growing mushrooms--
I've been in this line, I've been in this line,
I've been in this goddamn line for so long!
(ugggh)
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6. |
Shadow of a Love
04:28
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Shadow of a Love
(© 1997 Walter Ehresman)
He keeps it in that special place,
'cause he can't bear to see her face;
He opens it up anyway,
At least 100 times a day, and
all the years that brought him here just
fall away when she appears;
He folds it back up, turns away,
he's got a few more miles today to go--
it's just the shadow of a love we'll never know.
It's hard when you feel things so strong, but
every time you speak it's wrong--
the words they tangle up inside,
you've got to show what you must hide; and
she rode that string as best she could, much
longer than he thought she would, and
in the end, when things went bad,
she raged about what they might've had, but no--
it's just the shadow of a love we'll never know.
[chorus]
He's remembering a feeling
that for most of us will never come at all;
Just four aces in the dealin'; so if you get that hand...
you better take it all.
He checks into a cheap motel;
The dingy sheets, the musty smell;
The snow it flickers on the screen--
white noise drowning silent screams, and
he thinks about a thing so rare;
He turns to look but she's not there.
He pulls the picture out again,
it's faded now, but not to him--it glows;
It's just the shadow of a love we'll never know.
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7. |
Khamsin
12:07
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Khamsin
(© 1997 Walter Ehresman)
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8. |
Ain't No Use
05:58
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Ain’t No Use
(©1997 Walter Ehresman)
Frozen in my tracks, but was I going anywhere?
Can’t put a foot forward, can’t work up the bile to care.
Energy drained from me, can’t remember when I was strong.
My edge is sinking deeper--ain’t no use in goin’ on.
I feel just like a boxer--hears the countin’ through the haze;
He’s got just enough snap left to know that he’s sure seen better days.
You look into the mists of time to find the reasons for what you’ve done;
Would I know ‘em if I saw ‘em?; Ain’t no use in goin’ on.
I want to find those people who, in my life, I’ve wronged;
But, then again, I know it would add too many verses to this song.
If I could, I’d give my reasons--ask them if it seems I’ve grown;
But they sure don’t owe no answers; Ain’t no use in goin’ on.
My history, it crowds me, and I can’t escape the scenes.
I’d like to talk about redemption, but I don’t know what it means.
When you know there’s no “Hereafter,” and that when you’re gone, you’re gone--
who in this world can forgive you?; Ain’t no use in goin’ on.
I feel I’ve got some more to say, but I cannot lift my hand;
Don’t know if the path would change if I tried to make a stand.
Is the good fight good enough when the battles can’t be won?
It’s a tougher sell these days; Ain’t no use in goin’ on.
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9. |
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Things Never Done
(© 1989 Walter Ehresman)
I can tell you every single thing I do not want to be,
and I can look into your eyes and see the things I want to see;
But the space between us multiplies as I stand on and stare,
and I see the webs of kindness dissipate into the air, and
the words are there, the thoughts are sung, it still does not apply
to the rare moments in time I find to look one in the eye;
It’s an old cliche’, a tired song, that I’ve been hurt before,
but the newest is the deepest, disillusion is the score.
I am wrong again.
The last thing I would try to say is that I have the right
to dictate in the slightest way the way you spend the night;
But I can’t help thinking that we come from the same point of view--
reactionary insecurity, I call out to you.....
[chorus]
No presumption;
No intrusion;
No interaction;
No collusion;
No emotion;
No infusion;
No discussion;
No union;
Just reality.
Propriety just seems to be a method to despair;
As I try to do the right thing, what I want just isn’t there.
As I look into your eyes and revel in your golden hair,
the last thing that I see is image fade into the air.
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10. |
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My Little Spleen #1 (...and they don't even blink)
(© 1996 Walter Ehresman)
It's not as if bad people haven't done bad things before. Human history is nothing if not rife with examples of the famous Brian Gysin quote--"man is a bad animal." It's just that, these days, the negative action is compounded by what may be an even greater transgression associated with the mental state of the actor....and it is the latter, the "mens rea" of the perpetrator, which seems to signal an acceleration toward the end. Anyone who comes into contact with the ambitious, the political, has certainly experienced the empty black shark-eyes that look placidly, unblinkingly on as the blade slips in. A moment of pathos is as unlikely--indeed, as impossible--as an erection on the Rev. Donald Wildmon.
There are two sins here: the amoral act itself, and the refusal to acknowledge it, even in those most up-close, surveillance-free moments when the screwer is alone--in an elevator or empty room--with the screwee. Which is worse? Consider: the act itself is easy to judge--amoral conduct is as pure as it is prevalent. These creatures can't help themselves--the self-serving act is instinctual, and can be recognized not only by the detestably selfish nature of the thing done but also by the utter lack of deliberation that precedes it. That these acts arise from the animal hind-brain leaves the higher functions free to scan beyond the activity at hand for general data which might be helpful during the next foray. Analyzed as animal behavior, these traits are easy to understand on some levels, and are easy to deal with (in a karmic sense) as one deals with a rogue crocodile too close to the village. Of course, this is a slander to the animal kingdom--they have the very real excuse of not being sentient.
What of the absence of acknowledgment? Should this be considered worse than the loathsome act itself? Is it that the creature will not acknowledge, or that he cannot? Ultimately, does that distinction matter? Perhaps the answer lies in the concept of humanity....what does it mean to be human? Surely self-awareness is part of that definition...and isn't part of consciousness understanding the nature of your actions and motivations? And what of pathos....empathy.... mercy...at the very least, the ability to conceive of what other people must feel in response to various situations, including those you put them in? Can anyone be said to be truly "human" who finds these ideas alien and irrelevant to their course? As strange as it sounds, the killer who acknowledges the act to the victim in that final moment is somehow more potentially redeemable than the one who refuses that last minor gesture of respect to the dying man.
Because man is a bad animal, who at best will always struggle against acting in naked self-interest, the selfish acts of man can never be eliminated (absent a wholesale lemming-leap into the sea)....the best we can do on that front is to create and maintain an environment that fosters ethical behavior and a sense of community. Hopefully, in such a society, conduct will ultimately be self-policing--when someone's Yin overcomes his Yang, he will feel out of tune with the world...understanding his act and its consequences by its jarring juxtaposition with everything else in the environment, the bad actor will see what he's done as a stain on the fabric of his community and feel compelled to rectify it so as to improve his own surroundings and in turn his own life. At the very least, he will be likely to understand what he has done and the ripples it has caused. We have hope in this....
But what of the more recent phenomenon of the apparent lack of awareness in the perpetrator of the nature of the bad act itself?....the refusal to acknowledge it?....is it endemic to the species? It must not be, given that we're still here. Can we tolerate this trait?....should we? Perhaps it should be viewed as one of those evolutionary deadends that would lead to extinction if it became the norm. Certainly it should not be viewed as it is today--as a sign of the successful man, to be envied, emulated, and celebrated (in a marginally-subliminal way) in commercial mass-manipulation. This path allows for no hope....and it is a symptom of the most dire sort.
It's much like Area 51....where the MPs and the Generals and the goddamn Secretary of Defense will stand right next to you on the hill overlooking Groom Dry Lake, stare you right in the face and say "that doesn't exist." And they don't even blink....and if you take a picture of it, you're charged with treason and hustled away to a converted missile silo in some bleak, flat, soul-charred wasteland in the Dakotas where experimental psychoactive drugs are fed through tubes violating every natural and newly-created orifice in your body to see how malleable your reactions can be made without it being too obvious and/or affecting your willingness to be a pliable, unquestioning consumer.
Of course, you can buy very attractive (if grainy) photos of Area 51 from the Russians at a "going-out-of-business" sale and be OK.
Why didn't they just put this place under the Rockies in Colorado Springs where all the other federal vivisectionist forbidden zones are? Putting it out in plain view in the middle of the Nevada desert is like giving Jesse Helms a bottle of Old Crow, a lounge chair, and a high-powered rifle on a grassy knoll overlooking Henry Waxman. What was the military thinking? I think we've got a good tort here--THE DOCTRINE OF ATTRACTIVE NUISANCE. This is what you're sued under when you have a dog in your backyard that is so hideously vicious and dangerous-looking that the neighborhood kids can't help but scale the 20ft fence you erected for just such an occasion.
But I digress.
Some might be tempted to label this new breed of men as simply "urban predators." I mean, surely we're familiar with the general concept. We know the reality of ill-intent on the streets, and--thanks to Mr. Bush and his Willie Horton ads (funded through truck-sized loopholes in federal campaign spending laws)--we've been told who "those" people are. But this would be a dangerous mischaracterization. The acts of ordinary criminals can be understood on an intellectual level, and make a certain sense in our "cause-and-effect" analyses--these actions usually rise up from the despairing breeding grounds of poverty, abuse, discrimination, and...above all...abject hopelessness. This is not to say that these are excuses. They are merely reasons. But, being explainable, they can be addressed. The genesis of the "upscale urban predator" (see the nearest person with political aspirations) is a much more muddled affair. We can certainly identify some of the factors, most of which fall into the general category of "image is everything"...touted by Agassi before karma balded him. These include: the progressive adoption of form over substance (a process which has been inestimably abetted by the media as a means of feeding itself); the pervasive corruption at all levels of American government; the idolatry of power, at the expense of a moral and aesthetic evaluation of actual achievement; the utter absence of justice in our legal system; a self-perpetuating bigotry and sense of entitlement in the boardrooms and blue-blood breeding enclaves of this county; and the evisceration of higher education, sacrificing the character-building exposure to "liberal arts" for an ultra-narrow fast-track through the spiritual wastelands of business degrees and MBAs. Mix all this into the known psychological effects on too many rats in a box, and you're living the Life of Riley (god help you...and us).
We know these causes are in there somewhere, but we certainly don't know the whole recipe. It must be a synergistic effect, operating at a level we do not yet understand. If we could see, as a country, a clear link between the causes and the monsters that are the end result--I would like to think we would rise up as one and do a mop-up on the bastards, while making sure that no more are spawned.
But we don't know why....not entirely...but we do know that these creatures are wrong....that they are an abomination...that at one level, even your murderer owes you an acknowledgment of your death as he kills you....that somehow, the blankness is more abhorrent than the intent. In the acknowledgment, there is a kernel of empathy....where there is empathy, there is hope.
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11. |
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My Little Spleen #2 (the downward spiral of meaning)
(© 1996 Walter Ehresman)
You know, it's tough to express yourself these days. It seems that every possible word, term, and phrase is so loaded with explosive meaning and the attendant social, political, and psychological consequences that you can never fully communicate even a marginally-complex idea without fumbling through your internal Rolodex of implications...without following each path on the labyrinthine flow chart of political correctness and soundbyte potential...without deriving the minutiae of reference...without being caught in the downward spiral of meaning....
To the onlooker, this reactive trip 'round the self-policing loop is certainly less than impressive. Despite this image concern, it is so desperately crucial these days to be properly understood--or, more to the point, to not be misunderstood--that one can scarcely afford not to run the traps. The choice becomes one of intermittent paralysis versus being tagged with a prominent searing brand in the middle of your forehead, labeling you as some hideous social leper in a manner easily discernable to passers-by in this "Era of the 30 Second Trial"....
Because you will be judged, make no mistake; and in this decaying society where the crises caused by gross overpopulation and general lack of conscience are truly not solvable until those fundamental problems are remedied, and shameless political pandering to a dying world's fears dresses up the usual scapegoats daily as an outlet for our rage and helplessness, you can hardly blame a justifiably-frightened and horrified populace from eying each potential human encounter with the same fear and loathing as a Kurdish refugee forced to look for a night's shelter in a minefield. You should be afraid of the next guy, for Christ's sake--I mean, you'd be a fool not to play the percentages, and the odds are clear and getting clearer....."Danger, Will Robinson"....
It is not only an act of mortal self-preservation that drives us to the desperate need not to be misunderstood......As the so-called "fringes" of society move with increasing speed toward the middle (so that "mainstream" is more an island than any majority), and even the most heinous acts previously reserved for terrorists "over there" are now committed almost routinely by our own yahoo contingency, it is central to a sense of self-worth that you not be perceived as one of "them" (plug in your own fear here).
This brings up the dichotomy of internal versus external focus: on the one hand, "internal" focus is bad--constituting selfishness, narcissism, and ultimately amorality; on the other hand, formulating your sense of self-worth through introspection (held up against a morality derived from the appropriate sources in literature, philosophy, and the common-sense aspects of conscience) is the only healthy approach; external focus, in terms of deriving one's self-image, is extremely self-defeating--for the individual and ultimately for the society itself (sidebar here into envy, greed, coveting thy neighbor's ass, religion in general and other mob mentalities)--while external focus in terms of considering people and things besides yourself when acting and forming a world view is certainly integral to any lifestyle that will ultimately sustain this species.
Ah, perception. "Us and Them" goes a long way past the Dark Side of the Moon....It is interesting to note the howling frenzy Americans were working up when Arabs were assumed to have blown up Oklahoma. Before we could get righteously good and lathered, however, a truth more hideous than the act itself reared its ugly mirrored head. We done it to ourselves. The collective poison that was set to spew forth in unprecedented streams from this land toward those decidedly-dusky heathens who have the bad form to live atop the world's power juice and consistently want market value for it without assimilating the cultures of those who buy it was denied its cathartic venting and instead stayed just below the skin to fester and rot. It was as though we couldn't bear the thought of turning the same kind of hatred we have for "them" onto one of "us"--that such a thing would be more damaging to the American psyche than the act of terrorism itself. I have not recently been as ashamed and frightened as I was when I realized that the people of this country were going to use the bombing as a catalyst for knee-jerk debate on “the insidious creep of the federal government.” Where was the condemnation?....where was the outrage and the coming together to root out this cancer in the lymph nodes of this country?....Rather than spending our energies on turning over rocks and shining the light of day on our domestic Hesbolas and turning them to ash in the withering glare of that scrutiny, we took the lowest possible road. Within days, these impotent, paranoid, misanthropic wastes of carbon who couldn't count the toes on their own feet were elevated to the same glorious heights in the media pantheon usually reserved for the endless supply of mutants paraded through the daytime talkshows. Was the media afraid to condemn these men because such a stance could somehow be interpreted as a stand against "property rights", "block grants to the states", or some other Republican smokescreens so treasured by the one or two corporations that now own all the world's media outlets? Was the average citizen afraid to speak out because of fear for his own safety, since he hasn't really felt safe even in his own home in years? Have we all collectively become so numb, stupid, and hopeless that the soundbytes we have been so relentlessly fed by the powers that be are the only context we have left into which to plug new information? If so, we will surely die with that shallow warm feeling that comes from not breaking ranks with the mob....If not, we can try to tell those around us, one at a time, that there are no easy answers...that the world is not bi-polar and that there are shades between all possible answers....that these things need to be viewed with the forebrain rather than the medulla....
but be careful how you say it...beware the downward spiral of meaning.....
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Walter Ehresman San Miguel De Allende, Mexico
Called "the quintessential Austin DIY artist" by famed local disc jockey Charlie Martin , Walter Ehresman was an eccentric presence in the Austin music scene from the '80s until his 2015 move to Mexico. A prolific songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and recording artist...and a restless musical spirit, always looking for something new, expressed with fearlessly honest, socially-conscious lyrics. ... more
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