| Leonard Cohen |
  
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 The Future1998, Sony Music, - 1. The Future 2. Waiting for the Miracle 3. Be For Real 4. Closing Time 5. Anthem 6. Democracy 7. Light as the Breeze 8. Always 9. Tacoma Trailer 1. The Future Give me back my broken night my mirrored room, my secret life it's lonely here, there's no one left to torture Give me absolute control over every living soul And lie beside me, baby, that's an order! Give me crack and anal sex Take the only tree that's left and stuff it up the hole in your culture Give me back the Berlin wall give me Stalin and St Paul I've seen the future, brother: it is murder. Things are going to slide, slide in all directions Won't be nothing Nothing you can measure anymore The blizzard, the blizzard of the world has crossed the threshold and it has overturned the order of the soul When they said REPENT REPENT I wonder what they meant When they said REPENT REPENT I wonder what they meant When they said REPENT REPENT I wonder what they meant You don't know me from the wind you never will, you never did I'm the little jew who wrote the Bible I've seen the nations rise and fall I've heard their stories, heard them all but love's the only engine of survival Your servant here, he has been told to say it clear, to say it cold: It's over, it ain't going any further And now the wheels of heaven stop you feel the devil's riding crop Get ready for the future: it is murder Things are going to slide ... There'll be the breaking of the ancient western code Your private life will suddenly explode There'll be phantoms There'll be fires on the road and the white man dancing You'll see a woman hanging upside down her features covered by her fallen gown and all the lousy little poets coming round tryin' to sound like Charlie Manson and the white man dancin' Give me back the Berlin wall Give me Stalin and St Paul Give me Christ or give me Hiroshima Destroy another fetus now We don't like children anyhow I've seen the future, baby: it is murder Things are going to slide ... When they said REPENT REPENT ... 2. Waiting For The Miracle (co-written by Sharon Robinson) Baby, I've been waiting, I've been waiting night and day. I didn't see the time, I waited half my life away. There were lots of invitations and I know you sent me some, but I was waiting for the miracle, for the miracle to come. I know you really loved me. but, you see, my hands were tied. I know it must have hurt you, it must have hurt your pride to have to stand beneath my window with your bugle and your drum, and me I'm up there waiting for the miracle, for the miracle to come. Ah I don't believe you'd like it, You wouldn't like it here. There ain't no entertainment and the judgements are severe. The Maestro says it's Mozart but it sounds like bubble gum when you're waiting for the miracle, for the miracle to come. Waiting for the miracle There's nothing left to do. I haven't been this happy since the end of World War II. Nothing left to do when you know that you've been taken. Nothing left to do when you're begging for a crumb Nothing left to do when you've got to go on waiting waiting for the miracle to come. I dreamed about you, baby. It was just the other night. Most of you was naked Ah but some of you was light. The sands of time were falling from your fingers and your thumb, and you were waiting for the miracle, for the miracle to come Ah baby, let's get married, we've been alone too long. Let's be alone together. Let's see if we're that strong. Yeah let's do something crazy, something absolutely wrong while we're waiting for the miracle, for the miracle to come. Nothing left to do ... When you've fallen on the highway and you're lying in the rain, and they ask you how you're doing of course you'll say you can't complain -- If you're squeezed for information, that's when you've got to play it dumb: You just say you're out there waiting for the miracle, for the miracle to come. 3. Be For Real (by Frederick Knight) Are you back in my life to stay Or is it just for today Oh that you're gonna need me? If it's a thrill you're looking for Honey, I'm flexible. Oh, yeah. Just be for real won't you, Baby Be for real oh, Baby You see I, I don't want to be hurt by love again So you see I'm not naive. I just would like to believe Ah what you tell me. So don't give me the world today And tomorrow take it away. Don't do that to me, darling. Just be for real won't you, Baby Be for real won't you, Baby Been hurt so many times You see I, I don't want to be hurt by love again. (I don't give a damn about the truth, Baby Except for the naked truth. Oh yeah) Just be for real won't you, Baby Be for real won't you, Baby No, no, no, no It's just that I, I don't want to be hurt by love again. Thanks for the song Mr. Knight. 4. Closing Time Ah we're drinking and we're dancing and the band is really happening and the Johnny Walker wisdom running high And my very sweet companion she's the Angel of Compassion she's rubbing half the world against her thigh And every drinker every dancer lifts a happy face to thank her the fiddler fiddles something so sublime all the women tear their blouses off and the men they dance on the polka-dots and it's partner found, it's partner lost and it's hell to pay when the fiddler stops: it's CLOSING TIME Yeah the women tear their blouses off and the men they dance on the polka-dots and it's partner found, it's partner lost and it's hell to pay when the fiddler stops: it's CLOSING TIME Ah we're lonely, we're romantic and the cider's laced with acid and the Holy Spirit's crying, "Where's the beef?" And the moon is swimming naked and the summer night is fragrant with a mighty expectation of relief So we struggle and we stagger down the snakes and up the ladder to the tower where the blessed hours chime and I swear it happened just like this: a sigh, a cry, a hungry kiss the Gates of Love they budged an inch I can't say much has happened since but CLOSING TIME I swear it happened just like this: a sigh, a cry, a hungry kiss the Gates of Love they budged an inch I can't say much has happened since CLOSING TIME I loved you for your beauty but that doesn't make a fool of me: you were in it for your beauty too and I loved you for your body there's a voice that sounds like God to me declaring, declaring, declaring that your body's really you And I loved you when our love was blessed and I love you now there's nothing left but sorrow and a sense of overtime and I missed you since the place got wrecked And I just don't care what happens next looks like freedom but it feels like death it's something in between, I guess it's CLOSING TIME Yeah I missed you since the place got wrecked By the winds of change and the weeds of sex looks like freedom but it feels like death it's something in between, I guess it's CLOSING TIME Yeah we're drinking and we're dancing but there's nothing really happening and the place is dead as Heaven on a Saturday night And my very close companion gets me fumbling gets me laughing she's a hundred but she's wearing something tight and I lift my glass to the Awful Truth which you can't reveal to the Ears of Youth except to say it isn't worth a dime And the whole damn place goes crazy twice and it's once for the devil and once for Christ but the Boss don't like these dizzy heights we're busted in the blinding lights, busted in the blinding lights of CLOSING TIME The whole damn place goes crazy twice and it's once for the devil and once for Christ but the Boss don't like these dizzy heights we're busted in the blinding lights, busted in the blinding lights of CLOSING TIME Oh the women tear their blouses off and the men they dance on the polka-dots It's CLOSING TIME And it's partner found, it's partner lost and it's hell to pay when the fiddler stops It's CLOSING TIME I swear it happened just like this: a sigh, a cry, a hungry kiss It's CLOSING TIME The Gates of Love they budged an inch I can't say much has happened since But CLOSING TIME I loved you when our love was blessed I love you now there's nothing left But CLOSING TIME I miss you since the place got wrecked By the winds of change and the weeds of sex. 5. Anthem The birds they sang at the break of day Start again I heard them say Don't dwell on what has passed away or what is yet to be. Ah the wars they will be fought again The holy dove She will be caught again bought and sold and bought again the dove is never free. Ring the bells that still can ring Forget your perfect offering There is a crack in everything That's how the light gets in. We asked for signs the signs were sent: the birth betrayed the marriage spent Yeah the widowhood of every government -- signs for all to see. I can't run no more with that lawless crowd while the killers in high places say their prayers out loud. But they've summoned, they've summoned up a thundercloud and they're going to hear from me. Ring the bells that still can ring ... You can add up the parts but you won't have the sum You can strike up the march, there is no drum Every heart, every heart to love will come but like a refugee. Ring the bells that still can ring Forget your perfect offering There is a crack, a crack in everything That's how the light gets in. Ring the bells that still can ring Forget your perfect offering There is a crack, a crack in everything That's how the light gets in. That's how the light gets in. That's how the light gets in. 6. Democracy It's coming through a hole in the air, from those nights in Tiananmen Square. It's coming from the feel that this ain't exactly real, or it's real, but it ain't exactly there. From the wars against disorder, from the sirens night and day, from the fires of the homeless, from the ashes of the gay: Democracy is coming to the U.S.A. It's coming through a crack in the wall; on a visionary flood of alcohol; from the staggering account of the Sermon on the Mount which I don't pretend to understand at all. It's coming from the silence on the dock of the bay, from the brave, the bold, the battered heart of Chevrolet: Democracy is coming to the U.S.A. It's coming from the sorrow in the street, the holy places where the races meet; from the homicidal bitchin' that goes down in every kitchen to determine who will serve and who will eat. From the wells of disappointment where the women kneel to pray for the grace of God in the desert here and the desert far away: Democracy is coming to the U.S.A. Sail on, sail on O mighty Ship of State! To the Shores of Need Past the Reefs of Greed Through the Squalls of Hate Sail on, sail on, sail on, sail on. It's coming to America first, the cradle of the best and of the worst. It's here they got the range and the machinery for change and it's here they got the spiritual thirst. It's here the family's broken and it's here the lonely say that the heart has got to open in a fundamental way: Democracy is coming to the U.S.A. It's coming from the women and the men. O baby, we'll be making love again. We'll be going down so deep the river's going to weep, and the mountain's going to shout Amen! It's coming like the tidal flood beneath the lunar sway, imperial, mysterious, in amorous array: Democracy is coming to the U.S.A. Sail on, sail on ... I'm sentimental, if you know what I mean I love the country but I can't stand the scene. And I'm neither left or right I'm just staying home tonight, getting lost in that hopeless little screen. But I'm stubborn as those garbage bags that Time cannot decay, I'm junk but I'm still holding up this little wild bouquet: Democracy is coming to the U.S.A. 7. Light As The Breeze She stands before you naked you can see it, you can taste it, and she comes to you light as the breeze. Now you can drink it or you can nurse it, it don't matter how you worship as long as you're down on your knees. So I knelt there at the delta, at the alpha and the omega, at the cradle of the river and the seas. And like a blessing come from heaven for something like a second I was healed and my heart was at ease. O baby I waited so long for your kiss for something to happen, oh something like this. And you're weak and you're harmless and you're sleeping in your harness and the wind going wild in the trees, and it ain't exactly prison but you'll never be forgiven for whatever you've done with the keys. O baby I waited ... It's dark now and it's snowing O my love I must be going, The river has started to freeze. And I'm sick of pretending I'm broken from bending I've lived too long on my knees. Then she dances so graceful and your heart's hard and hateful and she's naked but that's just a tease. And you turn in disgust from your hatred and from your love and comes to you light as the breeze. O baby I waited ... There's blood on every bracelet you can see it, you can taste it, and it's Please baby please baby please. And she says, Drink deeply, pilgrim but don't forget there's still a woman beneath this resplendent chemise. So I knelt there at the delta, at the alpha and the omega, I knelt there like one who believes. And the blessings come from heaven and for something like a second I'm cured and my heart is at ease 8. Always (by Irving Berlin) (Oh friends, .. don't matter if you're a man or a woman. If you're in love with somebody, these are the words that you got to learn to say. Now listen carefully. Here it comes...) I'll be loving you always with a love that's true, always When the thing you've planned needs my helping hand, I will understand, always, always Days may not be fair, always Yeah but that's when I'll be there, always Not for just an hour, Not for just a day, Not for just a year, but always. I said that I'll be loving you, always with a love that's true, always. When the thing you've planned needs my helping hand, I will, I will understand, always, always (Oh that's pretty ... that's pretty too ... Oh darling) The days may not be fair, always Yeah but that's when I'll be there, always Not for just a second, or a minute, or an hour, Not for just a weekend and a shake down in the shower, Not for just the summer and the winter going sour, But always, always, always (Ok if you don't want to quit, let's try it one more time) I'll be loving you, always with a love that's true, always. When the thing you've planned needs my helping hand, I will understand, I will, I will understand, always, always The days may not be fair, always (Don't worry, baby) That's when I'll be there, always Not for just an hour, Not for just a day, Not for just a year, but always. 9. Tacoma Trailer [Instrumental] |