Empire Lounge lyrics and credits

lyrics © 2014 John Newlands and Rachael Charbonneau
 

1 - Holy Dollar
2 - Sociopaths' Social Club
3 - Know To The Police
4 - Train Rolled On
5 - This Place
6 - Empire Lounge
7 - Listen Tonight
8 - Peace Never Had A Chance
9 - The Future
 

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1 - Holy Dollar


drums: Joe Fiorino
bass: Chris Peplinski
voice: Anita Ansamaa
voice: Kevin Closs
trumpet: Carter Umpherson

The sermon today
And every high-living day
Is all about finding ways
To make the planet pay

To Milton we pray
In Warren we trust
Vanity, gluttony, greed and lust
Vanity, gluttony, greed and lust

Church of the holy dollar
The eucharistic purse
Low priests in slipknot collars
Do miracles in reverse
Do miracles in reverse

To covet is fine
It shows you as our kind
But a mantra most divine
Is: "I take what is rightfully mine"

In Warren we trust
To Milton we pray
The colour of money is smokestack grey
The colour of money is smokestack grey

Church of the holy dollar
The eucharistic purse
Low priests in slipknot collars
Do miracles in reverse
Do miracles in reverse
Do miracles in reverse
Do miracles in reverse

Muzak the message by megaphone
To the mass distraction zone
We've got them believing in alchemy
And anything else is blasphemy

Gold magic
Gold magic
Gold magic
Gold magic

Study the ledgers of the sacred text
You will know what happens next
Same as always, rest assured
Fuck the future and fuck the poor
Fuck the future and fuck the poor

Forget the lie about boats and a tide
Grab your fortune and get inside
This ain't rock and roll
This is omnicide
 

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2 - Sociopaths' Social Club


marimba: Andrea McColeman

We're the blue chip thugs
Doing power drugs
With Beelzebub
At the Sociopaths' Social Club

Finally made my stash
Found some friends in the sun
They're no fools, yeah they make the rules
And they carry the biggest guns
Now the plan is to keep on taking
Until there's nothing left
They've even a guardian angel
They call him IMF

Once I was ostracized
For thinking I was god
But knocking knees with these VIPs
I get the knowing nods
Back home I'd get inspected
By Dr. Rubber Room
But here I am respected
By tireless tycoons

We will never be perfectly set up
There will never be nearly enough
If you were to give us everything we want
Sadly, you would be missing the point

We're the blue chip thugs
Doing power drugs
With Beelzebub
At the Sociopaths' Social Club

Fuck the future and fuck the poor
Fuck the future and fuck the poor

Misunderstood by low society
My twisted need to watch things bleed
Is fed at the SSC
Who can feel the most entitled?
Like Tony in his swivel chair
All billionaires who need a bailout
To remain billionaires

A round for my pals
Monsanto, Gildan and Barrick, my buddies from RBC
Absolutely no empathy for misery
They see themselves in me
We will do the workers over
And know no consequence
Condemn the world to ruin
From behind the government fence

We will never be perfectly set up
There will never be nearly enough
If you were to give us everything we want
Sadly, you would be missing the point

We're the blue chip thugs
Doing power drugs
With Beelzebub
At the Sociopaths' Social Club
 

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3 - Known To The Police (A or B)


voice: Anita Ansamaa
trumpet: Carter Umpherson
saxophone: Allan Walsh

A...
Dumpster diving
Urban surviving
Yeh yeh
Camels needles
Poor is illegal
They say
Sometimes he can make a lousy buck
Shifting fifty tons off a free trade truck

B...
The owner isn't in town tonight
He's waiting for a connecting flight
Checking his stocks in the lounge
Barrick is up
The natives are down

Which one would you say
Is known to the police?
Which one do you think
Is known to the police?

A...
Here's your sister
Oppression resister
Yeh yeh
Sowing seeds in
Paved over Eden
For all
Always loud and clear against the war
She's still pretty sure that two plus two is four

B...
The answer's five if the margin's sweet
Warren's disciple thinks on his feet
Gotta stay real, nothing is free
Pin on a map
Caspian Sea

Which one would you say
Is known to the police?
Which one do you think
Is known to the police?

...And those low priests in slipknot collars
And those low priests in slipknot collars...

Which one would you say
Is known to the police?
Which one do you think
Is known to the police?
Which one would you say
Is known to the police?
Which one do you think
Is known to the police?

...And those low priests in slipknot collars
And those low priests in slipknot collars...
 

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4 - Train Rolled On


drums: Joe Fiorino
bass: Chris Peplinski
voice: Anita Ansamaa

"All aboard," cried the leaders
"All aboard," cried the dealers
"Not so fast," whispered the wilderness

"All aboard," cried the bankers
"All aboard," cried the anchors
"Think again," whispered the wilderness

What starts wrong will end wrong
Latest twist on an old song
Train rolled on
Until the coal was gone
Train rolled on
Stalled in a deadly dawn

The last of the capital class
Took off for Mars
Never made it past the moon
Could not resist
Yet another techno fix

Kevlar walls and super guns
Factory-shiny in the sun

This is what they thought of you
This is what they thought of you

What starts wrong will end wrong
Latest twist on an old song
Train rolled on
Until the coal was gone
Train rolled on
Stalled in a deadly dawn

The light in the silicon night
Flickered and died
Virtual pride erased
Binary code
Isolation overload

To enslave the dispossessed
Was the best way to invest

This is what they thought of you
This is what they thought of you

What starts wrong will end wrong
Latest twist on an old song
Train rolled on
Until the coal was gone
Train rolled on
Stalled in a deadly dawn
 

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5 - This Place


drums: Joe Fiorino
bass: Chris Peplinski
voice: Anita Ansamaa
trumpet: Carter Umpherson
saxophone: Allan Walsh

Let's not deal in fantasy
Every boom, every boom goes bust
Your mother or the company
Which one do you, which one do you trust?

Oh how much will we kill
Kill of water, kill of soil and sky?
When the grandkids get the bill
They will wonder, they will wonder why

I feel I need to break it down
Or be misunderstood

This place is not plunder for cutthroat corporations
This place, this place is a sovereign nation
This place is not equity for lazy profit chasers
This place, this place is the base
So lose that false allegiance to the tv, to the mall
There's a deep green voice inside you
Will you heed the call
Of this place?

And those externalities
Our computers cannot calculate
Land reduced to royalties
See the commons stripped down to freight

Free marketeer gets subsidized
Then that gangster climbs a notch on Forbes
Politicians sell the poor the lies
When they should be falling on their swords

I feel I need to break it down
Or be misunderstood

This place is not plunder for cutthroat corporations
This place, this place is a sovereign nation
This place will not benefit from reckless speculation
This place, this place is the foundation
So kick that sad addiction to a dream of boundless space
We need science without fiction
Can you see the face
Of this place?
 

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6 - Empire Lounge


drums: Joe Fiorino
bass: Chris Peplinski
marimba: Andrea McColeman
voice: Anita Ansamaa

When the band plays happy hour
At the Empire Lounge
All raise hands 'round the fountain
When the clock rings from the tower
"The city's coming down"
We listen like standing stones
We listen like standing stones
We listen like standing stones

Give it up for Omnicide

Red flags wave in the petro air
In the dusk of the industriocene
So it's back to the drawing board
To build bigger and better machines

Clutching at the tail of the master we serve
We joy ride down the back slope of Hubbert's curve

When the band plays happy hour
At the Empire Lounge
All raise hands 'round the fountain
When the clock rings from the tower
"The city's coming down"
We listen like standing stones
We listen like standing stones
We listen like standing stones

Absolutely Rapa Nui

Cling to days of wine and roses
And promises our leaders could never keep
Required to admire the emperor's clothes
Naked in a nightmare without sleep

Clutching at the tail of the master we serve
We joy ride down the back slope of Hubbert's curve

When the band plays happy hour
At the Empire Lounge
All raise hands 'round the fountain
When the clock rings from the tower
"The city's coming down"
We listen like standing stones
We listen like standing stones
We listen like standing stones

Give it up for giving up

When told control is happiness
When power promises a kiss
We close our eyes

...and the train rolls on...

When the band plays happy hour
At the Empire Lounge
All raise hands 'round the fountain
When the clock rings from the tower
"The city's coming down"
We listen like standing stones
We listen like standing stones
We listen like standing stones

Once again in history's frame
The root of all remains the same
The sane imprisoned
The mad empowered
Nature howls in a desperate hour
But in a winter dark
Or in a summer high
Will the wild things walk
Under starlit skies
In this place?
 

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7 - Listen Tonight


marimba: Andrea McColeman
guitar: Kevin Closs
double bass: Brian Quebec

The loons are back at their summer lakes
And they're saying they have taken
All that they can take

There is no place that isn't the scene of the crime
My love and I listen tonight like it's the last time
Like it's the last time

The bees are out in their summer fields
There is something in their buzzing
Ominous and real

There is no place that isn't the scene of the crime
My love and I listen today like it's the last time
Like it's the last time

The leaves and the breeze dance their verano
But the music will not take us
Where we used to go

There is no place that isn't the scene of the crime
My love and I listen tonight like it's the last time
Like it's the last time
 

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8 - Peace Never Had A Chance


voice: Rachael Charbonneau
trumpet: Carter Umpherson
saxophone: Allan Walsh
marimba: Andrea McColeman

Time to escape the barless cage
Time to grow up and act our rage
War without end fought in our names
States and corporations, all the same

When the time comes round to get your vote
That junk mail reads like a ransom note

All we are saying
Is peace never had a chance
All we are saying
Is peace never had a chance
It's not that they don't understand
Peace was never in the plans
Of leaders with their heads in the Alberta sands

After all the bombs that he has spent
Peace still eludes the President
Power has a will, it makes a choice
So filter out the sociopathic noise

And as Orwell spins, the news head speaks
Trotting out the Hitler Of The Week

All we are saying
Is peace never had a chance
All we are saying
Is peace never had a chance
It's not that they don't understand
Peace was never in the plans
Of leaders with their heads in the Alberta sands
 

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9 - The Future


voice: Rachael Charbonneau
trumpet: Carter Umpherson
saxophone: Allan Walsh
baritone guitar: Matt Foy

Once upon I was too clever
To converse about the weather
On the downside of never never
We are
Might we hitch our fading stars together?

Forget the future that you heard about
Good and evil having it out
Here's some gospel where you might begin
The planet wins
The planet wins
Forget the future that is nightmare red
But happens only after you're dead
Stick to your guns or swallow your pride
Either way the planet decides
Either way the planet decides
Either way the planet decides

Money makers stoke the war flames
Think the world is laid out for them
Now we must break their laws to thwart them
For love
Does not place one kind above another

Forget the future that you heard about
Good and evil having it out
Here's some gospel where you might begin
The planet wins
The planet wins
Forget the future that is nightmare red
But happens only after you're dead
Stick to your guns or swallow your pride
Either way the planet decides
Either way the planet decides
Either way the planet decides

Blue chip thugs
Lazy profit chasers
Joy riders, joy riders
Who would keep us in their barless cages

Hitch our fading stars together

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