Get all 7 Mike Cavanagh releases available on Bandcamp and save 50%.
Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Fittin' In, Works in Progress (old and new), Hebridean Suite, Simple Days, Chosen Few, Holiday Cliche, and Every Day Has Its Dog.
1. |
Rain in the Key of A
03:33
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RAIN IN THE KEY OF A
Rain on the windows
Wind through the trees
Got the two bar heater on
And the cat for company.
Days are so short now
Winter’s settled in
I don’t think about you
Don’t know where to begin.
Got a 12 bar blues
Running through my head
Keeping time with the tin pots
Catching raindrops on the bed.
Pour myself another drink
Light another cigarette
Swear to give them up again
Seven days a week.
Can’t say I’m broken hearted
Not howling at the moon
Just in this place
Where I see your face
Midnight through to noon.
Could pull myself together
Anytime I wanted to.
No big deal, no scars to heal;
Just one more drink, or two.
Junk mail piled around me
It’s all I seem to read
I think I might have sent off
for Reader’s Digest magazines.
I should have listened to you
You were right all along
I’m better off without you…
How could both of us be wrong?
Rain on the windows
Wind through the trees
Got the two bar heater on
And the cat for company.
Days are so short now
Winter’s settled in
I don’t think about you
Don’t know where to begin.
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2. |
Give It All Away
03:30
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GIVE IT ALL AWAY
She was searching for a better time
Than the one she’d been counting on
She left her watch on the kitchen bench
By mid-morning she was halfway gone.
Along her road I thumbed a ride
She picked me up, said “I don’t know why.”
She smiled at me as I got in
Told me her stories and I told her mine.
I’d been hitching on Pacific One
Heading nowhere really, just ‘up north’
Running from my own demons
And looking for some new type of effect and cause.
We pulled off the highway at Innisfail
The night was dark; it began to hail
She had some port; I rolled my drum;
We smoked and talked till half past one.
She told me before she kissed me:
life’s like a decoy play;
Sometimes the best we can do to keep something
Is to give it all away.
Next morning we drove off again
The sun was shining over the Pacific blue
Neither of us spoke much
We just watched as the miles went rolling through.
She dropped me off near Gordon Vale,
Some people there I knew.
She drove off, headed inland now,
Along Highway 52.
She was searching for some better time
Than the one she’d been counting on
I wonder now if she found it out there
Or if she’s still moving on.
But I think we both found something
When she drove off from me that day
Precious things can still remain
Even if they don’t stay.
She told me before she kissed me:
life’s like a decoy play;
Sometimes the best we can do to keep something
Is to give it all away.
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3. |
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FREEWAY
The half light steals across the world;
an unchanging ribbon of change unfurls
across another day at the
centre of the universe.
Change is the only constant thing
in the revolving wheels within the wheels within the wheels that are the rhythms
of the universe.
Get me out of here.
And everything is just off centre
in centring on something else,
creating seasons and providing reasons why we seek
to find the reasons.
While in a hundred generations passing
beneath the same solar great unmasking
who else wonders why we need to light the night the way we do?
Get me out of here.
But Barney at the Petrol Station
only knows this summer's weather's crazy;
And he's sick of fumes and grimy fingers
on the window panes he cleans.
His wife complains about his hours,
and about the hours he has to keep
and doesn't keep alone or not
alone at home.
And he turns away to pick up the phone
as another message shunts down the line
of 'This transaction has been denied.’
at the register of dreams.
Get me out of here.
I pull out into the early morning's
commuter, freight and taxi traffic;
A steady state of little lights
played out across the dieing,
blank black night:
This is the new Pacific.
This is the new Pacific.
This is the new Pacific.
Get me out of here.
One day across these event's horizons
we all will tumble, with surprising
looks upon our faces
as we realise:
There really is no day or night, and all those ancient maps were right;
there really is a falling edge to the
whole known
and unknown universe.
Get me out of here.
And six billion universal unthinkings
into the one morning's light go blinking,
as one cock crows and someone's pre-paid
mobile rings.
And Barney says "And so it goes";
And the only thing I think I know is
I understand less than half I think
I know. And
Get me out of here.
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4. |
Bogong Dreaming
05:37
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BOGONG DREAMING
Bogong moths at the window panes
behind slimline venetian's blades
caught up in the intricacies
that suddenly appeared
these last two hundred years.
Bullet winged and compact
adhered to shadows well backed
away from brash efficiencies
that obdurate in discord rise
over the true earth’s richly wrinkled hide.
Sounds of fluttering futile wings
against windows somehow brings me images quite unexpected
of winds and spring and melting snow
on kosciuskan peaks -
far and long ago;
and of dark eyes burning bright
in the camps fired glow, alight
with dreamings’ tales renewed;
at the gathering of the dark moths again,
so the night, so the telling, so the men.
Same stars aloof in raven night's
still glimmer, moon-full, coal bright;
but now in vain entrapment viewed;
never again to be what it once has been
-moths and men alike agleam,
and shared translucent dreams.
Bogong moths at the window panes
behind slimline venetian's blades
caught up in the intricacies
that suddenly appeared
these last two hundred years.
but now in vain entrapment viewed;
never again to be what they once had been:
moths and men alike agleam,
and shared translucent dreams.
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5. |
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6. |
Gonna Be There
04:29
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GONNA BE THERE
When all the rocks have turned to dust
And all our fears our sunken rust…
When all the seas are dry and gone
Where the last rainbows sing their songs…
When there’s no more music in the air
The winds blow silent cold and bare…
When the last star fades into night
Bathed in the warmth of that soft light…
When every step on every strand
Lies buried beneath the desert sands…
When every tower we built on high
Is crumbled to ruin ‘neath an open sky…
When every politician in every land
Only speaks the words we understand…
When all we’ve dreamed and all we’ve made
Are but fading glyphs on all our graves…
When every sword that was ever raised
Lies shattered on the words of an open page…
When every deception every lie
Is scattered to the winds by one child’s smile…
When all men break free of these chains
Their faces bathed in freedom’s rains…
When all these words are meaningless
Compared to the love in all of us…
Through endless nights across boundless seas
In my sweet woman’s company…
For when life’s light drains from my face
Still forever lost in your embrace
I’m gonna be there.
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7. |
Du Cane Gap
07:17
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8. |
Dances in Clouds
05:36
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9. |
Quilting the Machair
08:25
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10. |
Kings Cross
04:02
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KINGS CROSS
(I was) lost in the winter of ’79,
Staring at the streetlights, as I waited to cross.
Wind whipped down William Street,
shredding yesterday’s news.
Alone on a corner, at home and so lost. At home and so lost.
Kings Cross.
She said behind me, her voice soft and warm,
“Stay a while and talk, it’s a long time ‘till dawn.”
I turned to look, she was dressed all in white,
Strange glimmering angel fallen into the night.
Sad, dark eyes, hollow cheeks and pale skin;
girl’s who need money, can’t stop to count costs.
Yet, I thought I might know her face,
Maybe a friend of a friend.
but street corner girls, dressed to the nines… they’re a dozen a dime,
in Kings Cross.
Unravelling threads, just to make ends meet
a slow dance to darkness, on a bright busy street.
Just a minute of comfort, just to stand and talk…
Then the lights changed, the traffic stopped…
I walked.
(I was) lost in the winter of ’79,
What was her name still haunts my mind.
She was gone when I went back,
I never saw her again,
just a memory, opportunity lost,
maybe a friend of a friend; maybe not.
Kings Cross.
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Mike Cavanagh Catalina, Australia
In my 60s (how the hell did THAT happen!). Married to the love of my life - Jules - for 20 years. Stepdad to three adult 'kids'. Other loves of my life - 1970s Gibson J-200, 1978 Gurian 3M and Maton FG 12 string also 1970s vintage. Don't play nowhere these days, but paid some sort of dues over the years - restaurants, bars, even a few weddings. Motto - find beauty; be still (thanks Mr W.H. Murray) ... more
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