Strange Currencies: A Podcast For Songwriters

A life in a mirror Of someone’s design With a fleeting interest In my own mind New, improved rules Assimilated inside Genuflect and pray Before your mobile device There’s a new boss in town Polarized from the other guy Queens is quiet tonight I hate when bands make me wait For something I’ve already seen With survival less guaranteed It matters less what it all means Falling through the seasons Of my dreams Observing the fire hydrant ejaculating blood On my $100 jeans It’s hardly apathetic Noticing where we no longer align Queens is quiet tonight The urgency of yesterday Becomes an uneasy today In a broken contract with safety Which used to account for the price paid And the poets always miss The sunset’s indifference And the politicians equate a vote With a kind of spiritual deliverance The Internet has fallen And now there’s nowhere to hide Queens is quiet tonight My notebook’s privilege Might be something you forgive In the mad dream of culture Where we both live Somewhere a phenomena Uncommented u

Well, it isn’t much to boast about Jump the fare Get choked out Our fine metropolis Can be… inelegant Harder to say Without being paid What they take out of me Monday through Friday The bureaucratic arm Can be negligent But one bat of your eyes And baby, I’m sold Out of the lie The teleprompter told Anyone can shout from a rooftop And pretend they are omniscient You keep me singing You keep me sane You spare me from the logic Of my obsessive brain Without your presence Darling, I’d barely be sentient Chorus: This world can go down in flames And I’ll buy an ashy bouquet The arsonists Are spraying propane But we’ll keep waltzing Anyway, anyway…. Another text, but it’s never from God So I keep watching highlights From 2001 I may be numb But damn, Jeter could swing it With my death mask on I drive my car Laughing at my fantasies Being so far gone If it weren’t so fast, I’d have hit it Kiss me in the morning And put my fears to bed When I cry flower petals J

Life in the empire /The sentries sing at sunrise/ Their Gods are deader / Than the look in their eyes / And I am tethered / To the awaited surprise / The turn in the narrative / The truth in the lies / Where all will make sense / Be at last contextualized / We’re alone in our own reality / Where no one may hide Life in the empire / Culture is a transparent bag / Accusing you of having / Things you never had / And some tin-eared pawn / Celebrates the new hit / While another gatekeeper / Decides if your copper slipper fits / They danced in the street / Because they thought they won / But nothing is stopping / The next flood The songs inside me must be born / Like the clothes outside you / Must be worn / And the seawall constructed / On the cusp of Babylon / When there still were matinees / In days halcyon / Such a feat of engineering / A true union job / But praying in high-water / Bought me closer to god / May the old become new / And life continue on / We are but the remnants / Of a world that is gone

Got a word of advice? I’m having the same problem twice Holy places in my mind protect against time But they don’t make my answers right Always the same town At dawn, lamp-lit puddles on the ground An old library on the corner Where the mayor’s daughter Ensures all lost souls are found A fantasy of possibility An antidote to urbanity With enough room to maneuver I would be so much truer To process And intuitive certainty At the center of things The bells of freedom ring At the center of things There’s no need for a savior At the center of things The echoes of history sing At the center of things Emptiness is a perfectly fine neighbor Do you also have a place you go? When the static stars no longer glow? And nature’s critique Renders you unwilling to speak In defense of culture’s Vaudeville show In Honesty, you don’t need a job They give you a room above the saloon Where you can converse with God An old typewriter and wooden bench One tough but understanding friend Who takes

Paralyzed At the crosswalk sign And it’s telling me to move In this Balkanized Corporate paradise Consciousness is a fool On my way To a date With the anxious apparatus To plead my case And amend my mistake Of writing that ending Tragic Do you have an empty feeling? Can you play the part of hope? Was their dream worth believing? When you already had a coat? Satisfied By a momentary high After signing their contract Unrecognized Walking the Highline Alias intact We were running late To a play That was about our lives We did not know ourselves Everybody is somebody else And I still love the way you Survive Do you have an empty feeling? Can you play the part of hope? Was their dream worth believing? When you already had a coat?

Never lied to you Never told the truth Only ever suggested Never made it a job I was far too enthralled To make the connection With one wrinkled face Staring at my lonely place onstage As I hit the right inflection Between desperate and alone Delusional and in the zone Untaught living your lesson Dualistic identity Off-key and heavenly Like a frail body undressing Will you remember my name? Will your mind be the same? After our 45-minute session Chorus: Loyal to the final hour Offering a burning flower From my charred human hand Summoning my mystic power Dressed in black like a priestly prowler Willing myself from obscurity To take this stand Clenched jaw Fearing the claw Nullifying finger dexterity The chord must be changed Another naked melody named Attempted profitability Take a seat after the set Response about what I expect For an expression of honesty The next singer comes up Crystalline scraping dust From the face of recycled homily Kid’s the r

You say Your heart wants things But its really your brain And you say This lyric don’t mean nothing It only rhymes with rain And I long For this song to heal To be a beacon upon Your sea of distress Its too late for the truth to be beautiful In a story about neglect Chorus: If you feel homesick Even when you’re home That means in a crowded room You are totally alone Can you find a way out of your head? Will you ever finish your manifesto in red? You say Down in Queens Parking lots are united nations And you say Policemen blow stop signs As an expression of a collective frustration But you’re wrong To accept such a crooked deal Even though you’re too proud To confess If you allow yourself to quit Will the silence somehow hurt less?

You lost your mind in the rain You kicked the taxi You said we’re absolutely over And you’d never forgive me We never carried umbrellas Your angel wings hit my head I walked alone to Washington Square Where pigeons pecked crumbs of bread We started when folk was hot Everyone with a beard had a deal We met at Treehouse You did the robot to Electric Feel You could hit the high notes I wrote a novel about your hair Our songs could have won it all If the game was fair Lost our minds Trying to describe The world as it is Optimism was a fashion victim In the booze-soaked delirium Girls wore shades and bright shorts They asked what you thought of them It was honest, unpretentious An attempted communication We posted pictures, shared oblivions Got on with our aging Jealousies they come in three Why was it them instead of me? Why did I nail myself to purity? And pretend I was free? Our love was a welcome distraction Like a stray dog at the door Sometimes we were quiet at night In the s

Never lied to you Never told the truth Only ever suggested Never made it a job I was far too enthralled To make the connection With one wrinkled face Staring at my lonely place onstage As I hit the right inflection Between desperate and alone Delusional and in the zone Untaught living your lesson Dualistic identity Off-key and heavenly Like a frail body undressing Will you remember my name? Will your mind be the same? After our 45-minute session Chorus: Loyal to the final hour Offering a burning flower From my charred human hand Summoning my mystic power Dressed in black like a priestly prowler Willing myself from obscurity To take this stand Clenched jaw Fearing the claw Nullifying finger dexterity The chord must be changed Another naked melody named Attempted profitability Take a seat after the set Response about what I expect For an expression of honesty The next singer comes up Crystalline scraping dust From the face of recycled homily Kid’s the r

First songwriting collaboration between me and my wife!

The night is like a curtain Outside my window It is indifferent to me I’ve worked my entire life To be a winner But losing has a thing for me While my pen wonders when I’ll quit her Only if your words stop singing to me Chorus: It’s a losing battle In a proxy war Toy soldiers lined up On the killing floor Someone dies for their reason Another adjusts the score Take me to our bedroom Beyond this locked door The victor’s narrative Is an attractive incentive Recalibrating chance as clarity I’ve never been overly Inventive Assessing its relationship to me Seeking an unbiased Outsider perspective To diagnose ambitious purity

under control by Matt Waters

Well, it isn’t much to boast about Jump the fare Get choked out Our fine metropolis Can be… inelegant Harder to say Without being paid What they take out of me Monday through Friday The bureaucratic arm Can be negligent But one bat of your eyes And baby, I’m sold Out of the lie The teleprompter told Anyone can shout from a rooftop And pretend they are omniscient You keep me singing You keep me sane You spare me from the logic Of my obsessive brain Without your presence Darling, I’d barely be sentient Chorus: This world can go down in flames I’ll be Holding an ashy bouquet One-of-a-kind minds Homogenized through identity cliché But me and you, we’ll keep waltzing Anyway, anyway…. Another text, but it’s never from God So I keep watching baseball highlights From 2001 I may be numb But damn, Jeter could swing it Treating disillusion by watching Youtube The screen, window and couch My fortress of solitude If it weren’t so fast, I would’ve hit it Kiss me in the morning And put my fears to bed Whe

Never lied to you Never told the truth Only ever suggested Never made it a job I was far too enthralled To make the connection With one wrinkled face Staring at my lonely place onstage As I hit the right inflection Between desperate and alone Delusional and in the zone Untaught living your lesson Dualistic identity Off-key and heavenly Frail body undressing Will you remember my name? Will your mind be the same? After our 45-minute session Chorus: Loyal to the final hour Offering a burning flower From my charred human hand Summoning my mystic power Dressed in black like a priestly prowler Willing myself from obscurity Up, to this microphone stand Clenched jaw Fearing the claw Nullifying dexterity The chord must be changed Another naked melody named Attempted profitability Take a seat after the set Response about what I expect For an expression of honesty The next singer comes up Crystalline scraping dust From the face of a recycled homily Kid’s the re

Saw such lovely colors in your pictures

A touch of the tragic May be conducive to magic But it’s a rock in the shoe Of ordinary life Never wanted it to happen Our branch bent before snapping Saw reality as an anomaly As our little tree struggled in the strife Upon the polished bar-slab Rests an old head who can’t pay his tab While his pocket chimes, a music box The last gift from his wife Well, life may be short I may be numb My country is Governed by a gun Hey, maybe it’s simple Maybe its not I could not work The way that you want If there’s a god If you’re a friend If there’s a story With an end I won’t forget When things were good I’ll someday figure out What I never understood Plinking my night symphonies The Detective wants his car keys Originals and standards No spotlight Couldn’t learn how to quit Months before you split Should’ve held you harder After that last flight Your father offered a good job And my pursuit’s run by the mob Why not grow-up, own property And bow out from a rigged fight? The sound of th

Originally written in 2017, 'Usually' was inspired by a line in one of my unpublished novels. "I usually run," the character said, and this song seemed to blossom all-at-once from a simple consideration of what that line meant to that character. Ultimately the people we love are the people for which we eschew 'usually.'

Originally written in 2018, this is a song that makes me feel like a count in a castle. Partially inspired by classic American literature and the emptiness of solitary evenings.

The live debut of a more recently written track, 'Intruder.'

World War Pain My body at the break of dawn Always obeys the first alarm I do what I’m told these days Sometimes I feel I’ll give out The mask gets heavy and I could pass out Finally found a gig that pays Nobody’s involved or wants the job We can’t elect a new god While still hauling biblical names World War pain They teach us to be sane When I train my sights on you It’s me being free World War pain What’s your favorite game? If you shoot me through the forehead Would you wonder what I dreamed? We’re each other’s targets tonight Only one will see the sunlight Seem to bless his lover’s eyes We don’t bother with questioning null Our local car was totally full Of political hacks parroting lies Do you also have empty night streets? Where distant traffic hums sweet relief From the vengeance born in our minds World War pain Has nothing to do with shame That’s for civilian life, where it is Essential to forgive World War pain Did you cauterize with flame? I wasted a second wondering If we’