Tagged: recording

September 29, 2010

New Song: Welcome to the Party

Today I’m proud to release a new song from the Workin’ Progress project called “Welcome to the Party”. This one was a bit different for me and a bit challenging but a lot of fun. It’s basically a funky party jam.

The amazing sax you’ll hear on the track is by Gary Breitling, a local NJ player. The organ parts were played by Chris Preston. I played everything else.

You can play the track on the right in the music player or if you want, you can hit one of my other links listed here and get to the song that way. If you’re having trouble, just contact me.

Hope you enjoy it!

Lou's News / Music

September 20, 2010

Every Song Tells A Story: Will We All Be Friends At The End Of The World?

The Story

This song is, basically, a protest song. Protest songs and rock and roll seem to go hand in hand. I’m not one of those activist-types who go to rallies with signs and stuff but I’m certainly not opposed to writing a protest song when the feeling hits me and the inspiration is there.

This song is the end result of the combining of two song ideas, plus a little Utopia. I had a batch of lyrics with a loose melody called “The World’s Gone Crazy” lying around, waiting to be worked out. That song was more of a misanthropic ode than a protest song and it still has a few good bits in it that I’m going to eventually re-work and transform into another song when I have time.

The other idea was the protest song that eventually ended up as “Will We All Be Friends at the End of the World?” This idea was straight-up inspiration from both a vibe and a lyric from another song I was listening to at the time. That song was from Utopia, Todd Rundgren’s side project, and is called “Marriage of Heaven and Hell” from the album Oops! Wrong Planet.

Somewhere in that song is a lyric that goes, “They will all join hands at the end of the world,” and I thought to myself, “Hey, that’s a neat little visual.” That led to a stream of consciousness that led me to all sorts of places. I was thinking about current events and how all the nations of the world can’t seem to get it together. There’s hatred all over the world pointed in all sorts of directions. There’s hatred within political circles here at home. It’s like a cancer, eating away at humanity.

So I was thinking to myself, “What’s it going to take before everyone gets along and can be friendly to each other? When will we all be friends? Is it going to take a big alien invasion? A nuclear war? The end of the world as we know it? When the world is about to blow, will we then be able to hug it out? Will we all be friends at the end of the world?”

Now, the Utopia song has a couple of different parts to it. The first part and the bit at the end are very upbeat and bluesy which I liked a lot. The part with the quote that I mentioned above is a slower part with a totally different feel. I thought that the bluesy vibe really fit the idea I was trying to convey.

As the newly re-worked lyrics came around, the music in my head started to change a little also. The upbeat vibe was still there and was joined a little by some KISS; specifically the song “100,000 Years”. So, musically, if you take Utopia and KISS and throw them together in a blender, then add a little Alice Cooper and maybe some Wings, and then let me have at it for a while, you’ll come up with something like the song I ended up writing.

As I said, I’m not really a big fan of protest songs, but sometimes inspiration hits and you can’t just turn that sort of thing off. It’s really easy to get angry at the state of the world today. The chorus is something you might hear me say in casual conversation while scanning the news stories of the day. The world really has gone crazy. Nothing makes sense anymore and no one can really tell me why. I don’t get it.

There was a time where I started to really pay attention to politics and what was happening in the world and more so in our own government. Slowly, as Presidents came in and out of power, I just started to realize that there was really no difference between any of them at all. Politicians say what they have to in order to get elected and keep a career going. I also realized that political parties are a bit of a joke. There’s no room for a centrist like myself. If you don’t fall totally and completely down the party line, you don’t fit. I don’t vote based on party, I vote on the issues. I agree with one party on this or that, and I agree with the other on certain other issues. But why is there all this hatred between the parties? There’s no agreeing to disagree. There’s blame, pointing fingers, excuses, lies and red tape. Meanwhile, the people bear the brunt of their mistakes. I’ll stop there. Let’s just say the world was making me angry and therefore, I wrote a song in protest. Do I feel better? Maybe a little. Will the world change? Nope.

The Recording

As usual, I recorded the drums first on this one. I usually try to map the song out in my head and then jot down a few notes so when I’m playing the drum track I know where I am in the song. I’m usually singing in my head as well which is why it’s important for me to have lyrics, even if they’re scratch verses or whatever.

The song starts out with a drum intro that I did “on the fly”. I tried a few different things and it wasn’t until after I was done with the track that I noticed my subconscious inserted a little Peter Criss into my playing. The little intro is a bit similar to what Peter used to do in his old KISS drum solo. So I recorded the drums, made sure I added some accents, left room for some other ideas I had in my head and that was that. As usual, there were not many takes.

There are specific accents in the song, so when I was laying down the bass parts, I tried my best to hit them well. There were no issues that I recall. The song is a bit repetitive, especially on the bass. There’s a constant bluesy thumping that provides a secure foundation.

The guitars were a whole different scene. Once I got started having fun, I found it hard to stop. The tune is very guitar driven and almost “anthemic” in a way. So the basic rhythm guitar is intact, mostly a big A with some C and D accents. Over those accents, however, I started to add some harmonized guitar fills that worked really well. I’m very pleased with the results on those. They added another layer to the song.

The guitar solo is 16 measures, which is quite a bit for me. I pieced together something that I felt worked really well though. The solo took me quite a while. It wasn’t so much playing it as it was coming up with the parts that worked best and then quickly putting them down. I layered a lot of other little guitar parts over stuff where it fit, most noticeably over the bridge which was another bit that I felt worked really well.

This kind of song is especially fun to sing. You can yell a bit and it’s OK. I didn’t pay too much attention to the way I was singing. I just did what felt right and it seemed to work well. The one thing I pre-planned vocally was the little a cappella breakdown with the hand-claps toward the end. That was something that came to me early on when I was writing the song and I wanted to make sure it sounded good. When it was done, I walked away for a while so I could give it a fresh listen and when I played it back later it sounded great. I was actually surprised I pulled those harmonies off. My approach to harmonies and backing vocals is so laid back that I never know what I’m going to do until I do it. This usually gives me mixed results but in this case, I just got lucky and nailed the parts quickly.

Many protest songs are folksy and acoustic with lots of meaningful lyrics and are designed to make you think. This one’s energetic, sloppy, and pretty angry but somehow maintains an air of guitar-in-your-face fun. Protest songs don’t need to be dreary.

I’m really proud of this song and it’s one of my favorites to play.

The Lyrics

Wake up, put on your coat and your hate
The train’s moving backward – you don’t wanna be late
Road full of rage and a heart made of stone
Stupid people make you wanna go it alone

Countries of the word all acting like babies
All the pointing of the fingers and the drama and the hating
Every fist clenched tight raised high in the air
Now we can’t come together when there’s nobody there

The world’s gone crazy, it’s a hell of a time
Nothing’s making sense and nobody knows why
There’s only one thing I’m asking you girl
Will we all be friends at the end of the world?

Don’t believe in politicians they’re not working for you
They’re just thinking about elections, nothing they say is true
From the crib to the dirt you’ll find the sky ain’t so blue
It’s one hell of a quandary, I don’t know what to do

The world’s gone crazy, it’s a hell of a time
Nothing’s making sense and nobody knows why
There’s only one thing I’m asking you girl
Will we all be friends at the end of the world?

The hate is too much
Makes you wanna give up
Somebody please tell me why
I’m seeing bombs in the sky

Power makes you lazy, yeah it goes to your head
Anybody tries to save us, they’ll soon end up dead
How can we get it right when we can’t get along
Everybody like the singer but they can’t stand the song

The world’s gone crazy, it’s a hell of a time
Nothing’s making sense and nobody knows why
There’s only one thing I’m asking you girl
Will we all be friends at the end of the world?

Lou's News / Music

August 17, 2010

Every Song Tells A Story: One Step Closer

The Story

“One Step Closer” is another one of those songs that was written back in the mid-1990’s. I don’t remember much about where it came from but I do remember it was a quick write that all stemmed from one lyric: “One step closer to what love can be.” The phrase popped into my head and I just kept going with it, creating a little love story.

I presented it to the band I was in at the time but it never really made it past me playing it at rehearsal one night. It was unfinished, I was the drummer, and I was needed on the drums. They told me to bring back a demo. While making that demo at home, the band dissolved so I just kept it around.

The story of the song is not all that complicated. For the most part, it’s a generic love song performed in an upbeat, folky, acoustic way. It’s about getting to know someone, falling in love, and wanting to be with that person until the end. It’s about a growing relationship and what that might feel like.

Let’s face it. It’s so hard to find someone with half a brain out there. The message here is that when you find someone good, hold on tight and just enjoy the ride. It might not be a perfect ride, but with a little time and some hard work, you can make it.

Another point I was trying to make here was that love isn’t something you get to the end of, like a race. You can always get one step closer to what you think love can be. Love can always get better.

Some of the lyrics are a little hokey but I was in my early days of songwriting and sometimes you go through those phases early on where you just want to make the rhymes work. You say you’ll change it later but in the end, it works just fine so you leave it alone.

The Recording

As I said, this song is an old one so there are a few older recordings sitting around in my house somewhere. The first time I recorded it was at home, playing all the instruments myself. Around that time, I played a few acoustic gigs and featured this song. I wanted to have a better recording of it, so I went into a friend’s basement studio and we recorded it again with me playing all the instruments except for the guitar solo, which my friend performed. Then the song sat in waiting for something like 15 years.

When it came time for me to start recording again, I had a choice to make. I could seek out the original demos and just use them or I could re-record this song again. It’s not a hard song to play, so I opted to just play it again on drums and build on that.

So one day while I was set up for drum recording, I laid down the track from memory on drums. Within a week or so, I had finished re-recording the song. I made a few changes because even though the song was written and had existed in another form, I was approaching it as a new song. I wanted it to sound the same, but different.

One unintentional change I made was the omission of a short breakdown toward the end. I simply forgot about it when I was recording the drum track. I admit, I do miss it when I listen to the song now so I’ll probably add it in when I play it live.

I made some subtle changes to the bass line which I feel were improvements. They’re not all that noticeable but they’re there and they sound nice. The two acoustic parts are all pretty much verbatim. I’m quite happy with the guitar solo also. I got some really nice tone out of the Telecaster.

Vocally, there were a few small changes. Now, I know I mentioned that I had these songs around a while and in various forms but when I was re-recording them, I didn’t have all the lyrics or the old tapes with me. I had to try and remember the lyrics. I recalled most of them pretty quickly except for the second half of the last verse. I could not, for the life of me, remember those words, so I wrote some new ones which are actually better than the original ones.

Of course, I eventually found the lyrics. The original lines were, “Step by step we climbed that ladder of love, and girl you’ve given me more than I could ever dream of.” Pretty hokey, I know. I replaced those lines with, “We’ll brave the storms and we’ll walk the miles, and the smile on your face will make it worthwhile.” Still a little hokey but definitely better. 🙂

I tried to add a little vocal harmony here and there. You’ll hear some in the bridge and during the ending. They’re not bad but I think we’ll do something better when we play it live.

One other change I added was some organ. There are no keys in the original versions of that song. I added some organ to the pre-chorus parts and at the end. They’re back in the mix but help fill out the sound a bit.

So, on the whole, it was a joy to re-record. It’s a fun little song and one of the few that I feel comfortable just sitting home and strumming on an acoustic without accompaniment. It’s pretty basic but it works for me.

The Lyrics

In this crazy old world where love can rule your life
You gotta search the world over for someone who’s right
Cuz when you find somebody who will love you so
It’s the greatest feeling you will ever know

So if I seem to like you and you seem to like me
Then we’ll be one step closer to what love can be
One step closer to what love can be

With every day that goes by I seem to like you more
Just a little bit better than the day before
When we’re together girl there is no past
It’s the only way to make this friendship last

And if it feels a little strange then that’s ok with me
Cuz we’ll be one step closer to what love can be
One step closer to what love can be

Driving down that lonely road
Where destiny controls your soul
It can’t be wrong if it feels this right
Stay with me baby – let’s run away tonight

And now we’re happy together, yes I knew we’d be
Words will never explain just what you do to me
We’ll brave the storm and we’ll walk the miles
And the smile on your face will make it worthwhile

And when youth fades away and there’s just you and me
Then we’ll be one step closer to what love can be
One step closer to what love can be

Lou's News / Music

July 21, 2010

New Song: My Own Private Babylon

The next song in the Workin’ Progress release schedule is called “My Own Private Babylon”.

I guess you could say it’s written from the perspective of a fading rock star or other celebrity.

I have more songs in the works so stay tuned, but for now enjoy the new song and the many others you can hear on the site.
Thanks for visiting and listening!

Lou's News / Music

July 13, 2010

Every Song Tells A Story: Hello Blue Sky

The Story

Genre-smashing is something I like to do. I don’t like being put into a box. I like many styles of music. I like diversity. When writing a song, this concept is always floating around in the back of my mind. I try not to sit down and say, “I’m going to write a ________ song today.” That usually leads me nowhere and what does come out of me sounds very forced. When I “genre-smash” it has to come naturally. This song is a good example of how that can happen.

“Hello Blue Sky” was inspired by positivity, plain and simple. I was in a good mood after being in a bad one the day before and wanted to reflect that positive vibe by mirroring it in a song. Many positive images started to dance around in my head as I started getting my thoughts together but the whole notion of a clear blue sky took over. There’s nothing like a good sleep and a brand new day to get you motivated sometimes. I liked the idea and ran with it.

I suppose this is when the genre-smashing thing reared its head. Lyrics started to flow almost immediately, starting with the title and chorus. As soon as that first group of words stuck, I heard the song in my head. It sounded a lot like a 1960’s song by someone like Herman’s Hermits (“I’m Into Something Good”) or maybe The Turtles (“Happy Together”) or something like that. It was most definitely sounding a lot like The Beatles (“Getting Better”) in my head, though, and so that took precedence. I was writing some heavier guitar rock around this time so it was a nice change of direction.

The lyrics came quite quickly after that and I was able to hear the whole song in my head, pretty much. They’re simple and don’t say much more than, “Hey, yesterday sucked but now it’s gone. Make the most of today.” I also employed a little “days of the week” nonsense in there. As the song progresses, so do the days of the week.

There’s not much else to the story, really. It’s one of those songs that just came out of nowhere after the words “hello blue sky” popped into my head. It’s not about a particular person, place or thing. It’s just about not letting things get you down. Is it the antithesis to Pink Floyd’s “Goodbye Blue Sky”? Maybe it is! The thought had crossed my mind, but only after I wrote it.

The Recording

As I often do, I recorded the drum track for this song first. By this time, I was wholly aware of the Beatles/McCartney influence and I knew what I wanted it to sound like. I did my best Ringo Starr imitation. There was little trouble.

So I then went through that little process I find myself going through at this stage of recording where I sing the notes out loud and try to match them on the instrument to see if they sound good. I had already worked out that the opening “hits” on guitar would consist of a chord up the neck somewhere, very similar to The Beatles’ “Getting Better” as I mentioned. Everything in the opening and chorus parts is fairly staccato.

Bass is always fun for me, especially right after I record a drum track. I don’t give the key of a song much thought until this point. When you record drums, you’re not really committed to a key yet. Once that bass is laid down, however, you’re all in unless you decide you want to re-record the whole song in another key. I’m referring to live bass and not taking into account all the ways you can do these things technologically. I’m a recording simpleton that way.

So, like I said, bass is really important to me while recording. It may sound strange but sometimes, with the way I write songs, this is where a lot of the “incidental” writing happens. By this, I mean I may have the song in my head but I may also be missing bits and pieces, connecting parts, or even entire bridges. I’ll say to myself, “I’ll fill in the blanks later on.” Later on usually ends up being while I’m recording bass. This song was no different.

As you can hear, the beginning is just those staccato hits but the real change is when the verse kicks in. Now we’re doing a walking, bluesy sort of thing that has a little walk down at the end (D-C-B-A) which leads nicely back down to the G, which ended up being the key. I found the key by simply trying different chord variations up the neck until I found something I liked.

The bridge was actually created during recording of both the drum and bass tracks. The drums provided the framework and the bass provided the notes. I had no lyrics for a bridge. Nothing came to me that I thought sounded good. I toyed with putting AAAHHHH’s in there or something but in the end, I kept it simple with some horn builds. In essence, I just reversed the little walk-down from the end of the verses. I slowed it down a little and used the horns to build it up a bit. It reminds me of the little pre-chorus in the song “Heat Wave” from Martha Reeves and the Vandellas: simple, yet effective.

A little electric piano helped fill out the sound nicely. I didn’t want to over-do things too much. Sometimes too much layering of instruments can muddle the sound (especially if they’re all playing the same thing). After keys, I found a nice guitar sound with some vibrato that sounded a little 60’s to me and used that for a guitar solo that basically just repeats the verse melody and is harmonized on the second pass.

The builds at the end are just horn hits following the thumping quarter notes. I would just add more notes (lower or higher) to the hits as the build progressed. The vocal “hellos” and “yeah yeahs” assisted, as did completing the “days of the week” thing.

It was an easy one to record. I enjoy the positive vibe.

The Lyrics

Hello blue sky
Fresh start, another try
Maybe I can get it right today

Hello big sun
Telling me the day’s begun
Monday’s gone and Tuesday’s looking great

Went to bed with a tear in my eye and a sandbag on my heart
Woke up this morning and I’m ready to make a new start

Hello blue sky
Fresh start, another try
Maybe I can get it right today

Hello big sun
Telling me the day’s begun
Tuesday’s gone and Wednesday’s looking great

My sister told me that her man done her wrong and she can’t get no relief
I told her, “Baby – you just need a good night’s sleep.” (then you’ll say…)

Hello blue sky
Fresh start, another try
Maybe I can get it right today

Hello big sun
Telling me the day’s begun
Wednesday’s gone and Thursday’s looking great

Hello blue sky
Fresh start, another try
Maybe I can get it right today

Hello big sun
Telling me the day’s begun
Thursday’s gone and Friday’s looking great

Hello Hello Hello Hello
Friday’s gone and Saturday’s looking great
Yea yea
Saturday’s gone and Sunday’s looking great
Yea yea yea yea yea yea
Yea yea yea

Lou's News / Music

April 23, 2010

Every Song Tells A Story: Corporate Robot

The Story

I enjoy humor in music. There are times to be cerebral and there are times to be just plain funny. I like making people laugh with a goofy lyric or idea. This song was meant to be humorous, of course, but underneath it all lies a thinly veiled satirical commentary on corporate America.

The underlying theme in “Corporate Robot” is of conflict. I’ve been working in corporate America now for a long time but I’m not a fan of the corporate mentality that you find in some places. I’ve worked for many companies; some of them big giants and some smaller. In each, I’ve found a different “company culture” statement (written behind closed doors in some HR department) which in most cases totally contradicts what goes on in the hallways and at the water coolers.

Some companies I’ve worked for were so rigid and quiet that there was hardly any communication at all except via computer or at meetings. In other places, there were definitely cliques of people and if you were not in that group, you lost out. At some jobs you didn’t dare talk to someone who had an office unless they came to speak to you (which was rare). At other jobs, the top dogs were the friendliest people, while the mid-level managers were micromanaging, power hungry ego maniacs who basically did nothing all day, much like Lumbergh from Office Space.

In fact, Mike Judge hit the nail so hard on the head with that film that it’s a wonder that film didn’t change the company culture of corporate America as a whole. Like a wake-up call. But I digress.

I’ve also had some good experiences in corporate America but to be honest, it’s just not a fun place. Depending on where you are, you have to basically sit around for a year or two and just observe people before you know who you can talk to and who you can’t. There are walls everywhere.

There’s also this false sense of what they call “professionalism” which apparently means you can’t be human. Everything has to be sterile and controlled. Mechanized. By the book. Robotic.

So after a few years out there, I realized that I don’t really work with people, for the most part. I work with robots. Corporate Robots. At times, I’d notice that as you went up the ladder, this applied more and more. It seems that folks got phonier the higher they climbed the company ladder. They became more clueless and detached somehow, like celebrities who have lived so long in their little bubbles that they can’t be real people anymore when they go out into crowds. They have an alternate sense of reality and can’t adapt.

Now, I’ll admit that the place I’m at now is not really like this. There are definitely walls and some rigid people but for the most part everyone’s cool, all the way up the ladder. The project I’m working on, actually, is going to try to break down some of those walls. So that makes me excited.

Still, all these years in corporate America (especially jobs I had before this one) have affected me and my thinking. I’ve seen some strange stuff and some really odd behavior from people who were paid very well and claimed to be “professionals”.

So that’s basically what this song is about. It’s about having to pay the bills and being stuck in corporate America doing so. Let’s face it. We all have dream jobs and for a high percentage of us, what we’re currently doing is not what we’d like to be doing. I’d sure like to be able to make music all day long, whether it be scoring films, making records, writing for other people, and so on. That’s just not going to happen for me at this point (without being able to dedicate 100% of my time to it), so here I am doing web design and managing portals. It’s decent work but not as fun as playing guitar. Hence the lyric, “I’m stuck in this world.”

The song is also about the creepy people you sometimes see in the hallways that pretend not to see you, the bosses who can never leave their work at the office and enjoy life, and the feeling like you’re slowly becoming one of these people; part of the machine.

Again, it’s meant to be humorous and I got a little serious while writing this. It’s not that I’m feeling all of this at the moment. I actually just liked the term “Corporate Robot” (I had been using it for years) and the rest of the song just sort of flowed from there. Maybe I was having a bad day at work. Who knows.

I tried to throw in some “corporate speak”, as it’s called. Offices have this strange little bit of vernacular that they like to make use of. Phrases like “low hanging fruit” (the goals easiest to achieve in a shorter time) are heard regularly. Of course, I had to throw a Starbucks reference in there. Corporate America basically keeps that place in business and Starbucks itself is pretty much the IBM of coffee.

The bits about the admins and conference rooms are all based on real events that got stuck in my head. People will walk past you in the office, look you in the eye, and not acknowledge you. It’s like they have to have a reason to say hello. Usually that reason is that they need something from you. I could go on all day.

Sometimes you just have to laugh. Or write a song.

The Recording

“Corporate Robot” was actually a fun song to record. I knew from the start that I did not want cymbals on it, outside of hi-hat. I wanted it to be stiff and robotic but I did not want to use a sample of myself or a loop. The song is more about the conflict and trying not to become a robot than about the existing robots themselves. So I wanted the drum track to be stiff and robotic but still somewhat human. Besides, I’m not really that into drum loops. I’d rather just play a drum track than sit there and edit fills for days.

I recorded the drum track, fighting the urge to hit the crashes on the one or wherever my gut would tell me to. I already had the beat in my head so it was easy to bang it out. I just sang along to myself in my head to keep track of where I was. I had a guide chart on a stand to help me.

I added the bass shortly after, which I also had in my head. I wanted the bass to drive the song because I knew there wasn’t going to be much guitar on it. I wanted a funky guitar chord that I would bang on the two with a little variation here and there. I worked out some chord that sounded right and fired up the tele with a nice clean sound. Before I knew it, the basic tracks were done.

It felt like it needed something else, though. Enter the Rhodes. I had purchased a used 1970’s Fender Rhodes some time in the early 1990’s and had been lugging this thing from home to home for years. If you’ve ever seen one of these beautiful monsters, you know they’re big and heavy. I even had a huge road case with wheels for it. Well, at that point in time I had been trying to sell it and had it set up to take a few pictures. It was almost as if it were saying to me, “Hey, I know you don’t want me any more but why not use me one last time?”

So I plugged the thing directly into my Mac and it sounded beautiful. I had fun coming up with some little parts for the song. The bridge is just straight chords. The little solo piece after that really added some life to the song, but not too much life. I even harmonized it a little for fun. Then there’s a different section for the outro based off some E chord. It all just fell together.

Of course, a few days later the Rhodes and the road case were sold and shipped off to Romania. Wild! I used most of the money to pay off some of the Mac and with the rest I picked up a midi controller so I could add things like pianos, horns and strings to anything I wanted to record. One door closes, another opens.

When it came to vocals, I had two ways I could go. I could have sung it normally or robotic. I opted for the latter but I had this issue where I wasn’t sure if people would get the idea. I knew it would sound very “monotonic” and I had hoped that people would know this was on purpose. I didn’t want people to hear it and think, “Does he really sing that poorly?”

So after a good 30 seconds of deliberation (I don’t like wasting time with decisions like that), I just went and sang it like a robot. I even added a little deep robot backing vocal here and there. Tons of fun, really.

“Where’s the plug? Come on pull it,” came out of my subconscious while I was ad-libbing at the end, but I guess it really does sum things up in a way. Unplug the robot. Be human.

Lyrics

Don’t wanna be no corporate robot
Don’t wanna hear about low hanging fruit
Don’t wanna kiss up to a bitchy admin
So I can get the better conference room

Walk past you in the hallway
Look you right in the eye
You look anywhere but my way
Would it kill you to say HI?

Corporate Robot – you’re lifeless and cold
Corporate Robot – you do what you’re told
Corporate Robot – you live by the code
Corporate Robot – it’s old old old

Every day that I’m here
I feel a piece of me slipping away
Replaced by wires and machinery
Transformation is taking place

When you go home to your dependents
Do you know how to be human at all
Do you forget you’re not in the office
Schedule some kid-time to throw around a ball

Got a meeting
Got a voice mail
Got a budget to pass
Got a new hire
Got a new tie
Got a stick up my ass

Got no time
Got no humor
Got no changing moods
Got no patience
Got no guts
Got no idea what I do

The corporate robots line up every day
They get their Starbucks and they pay pay pay
Corporate robots talk in dull corporate speak
Corporate robots think they’re smarter than me

There’s no humanity
There’s no reality
It’s like a B-Movie
It’s killing me

I’m stuck in this world
Gotta find me a corporate girl
Where’s the plug?
Come on pull it