Get all 12 MX-80 SOUND releases available on Bandcamp and save 40%.
Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Better Than Life, Das Love Boat: Instrumentals 1975 - 1990, Hougher House, So Funny, We're An American Band, I've Seen Enough, Existential Lover, Crowd Control, and 4 more.
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WHEN TULLY FLEW THE COOP (Conundrum)
I was a humble bumble bee
Until a gypsy moth put a spell on me
I lost my bumble and I lost my buzz
No sense crying over what was
I never knew the reason why
(Maybe she mistook me for a Spanish fly)
But It couldn't have happened to a nicer guy
No lie
Everything changed
when Tully flew the coop
Crocodile tears fell in your soup
An empty cage set the stage
for a tragedy of ominous proportions
The bird had flown; of thee I sing
so, sue me; I can’t remember every little thing
When Tully flew the coop
That bird was gone
I was a humble bumble bee
Who used to watch HBO for free
Each night I slept in a donkey's ear
Imagine waking up in cashmere
But an empty cage, a sudden noise
Brought on catastrophe
That bird was gone on a prayer and a wing
so, sue me; I can’t remember every little thing
When Tully flew the coop
That bird was gone
I’ve seen the future And it’s not much fun
But if you’re going, can I be your plus-one
Sitting on a train I can’t explain
Why I keep saying your name (I guess I miss you)
The humble bumblebee; the empty cage
Reliving that catastrophe, that tragedy
The bird had flown; of thee, I sing
so, sue me; I can’t remember every little thing
When Tully flew the coop
That bird was gone
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2. |
All For You (Brutus)
02:53
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ALL FOR YOU (Brutus)
I fought convicts in Sanibel
Battled gators back at the motel
Got sucker-punched at Carvel
By a guy who’ll never get in a good school
Climbed mountains of cheese
Saw the forest from the trees
Witnessed floods and drought
Suffered kidney stones and gout
Shoplifted a TV from Macy’s
Took a briefcase from Stacey’s
Stole vitamins from the Holy Ghosters,
Lived long enough to see orange toasters
I never healed my broken bones
Locked in a closet with The Rolling Stones
Never cared for Brian Jones
Crawled through deserts of garlic salt
It’s not your fault
I nodded out in a doorway
Sold knives from Norway
Jetted down a runway
The wrong way
I ran with the bulls on Zoom
Bought a tomb on time
Took a meeting with Yahweh
I did it my way
Lost a poker game on purpose
Just to get out of the circus
Backstage on a Kratom OD
(Have to admit that the joke’s on me)
Danced with a dragon in Slippytown
This elevator’s still going down
Nearly lost it all in Northern Cali
Hallucinated on the LIE in Queens
I don’t know what that means
But I did it all for you.
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3. |
Never Too Late (Crusade)
04:21
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NEVER TOO LATE (Crusade)
Never Too Late is a forgettable film from the 1960s, except I won't ever forget it because I saw it 31 times. Back then, I worked at the Levittown Theater, and for several months, Never Too Late was at the bottom of the double-feature bill.
I was a bored teenage usher and wanted to see whether I could memorize a whole movie.
PS - I couldn’t, though I did memorize the forgettable theme song.
It’s never too late for rainbows to shine
For whispering violins and bubbles in the wine
Never Too Late is a tired farce about a middle-aged woman (Maureen O'Sullivan) who becomes pregnant, to the chagrin of her domineering husband and clueless in-laws. Vic Damone sang the theme song,
It’s never too late to ring like a bell
To steal away somewhere and catch a carousel
Never Too Late advocates overpopulation, male dominance, double-entendres, and double-takes.
I won't forget this forgettable film (and its forgettable theme song), But once l’m gone it will be forgotten along with the Levittown Theater and the bicycle I rode to work. Everything is so forgettable.
It's too late for Maureen O'Sullivan, mother of Mia Farrow). And it's too late for Jane Wyatt, Paul Ford Lloyd Nolan, Vic Damone, and Jim Hutton, whose son Tim appears briefly in Never Too Late . And It’s too late for octogenarian Republican Connie Stevens. One day, she'll be gone and forgotten, too. It's never too late to be forgotten.
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4. |
Off Kilter
02:18
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5. |
Sterling Hayden (Mental)
02:07
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6. |
Diabolique (Scarecrow)
02:23
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DIABOLIQUE (Scarecrow)
I don't remember how old I was when my father took me to see Diabolique. I know I was old enough to read subtitles but not old enough to fully separate movie reality from real reality. The film was about a cruel French schoolmaster whose wife and mistress conspire to murder him in a bathtub. But then the schoolmaster's corpse disappears and eventually reappears in another bathtub sequence, and this one was so frightening that Alfred Hitchcock copied it for Psycho. I tried to be cool in the movie theater like my dad, but I couldn't take it, and I got out of my seat and ran to the lobby.
My father came out looking for me, and I was kind of embarrassed but my father was nothing but compassionate. I loved him for that. We just walked back in the theater and finished watching the film.
I was 26 when I watched Brian DePalma's Sisters at the Von Lee Theater in Bloomington. I went with Bruce and Dale, my new bandmates in MX-80, and with them was the gal from Discount Records, my secret crush. I hit the jackpot when she took the seat next to me.
The movie starred Margot Kidder as a Siamese twin who has been surgically separated. There's a frightening scene where Margot Kidder stabs her birthday cake. The sequence had a visceral effect making me sweaty and nauseous and wishing I hadn't smoked hash, I thought I would puke. The gal from Discount Records noticed my discomfort, and she walked me out to the lobby and got me a wet paper towel for my face. She was so compassionate. I loved her for that. And I still do.
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7. |
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SNOWING IN AMSTERDAM (Pink Corduroy)
When she starts to daydream
Her mind turns to the dead
Go back to bed instead
She wants something
But doesn’t know what it is
I see your long hair flowing
And It’s snowing in Amsterdam
Cake and sugar,
Eyes like two sad pills
She sees in muted colors
Diluted by the years
She looks into her gilded mirror
It’s dimmer by the day
I see her long hair flowing
And It’s snowing in Amsterdam
There’s a place in the ocean
Where my father’s shoes lay
Malevolent tides
No warning sign
His judgment day
And while his life was slowing
It was snowing in Amsterdam
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8. |
Tilt-A-Whirl
03:06
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9. |
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MY SHIRT HATES ME (Jaunty)
My shirt hates me
The buttons taunt me
The sleeves avoid me
We used to embrace
Now all we do is fight
My shirt hates me
That’s all right
My pants mock me
Stumbling on the carpet l
One leg in one leg out
We used to be so close
Now I hear laughter down below
My pants don’t like me at all
My Nikes despise me
Trip stumble and fall
We used to be a team
Now the laces scream, “Just do it”
Just do it
just do it
My silverware detests me
spoons spill soup,
knives are disloyal
My phone loathes me
It hates my touch
My bike tried to kill me
I’m sure it’ll deny it (that’s how it rolls)
The front door abhors me
It blocks my key
The stairs hate my guts
The couch holds me down
My stuff’s put a contract out on me
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10. |
Gloria (Courage)
02:39
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GLORIA (Courage)
There was a time when I wanted to be a man.
It lasted for quite a while.
I wanted to be a man like James Coburn in The Magnificent Seven or Steve McQueen in The Great Escape or Jean-Paul Belmondo in That Man From Rio, or Marcello Mastroianni in la Dolce Vita or Jack Nicholson in Five Easy Pieces or Warren Beatty in Mickey One. Some kind of cool, tough, man of action figure, a little bit antihero and a little bit existential.
Then I saw a movie, and I realized that the man I wanted to be was a woman, and her name was Gloria.
Gloria is a movie starring Gena Rowlands as a really tough lady who’s trying to save Phil, a seven-year-old boy wanted by the mob
Before Phil’s family is killed gangland-style
His dad’s last words to him are: "Be a man.”
And that becomes Phil’s quest
But it’s a challenge to be a man when you’re seven years old.
And gangsters are gunning for you
And you’re being bossed around by Gena Rowlands
You are not the man Phil screams at Gloria
I am the man
I do everything I can
But Phil is wrong
Gloria is the man
And it’s not because
Gloria is really tough and good with guns
And it’s not because nothing frightens her
Not even nightmares
And it’s not because she faces down gangsters, doesn't take shit from anyone, and knows how to haił a cab.
No, Gloria is the man because šhe sacrifices êverything
To šave one life
Àńd Whoever saves a single life saves the whole world
And that’s what it means to be a man
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11. |
Emily (Buoyant)
03:57
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EMILY (Bouyant)
I saw a movie called “The Awakening of Emily”
Or maybe it was just called “Emily”
Well, I saw some of the movie, not all of it.
I rented the videotape, watched the first 10 minutes,
And fast forwarded through the rest,
Stopping only to watch the shower sequence
I was supposed to return Emily to the video store
By seven pm the next day
But I forgot all about it until about six o’clock
Back then in San Francisco video rental shops were
Few and far between
So, I had to ride my bike from the Outer Sunset District
To West Portal to National Video (I think it was National)
It was four miles with a 500 foot climb
And I could make it in 35 minutes
To energize my bike riding
I installed Walkman headphones in my bike helmet
And that night on the way to the video store. I blasted the Ramones’s Rocket to Russia
(or was it Road to Ruin?)
It was November, foggy and dark
As I pedaled madly down the wide alphabetized avenues.
Judah, Kirkham, Lawton, Moraga, Noriega, Ortega,
Pacheco Quintara, Rivera, Santiago, Taraval, Ulloa, Vicente, Wawona
Flying by the blocky 2-story homes with their gated tunnels
The black Pacific Ocean to my right
At that point in my life,
I had stopped giving the finger to bad drivers
So when somebody in a Bonneville
Almost clipped me turning right on Noriega
I didn’t yell or raise my hand in a one-finger salute
Ditto for the L-Taraval streetcar driver
Who almost flattened me near the Ocean Park Motel
But once I passed the Doggie DIner
It was smooth sailing
I remember flying up Ocean Avenue
Despite the 400-foot incline
And arriving at National Video with minutes to spare
Except there was a problem
Emily was gone
Somewhere along the way
Probably when I hit the Taraval streetcar tracks
Emily had slipped out of the bungee cord on the
Back of my bike
I didn’t hear it
Because I was blasting Ramones
The manager at National video
Broke it to me. The retail price for Emily was $80.
That’s $230 in today’s money
Yeah, that’s what it cost to buy videos back then.
I pedaled home slowly checking and
Double-checking my route
But no luck
Why had I even rented Emily?
Because the movie featured the actress
Koo Stark who was in a hot and heavy relationship
With Prince Andrew
And she’d been on the cover of the National Enquirer?
40 years later, when I see pictures of Prince Andrew,
I remember that foggy November night and those wide streets and
I remember a time when I could race my bike up Ocean Avenue
And I remember the black Pacific
And the L-Taraval streetcar
And I remember the night that Emily awakened
and made her escape
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12. |
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LITTLE MURDERS (Innocence)
Little Murders is a black comedy built upon the premise that nothing is funnier than unhappiness. I saw it in 1971 with Carl van Brunt , my sister’s boyfriend. Before we went to the movies, we got seriously stoned at his uptown apartment. When we stumbled onto the subway, I tripped over my untied Converse.
As I bent down and fumbled with the laces, a guy shouted, “I know what you up to” and “I’m gonna kick your ass.” He was furious and his girlfriend gave me the evil eye.
Apparently, the guy thought I was one of those pervs who peeked at ladies’ underwear while pretending to tie his shoes.
Carl hustled me off the train. I was lucky the guy hadn’t popped me. This was New York City in 1971 — homicides were up 30% — and everyone was packing.
The incident was a perfect segue way into Little Murders, which is the story of Alfred, a self-proclaimed apathist — that’s an apathetic atheist. Alfred shuns relationships, hates families, avoids emotions, doesn’t defend himself when attacked, and makes his living selling photographs of excrement. He tells this to Patsy, a woman who befriends him.
Patsy convinces Alfred to marry hoping it will end his apathy and at the unhinged wedding party, the minister warns the couple that of the 200 marriages he has performed, all but seven have failed. So the odds are not good. He tells them. [“We don’t like to admit it, especially at the wedding ceremony but it’s in the back of all our minds, isn’t it?” “How long will it last?”]
The marriage doesn’t last long because Patsy is killed by random gun violence, an accepted price of life in the dystopian New York City in which the movie exists. In a dream-like stupor, Alfred buys several guns and with Patsy’s brother and father, he finds himself finally happy with his finger on the trigger, randomly picking off pedestrians on the street below.
On the subway back to Carl’s apartment I remembered the scene where Alfred, in a shell-shocked haze, wanders subway cars blood-spattered and unnoticed. I remembered the incident tying my shoelaces earlier in the day and it felt as if I was slipping between movie reality and real reality. Except in movie reality anguish absurdity and despair could be hilarious. Laugh and the world laughs with you. Cry and the world laughs harder.
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13. |
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GONE FISHING (Disappointment)
Uncle Ed is dead
And he’s not the only one
Who’s not coming back
There’s no second act
Just a long intermission
And a sign in the window: Gone fishing
I watched him put on his shroud
I watched him say goodbye to the crowd
Uncle Ed is gone
He fantasized about my mom
He hit on my wife
At our wedding reception
He was an expert on himself
A brilliant mind but …
On the path to eternity, he was once far ahead of me.
Now, he’s gone and left me next in line
Uncle Ed is dead
And some people might be glad
He was self-absorbed
An addict, an artifact, a performance artist
But he was on a mission
The sign’s in the window: Gone fishing
I watched him put on his shroud
I watched him say goodbye to the crowd
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MX-80 SOUND California
MX-80 SOUND (also known as MX-80) is an eclectic art-metal-rock band founded in 1974.
www.mx-80.com
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