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Live In Germany

by Don Neill

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1.
A New Star 04:21
Just one bell before the break of day / I took my watch on deck to earn my pay / I shook the sleep from my eyes /And took me a look at those south pacific skies / There was a star burning in the night / And it touched a place in me beyond my sight / It was more than just a sight to see / And I knew right then, this one burned for me // There's a new star born tonight / With a fire from the forges of heavenly light / There's a new star born tonight / And I finally get the feeling that I'm doing something right // From the deck of that ship I saw a warming line / To the east where the sun would bring a dawn so clear and fine / And I thought I heard the angels sing / From the top of the sky, morning bells did ring / So I reached on out to the night / Put that star in my pocket and held it tight / And the sun broke that morning line / And shattered the night into shards so fine // There's a new star born tonight / With a fire from the forges of heavenly light / There's a new star born tonight / And I finally get the feeling that I'm doing something right // The day you left I heard the call / I didn’t want to fight this time // I've been on the run enough to know / When the gate is open, you don't move slow / Your wake in the water just fades away / It takes conviction to remember the way / But the best laid courses go astray / From the deepest night to the break of day / With a star in your pocket and a warming line / You reach on out, say this one's mine.
2.
Melting Away 03:50
We both suffer / From broken hearts / Pain that seems here to stay / Gentle night breeze / The jeweled sky / Help to forget / Lonely evenings / And empty rooms / Feel the past fade away / With you near me / Heart-pain and fear / They just start // Melting away / Melting away / And my heart overflows / 'Till the pain finally goes away // Solo // Dream time flowing / Can this be love? / Let the past fade away / Come be near me / Eternity's here / Loneliness will be // Melting away / Melting away / And my heart overflows / 'Till the pain finally goes / It's just melting away / Melting away / And my heart overflows / 'Till the pain finally goes / And my heart overflows / 'Till the pain finally goes away.
3.
Summer silence descends like the clouds in my head to borrow you / For conversations about the digging of a grave / I don’t want your soul; I just want your arms // Down that road we kick the stones and fill the streams with laughing tears / A time of innocence, days of rain and nights of thirst / Drinking too deep we cannot bear to swallow // I hold your hand in deafening silence / And summer rain begins to fall / I'll say goodbye and I can’t even tell you why // Souls tripping over we break and repair the damage / The little pieces that never seem to fit so well again / The light shines through the cracks where they are missing // So here I am in plainclothes hidden and naked / Behind the innocence of days in the wasteland of the heart / You play the part, but let me wear the makeup // I hold your hand in deafening silence / And summer rain begins to fall / You'll say goodbye and I can’t even tell you why // Summer sadness descends like the clouds in my head to borrow you / For times of ritual without the digging of the grave / I don’t want your soul; I just need your arms / As night descends wrapped in summer silence // I hold your hand in deafening silence / And summer rain begins to fall / We'll say goodbye and I can’t even tell you why.
4.
It's so easy to cheat on yourself / It's so easy 'cause no one can tell / It's a natural thing to want to please your lover / A sacrifice that you're hoping to cover / What you got, it always goes for the other, but I'm telling you / You've got to please yourself. // It's so easy to leave it for last / It's to easy letting time slip past / You tell yourself that you don't really need it / It's your heart and you've learned how to bleed it / It's that feeling of guilt, you really know how to feed it, but I'm telling you / You've got to please yourself. // It's so hard to risk the romance / It's so hard to take that chance / But you will lose yourself if you don't really mean it / It's your truth and there's no need to clean it. // It's so hard to let your guard down / It's so easy to play the clown / Once you've learned the skill of denying emotion / Just watch those wheels that you've started in motion / It's your lie and it's as big as the ocean, but I'm telling you / You've got to please yourself. // Solo // I know it's easy to cheat on yourself / I know it's easy 'cause I do it myself / It's the pain of the truth that I'm still concealing / That holds me down in this weaselly feeling / This puddle of guilt has been slowly congealing / You've been holding it back, but your heart is still reeling / It's a matter of fact, but it feels too revealing, but I'm telling you / You've got to please yourself.
5.
Heavy Load 04:07
Rusty sun descending / Paints the whole world red / Hundred miles from nowhere / With voices in my head // Drank the last good water / Forty miles ago / Can't hold out much longer / So I wanted you to know. // I still think about you / Of all the times to miss you / Down this desert road / I never found it easy / To bear this heavy load. // All the things you asked me / All the talking that you do // Stirring up those feelings / It leaves me so confused // Don't you know the danger / Can't you feel the pain? / Or are you an angel / Come to kiss me with your rain // But it never comes true / the rain will never reach me / Down this desert road / I never found it easy / To bear this heavy load. // Solo // You couldn't leave it alone / And now there's smoke and ashes / Down this desert road / I never found it easy / To bear my heavy load.
6.
I've lived in Chicago I've Lived in LA / I've lived in a small town or two / I've traveled forever since I was a child / And never quite ever touched down. // You saw me in Memphis, we laughed in the rain / You said we should meet at the mall / I stopped at the park at the center of town / As night pulled the autumn leaves down. // Moon in the branches / Stars in the air / I've squandered my chances / Of meeting you there. // My Father had demons that bit at his heels / And kept us from settling down / He never said why, just a look in the eye / And we'd pack up and get out of town. // I got so caught up in this life on the road / And collected these demons of mine / And garnered the truth of the wounds that are healed / By the bittersweet pill of goodbye. // Moon in the branches / Stars in the air / I've squandered by chances / Of meeting you there. // As God is my witness it's freedom's bold hand / That cast out the seeds of my life / And harvested memories shining and gold / That burn as the reaper grows old // Solo // I've lived in Las Vegas, I've lived in Des Moines / I've lived in a small town or two / I've traveled forever since I was a child / And never, quite ever touched down.
7.
Enrico and the boys are building deadly toys / And harvesting the apples of the sun / They split them open wide to find out what's inside / And in their dreams they're planting as they run // It's heavy water cold and secrets are untold / And dirty work that takes a steady hand / The field is never seen hidden like a dream / While need to know is carving up the land. // Edward, Arthur, John, turn and they have gone / Desperation calls them into place / For work without a name, they'll rearrange the game / And all become the man without a face. // Radiation burns and calls to take a turn / In service to the holy atom grail / Our best minds disappear behind a wall of fear / And learn to grab the dragon by the tail. // Solo // Your neutron firelight is burning up the night / A spark that once lit never deigns to die / The raven calls your name and then it spreads the fame / Growing like a mushroom in the sky // All those who yearn to know just how far it can go / Without the burden of a civil choice / Are gathering the tools to violate the rules / To steal the fire, then to give it voice. // Fat Man, Little Boy, Armageddon's toys, scientific sealing wax and string / The truth has broken down to seed the zero ground / With mushrooms in a poisoned fairy ring. // Radiation burns, will we ever learn / In service to the holy atom grail / Our future disappears behind a wall of fear / we've got much more than just a dragon's tail. // Enrico and the boys are building deadly toys and stealing poisoned apples from the sun.
8.
A bird-song walk through the trees / Clouds shimmer in blood of dying sun / Wind rustles the cactus flower / Waves lift you up in Neptune's hands // As time shines and fades the colors / Desert flowers bloom on ocean shores / Sunset dreaming paints the landscape / Woven in a private tapestry // The thread we sew binds all these things / The thread we sew binds all / The thread we sew binds all these things / Oh, to the patchwork of memory // Trade remembrance for the present / Send that postcard to yourself / Take collection in the shoe box / Make a stash underneath your bed // The thread we sew binds all these things / The thread we sew binds all / The thread we sew binds all these things / Oh, to the patchwork of memory / Oh, to the patchwork of memory // Pull them out, take off the rubber band / Show them to your friends / Shuffle them all and throw away the box / Let them glide across your floor // The thread we sew binds all these things / The thread we sew binds all / The thread we sew binds all these things / Oh, to the patchwork of memory / Oh, to the patchwork of memory / Oooh, memory.
9.
When is it going to happen to me? / When is my day due? / Why can't I feel the inspiration? / Why am I so blue? // If needing and wanting are so bad / Then how can it be true? / That regret about never wanting to live / Can steal your heart from you // I've been kicking around my life trying to lose the need / Then spending my blue and dreary evenings / Wondering where it leads / It takes me down that rocky road, the wanting and the need // I've never been so lost and weary / As I am today / But thinking I'll never reach the stars / Just won't stop me anymore // I've decided I want it all so badly now it all begins / My life never seemed so long and hard / And worth the struggling / It takes me down that rocky road, the wanting and the need // Sometimes you have to ask yourself, sometimes you have to bleed / It shakes your will to bear the load, to wake and feel your life explode / It takes you down that rocky road, the wanting and the need / The wanting and the need.
10.
Life 04:08
Life is the laughter of hello / It reaches out to me and then says ‘no’ / It calls me in the morning time / Then sends the evening like a joyful rhyme // Life is the dancing of my heart / It pulls together and then pulls apart / It turns my head around again / To face myself and what I’ve always been // If I go on discovering and from my past recovering / I’ll find the road I’m traveling has always been unraveling / It makes it hard to understand my life // Life is the lightning in the rain / It flashes truth so bright it feels like pain / I built a world to keep me dry / But now I’m longing for the open sky // Life is the garden of your love / Warmed from below so let it rain above / We plant the seeds that soon reveal / A loving harvest or a fallow field // If I go on discovering and from my past recovering / I’ll find the road I’m traveling has always been unraveling / If wishes will sustain in me the will to feel the pain in me / I will begin to understand my life // Life, teach me life / Life, let me know / Life, teach me life // Life is the whisper of goodbye / It gives us memories and then asks ‘why?’ / It paints in colors on my mind / A wistful beauty of the fading kind // Life is the sorrow of a song / We leave the saddest ones to say so long / It’s been so good to sing for you / I’ll miss your shining faces when I’m through // If I go on discovering and from my past recovering / I’ll find the road I’m traveling has always been unraveling / If wishes will sustain in me the will to feel the pain in me / If truth that strays too far from me yet still remains a part of me / If laughter in the pouring rain keeps washing out the deepest pain / I will begin to understand my life / And yes I start to understand my life / Oh, maybe I will start to understand my life.
11.
Down in the Islands is a life so nice, set up for forever in a paradise / If you looking for a place to put your worries on ice / I know a man, he say, "Hey! Captain Kirk will take you there" // Every day the sun rises hot and sitting off the reef is a perfect spot / To be grooving on the moment like it's all you got / Get to the dock and say, "Hey! Captain Kirk, take me there" // Come on silly child get your wetsuit wet / We will dive an afternoon that you won’t forget / We will see the fishes dancing through the coral yet / I know a man he say, "Hey! Captain Kirk will take you there" / He'll take you there // Down by the sea / you and me / time set free / you will see / He will take us there to paradise / To paradise // Back to the shore for some hammock time / Tip back some margaritas and a meal sublime / Watch the sunset settle in like a fine red wine / Now aren’t you glad you say, “Hey! Captain Kirk, take me there” // Stars go up in the perfect sky how many times the beauty make a grown man cry / Feel the heart begin a-jumping 'till it wants to fly / Down where the people say, "Hey! Captain Kirk will take you there” / He’ll take you there // Down by the sea / you and me / time set free / you will see / He will take us there to paradise / To paradise // Hey, Captain Kirk will take you there / I say hey Captain Kirk, take us there / He'll take you there / He'll take you there / Take us there.

about

Recorded live at Intermezzo in 2019. I must thank Sabine Kinder and C. J. Ueberall who's kind invitation provided a peak musical experience for me. This was my first GoH appearance and my first German con and in all my musical travels, I have never been so warmly received. The connection and love I felt with everyone there sustained me and reminded me why music is such a powerful force for good in our world. I must also thank the entire Kinder family who welcomed me into their home and showed me such a good time that I didn't want to leave!

This project would not have happened at all without the efforts of Steve Macdonald. I owe him a large debt of thanks for recording my concerts and for whipping them into shape (smoothing over some of my worst mistakes!) so we can present them here. I also want to thank Kirstin Tanger for the wonderful cover photo and design and also Andrea Weil for providing photos on my website of my Intermezzo time. I also want to thank Tom Jeffers who joined me on stage for a few tunes and for sharing this wonderful experience with me. Anytime I'm on stage with Tom, I know it will be fun and awesome!

I feel lucky that I had the wonderful memories of Intermezzo to sustain me through the pandemic. I hope that I can return to Germany someday soon and listen and play again with this wonderful community! Thanks to all the German filkers and listeners who impressed me with their kindness and their musical abilities!

These songs are a collection of my original songs written in collaboration with my songwriting partner Tony Ryan.

credits

released August 15, 2022

All songs are original by Don Neill / Tony Ryan. Tom Jeffers joined me on stage for a few numbers.
Live Sound and Recording: Rika Körte, Steve Macdonald
Mixing and Mastering by Steve Macdonald at Triskelion Productions
Produced by Steve Macdonald and Don Neill

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Don Neill Los Angeles, California

Don Neill is a Kalamazoo, Michigan native and has been playing the guitar since 1973. He loves all musical genres and has been in bands that play jazz, latin, progressive rock, and even punk. He started a small song garden in his twenties and has faithfully watered it over the decades until it has become a full-fledged weed patch full of songs from all walks of life. ... more

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