[Jandek] Ruins Lyric Corrections

[Danen D. Jobe]

Man, this album is really staying with me. I love the way he sings it - real confident but all over the place. And the playing is crazy, but again so assured. 

Anyhow, one thing with the vocals (from a transcriber's perspective) is that the way he sings/speaks/warbles/stammers/yells the lyrics tend to obscure the words more so than many of the recent Corwood albums. So here's a few corrections to the earlier entry. Worked well tonight to use those lyrics as a template to guide a new listening of the album. Wrote down the differences as I went along. Not too many corrections, most in the second and fifth songs (which also happen to have the wildest vocals and the fiercest lyrics). I'm confident that I got it all this time, but PLEASE, anyone else, take a listen with the lyrics and point out anything you think might be out of place. Here's an updated version (and thanks Seth for posting them so fast! I tried to keep it so you could easily copy and paste)  :

The Park

I want to make a park and live on it
I don’t know anyone in the city
That understands this heart like you do
I’m leaving it here
I’m going to walk away
But with the park and the dogs
The birds and the squirrels
The cats and the people go away
Because it’s my park
The land was just here
I took it and I made it a park
I like the trees
The green leaves
Alive
I’ll make some pathways
And put rocks all around
I don’t need a gymnasium
I’ll sit up straight and keep my mind on you
Came in and took control
You told me what to do
And that’s what it’s all about
I’m making the park
There’ll be lots of things to do out there
Hello
How are you
Fresh air and the dogs
And if there’s some new thing
We’ll check it out



Bluff Brink

The glass you carry under your coats
The hidden tools of your trade
Poison bottle that you hold
The days of time you spend in a trance
The way you know your life's in your hands
And you create all your disabilities
You feel good about your wasting away
And all the circles that you dance around
Your swirling, whirling, dizzy sick
And you don’t care about who’s around
Reality doesn’t enter your thoughts
You’re walking stupid and stumbling about
I’ve got to tell you that I really think
You’re on some kind of canyon bluff brink
Why don’t you jump and forget about it
So you don’t have to be around
The way the day just flutters by
You’re in a coma and the earth is the sky
Your left is right, and it’s all mixed up
And you keep playing that game all the time
I’ve come around and I see you this way
I’ll go away, I’ve just got to say
I’ve got my own tornado
And my own mountain
And I’ll swirl in a whirl and stare from the top
The world is big and the people so small
I can’t possibly care about it all

Completely Yours

Please don’t ignore me
I’m your very best friend
I’ll be here forever
You can count on that
You’ve got your damages
And I’ve got mine.
We’ve corrected the discrepencies
And we’re moving on
It’s accurate, the computation
One and one is two
I don’t need a calculator
I’ve got my mind plus you
You don’t incorporate how I was before
It doesn’t matter to you
And I forgot me anyway.
I just remembered
Your eyes and mouth and hands
And the way that you love me
I’m completely yours
This time I’m certain
I give up my life
I throw it to the universe,
Where you are tonight
I have restated my vows again to you
You’re all that I care about
Let the world go on its way
And when we close the day
And the sun goes down
I’ll be with you the night and forever long

Mysteries of Existence

I could reconcile my habits with you
You accepted all that I was
I can do all the things superlogical
I can focus my thoughts like a laser beam
But what is the objective
If I’m just defending myself
I have to be a mental dynamo
And weave a spell on myself
With your reconciliation I don’t need a defense
I can join the circles and triangles
I can be with crystal rainbows
Dancing the cross waltz
I’m happy with the blues and reds
The furniture and your clothes
A glint of the sun and the dark of the night
As I turn to the left and turn to the right
I don’t need a special challenge
The elemental things are just fine
And I’m going to the south and east
Or maybe up the northwest way
Surrounding the peripherie
With some different kind of menagerie
There’s no sense bumping at the wooden door
Brick wall, iron gate, river, grassy fields
Walking to and fro
Being here and there
Unfolding the mystery of existence

The Ruins of Adventure

I don’t know what I’m doing and never did
Life seems so pointless
And stupid survival leads to stimulation,
But really, if you’re not fighting for your life
You just hurt yourself
Or find a cloud of unknowing to hide behind
And get lost in a fake smile
Yeah, talk it up, laugh and joke
but don’t include me
I just can’t do it
And what the wheels turn
I wish I wasn’t here
But there’s nowhere to escape to
Oh well
Maybe there’s action prefabricated
Put myself in the middle of the situation
But underneath everything I’m just waiting
Like a blade of grass in the field
To live and die, it’s too bleak
No mystery, solid fact
The ruins of adventure
Smoking in the burnt-out city
In the wildfire devestation
Better turn from adventure
Embrace the gray of reality
A passing on
Why should I leave a glow
Oh where, what
I feel so sick of days
Minutes are hours
Time hangs oppressive
Go away time
Leave me at once
I don’t want to know you
I’ll take the sun
I’ll take the black night
I’ll walk through perception
But it’s so hard to wait
I want to go now
I'm in a way of trouble, what can I do
I've had trouble in my mind I can’t shake loose
I want to go out the back door, get lost for good
I want to disappear and never be found
I want to cease to exist as far as I know
I could always go drinking and never come back
I could go traveling in search of nothing
I don’t want to know the world is changing
Just beat down my door, come on you nothing
I just don’t care and I can’t get it right
I heard tell of salvation but what I saw was controlled
Either by the inside or from without doubt
Give me your rules I don’t want to impose them
Or be imposed upon
I could do a good thing, discover a cure
But I can’t lift my hand up to open the door
I’m stuck in depression
Get out, go away, go away, go away.
I hate that I got any responsibility
I don’t want to talk, I don’t want to walk
But if I walk maybe I can escape talk
If I can be alone I’ll live through this
I’ll take the hammer, I’ll pound the steel
I won’t give up an inch to you, you rotten thing
I won’t fall in your hole