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Wives' Tales

by Illustrated Manual

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1.
Negatives 03:20
I got an old book, it’s never been opened And it looks the way it did the day I bought it Along with negatives that I’ll never develop Forever rolled up in their plastic canisters Oh Another night another year And I’m still sitting here behind this steering wheel Watching the plains turn into corn fields and white mountain ranges But I feel the same just Oh Like a traveling painting the scenery’s changing But I have stayed the same For centuries counting Dried oil on cotton Hanging on a peg Take me down, set me on fire Free me from this molding frame And I’ll dance in the air alive for a moment And then gone in the next Mmmm
2.
Kerouac Girl 05:54
Your mother told you to go and see it while you’re young So you kissed her goodbye and got on a flight to California Drawing your own lines across the country Connecting the dots from the ghost towns to the big cities An acid hit on the Vegas Strip it’s a scene a don’t remember Johnny Depp on a flashback trip riding on that elevator You told me it’s an old wives’ tale that you don’t believe in You told me that you only met yourself after you let yourself start breathing I’ve got no idea where this goes from here I guess it goes on I met a stripper in a bar, a street performer in the park And a young black man in a basement pool hall shooting in the dark Where I saw you in that flannel blue standing in the corner All the boys were walking on broken glass and drinking themselves to death to get your number I’ve got no idea where to go from here But you gotta go in your own direction I felt like I was falling in love but it was probably the booze building up in my blood Because the song that you sang in your sleep was not for me Now and then I wonder about if you’re a roman candle flickering out Or spidering across the stars Maybe our paths will cross again or maybe they won’t I heard you were living in Bend before you ended up back home It’s funny how that rubber band pulls you back After all the miles you covered and time elapsed I’ve been down that road before, east and North to Upstate New York Where the wind and the stunted pines whisper lies at the tree lines Oh your stuck in my memory like a repeating melody Like a repeating melody
3.
Stump 05:46
Babe do you know that I've been looking for a reason to blame Everything on you but it isn't fair I don't want to be a villain at the end of the story Holding all the cards and cutting out your heart I've never given up on you, you know, even when I wanted to Entangled in your past and my high expectations You know me and the darkest secrets that you keep Lesley can you see the animal and his flashing teeth Eating me alive every time that I Think about the causes and how I lost my way somewhere in the process Of growing skin so thick and getting over it I don't really want to meet another girl because she won't love me When I'm standing at the edge off balance and I need that steady Hand in mine, the one that I Know so well Honey did you hear that I've been looking for places to go And never look back because it hurts bad All the lessons I've learned have pruned my limbs right down to the dirt I am just a stump of who I thought I was When I told you I would run away with you and we'd live out of a Converted van and finally make good on those plans that we made when you were My best friend, you made me see in color No one can
4.
I am a gambling man laying it on the line That’s my philosophy down to my last penny I feel like there must be more but I guess there could be less There’s no way to know for sure before you place that bet Nothing good comes easy, easy, easy Nothing worth keeping, keeping comes for free I’ve been keeping score bending and forcing the parts to fit It may not be obvious but there’s one thing that I’ll admit You love me more than I could ever love you back You’ve got a way with words that I’ll never understand Playing ‘em close to your chest and holding ‘em in your hand If nobody knows what you got then nobody knows what you don’t But you got to lay ‘em down eventually or you gotta fold Nothing good came easy, easy, easy Nothing worth keeping, keeping came for free The old man sitting at the table told me son you gotta know when to walk away Assuming that you’re able and you’re not in so deep that you have to play Fingers crossed, hoping that I can make you see That I'm on your side even if it breaks me I’ve been waiting for you to put down the burden that you've carried Wavering back and forth over whether we should break up or just get married Because I love you more than you would ever ask me to
5.
I’m on my way to God I may not be old but I am old enough To know that my time is up So I’m throwing the towel in I’ve been on my way to making the same mistake That I’ve made ever since the day I was born I’ve been so afraid of causing anybody’s pain So I just stood still like a boy in a china shop I met a girl at school She was everything that I believed in When love was still simple Just holding hands and making promises I was on my way to making the same mistake That I made when I was so young I was so naive for telling her I’d never leave I left as soon as my clean hands got dirty Worried sick my life would never measure up to the mark On that measuring stick if I ever lose control I climbed out my window And went running down the old South Easton railroad I saw a man with pistol, aiming at the sky And asking God for a sign He was on his way to making the same mistake His father made when he was drunk Twenty years ago with a woman that he barely knew He fell in love with her for an hour in her bedroom
6.
When I came to my senses I realized that you Would never understand those words that I said too soon I laid there wide awake because I couldn't wait I was afraid that it would, it would soon be too late Oh, what a day it was I was reborn inside of a I went a tramping through the woods like a lumberjack Hoping to cut me down a tree and then drag it back But when I saw her standing in the middle of the old growth pines I found my saw and ax both as dull as butter knives Oh, what a day it was I was reborn inside of a Twenty-four hour moment The whole world was new, sitting across from you Maybe I'll try again or maybe I'll let it go Maybe I'll carve and whittle 'til you stop saying no
7.
I was born into the mouth of a lion Red and ugly and coming out early I couldn't be sure if I'd been here before But it was strangely familiar Half of a man and half of the devil himself Are living inside me and making me crazy Going to war, knocking on the doors Of all the questions that plague me Got a long way to where I am going But my eyes on that horizon Maybe I'll see you at the other end When I find my way out of this maze I found my way into I am an ant walking on a rubber rope Stretching out in front of me farther than an ant sees All I can do is break it into Moveable pieces I've been working my whole life to be a good man But it turned out to be harder than I imagined it would ever be But I won't give up or go along quietly I'm gonna claw my way out of the belly of the beast that swallowed me Immanuel was my age when he decided To put down his hammer and walk out on the water He didn't know where he was gonna go Only that he was going He wiped the dust off of his feet and let go of what he Knew he couldn't have anymore I wish I could say that I would do the same But I can't or won't or both What difference does it make He told me that I was forgiven But it feels like I've been living On the tip of someone else's tongue Tangled in the filament it spun Visible and waiting for the end to come
8.
I've been down low before and I don't want no more I've been down low before and I don't want no more A woman'll bring you down, oh what will you find That she's still a heartless soul or that she is kind? I've been way up high, high above the tower I've been way up high, high above the tower That holds her hiding heart up above the clouds Up above the treetops and the houses and the murmur of the crowds Up high and down low, from the Rockies to the rainy coasts Following that wandering heart before anyone breaks it But the devil, he knows me before than most And how far I am really willing to take it If god took his hand and made a woman out of man If god took his hand and made a woman out of man Then why is she so damn hard to understand Why is she so up and down and up and down
9.
I won't say I told you so Even though you don't remember What you said last night on the phone About how there's no use in talking Because my mind will not change like old folks stuck in their ways Waiting on their turn to tell That old joke everyone knows about the Catholic priest The kids and their three leads Erin, I wish I could Bring you back to the beginning Sitting in the bloodgood In front of your apartment Before I became so back and forth like the migrating gray geese Flying in their vees Heading for the melting north but by the time that they arrive It'll be about time to leave again Talking, talking in my sleep And I'm telling her everything Love is not enough When it's so quick to give up
10.
The barkeep remembers me Blacked out in the street Face down in a flower bed dream In a tiny town All the lights go out And all the stumbling boys go home alone To their mothers, hands on their hips Crawling out of their wranglers and into their beds The creek ran black The morning you went back To the Pacific Northwest on a couple hours of sleep One working headlight and a deadline to meet If things don't work out like they should Was it predetermined from before we ever knew Anyone else, even ourselves Or what it was like to sit in the dark Under a sky of LED constellations Poor bastards stranded high up on the bivy ledges Deep lake to the Cirque, wading out into the water Waiting it out until the clouds roll over You and me Maybe, let's just see Because there're things that you need to know I've been told That I'm mechanical That I'm always at a distance and never realistic Always analyzing the past Rearranging the deck chairs long after the impact But I wanna see you again In Wyoming or Oregon 'Cause you might be my Eddy in the alder And I could be your Gus in the brush I used to think no one would ever understand But I'm wagering that you maybe can
11.
Darling are you wondering to yourself If it was all for nothing All the energy wrestling with Something that you couldn't control You decided you were going away Out to the East Coast Gave away the Avett Brothers tickets I bought For you before I knew that you were leaving If I could tell what you were thinking Would it have been different Or would it have been The same in the end I remember dancing with you At the old Silver Dollar Bar Before they caved and tore a couple of the walls down To make more room for the aging Baby Boomers All the cowboys were looking at you Wondering if you were new to Jackson Holding on to me on that tiny dance floor Covered now by a wall-to-wall carpet If I could tell what you were thinking Would it have been different Or would it have been The same in the end Every time I hear "I and Love and You" Or "Murder in the City" I wanna tear down the house It'd be easy if you were just another pretty Girl from Matthews Girl from Raleigh Girl from Annapolis Girl from Rowan County The last time I saw you, you were making me laugh Back to your old self Feet in the water, the sun in your hair The sweet summer air in your lungs I've been trying to keep up with the changes I wonder where you're traveling to next But you don't want to hear from me anymore It's probably for the best
12.
The Hurt 05:58
I've got this feeling way down in my gut And I don't know what it is It made me act different Like I was in someone else's skin The more I thought about it The more confused I became I was sure but then I doubted And I watched you float away I would have stayed with you forever And figured out a way to make it work somehow I just wanna talk to you but you don't wanna let me through I just wanna see you smile the way that you used to I just wanna pull that trigger, head out on the road with you and Make good on the plan that we had before the hurt I really miss your wit I've never known someone so damn clever I'm trying hard to forget But I just can't help remembering All of the mornings that I woke up next to you I took it for a warning sign when it was too good to be true I travel back in time Once or twice a day, OK, once or twice an hour To excavate and analyze Digging in the dirt for a trace or any sign of The bones of the fire, waiting to be found Hiding underneath the ground Still warm Still glowing I could see the meteor coming in hot and heading right for The life that we've been building for the last three years The archaeology could never explain why we Couldn't make it work after all the hurt

about

Illustrated Manual's 3rd studio album. 12-tracks. Releases June 8, 2017.

credits

released June 8, 2017

Jonathan Cooke - Acoustic Guitar, Resonator, Vocals, Percussion
Dave Swanson - Electric Guitar, Vocals, Mandolin, Bass Guitar, Percussion

Produced, recorded, mixed, and mastered by Dave Swanson at Legend Studios in Avon, CT. Artwork by Kevin Peloquin. All songs written by Jonathan Cooke.

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Illustrated Manual Casper, Wyoming

Illustrated Manual was originally called "The Illustrated Man." Jon received an informal cease and desist for the name due to its use as the title of a collection of short stories by Ray Bradbury, published in 1951.

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