Disc 1 | ||||||
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1. |
| 6:35 | ||||
Year Of The Cat - Al Stewart
On a morning from a Bogart movie In a country where they turn back time You go strolling through the crowd like Peter Lorre Contemplating a crime She comes out of the sun in a silk dress running Like a watercolour in the rain Don't bother asking for explanations She'll just tell you that she came In the year of the cat. She doesn't give you time for questions As she locks up your arm in hers And you follow 'till your sense of which direction Completely disappears By the blue tiled walls near the market stalls There's a hidden door she leads you to These days, she says, I feel my life Just like a river running through The year of the cat She looks at you so cooly And her eyes shine like the moon in the sea She comes in incense and patchouli So you take her, to find what's waiting inside The year of the cat. Well morning comes and you're still with her And the bus and the tourists are gone And you've thrown away the choice and lost your ticket So you have to stay on But the drum-beat strains of the night remain In the rhythm of the new-born day You know sometime you're bound to leave her BUt for now you're going to stay In the year of the cat. |
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2. |
| 3:18 | ||||
The fishing boats go out across the evening water
Smuggling guns and arms across the Spanish border The wind whips up the waves so loud The ghost moon sails among the clouds Turns the rifles into silver on the border On my wall the colours of the maps are running From Africa the winds they talk of changes coming The torches flare up in the night The hand that sets the farms alight Has spread the word to those who're waiting on the border In the village where I grew up Nothing seems the same Still you never see the change from day to day And no-one notices the customs slip away Late last night the rain was knocking at my window I moved across the darkened room and in the lampglow I thought I saw down in the street The spirit of the century Telling us that we're all standing on the border In the islands where I grew up Nothing seems the same It's just the patterns that remain An empty shell But there's a strangeness in the air you feel too well The fishing boats go out across the evening water Smuggling guns and arms across the Spanish border The wind whips up the waves so loud The ghost moon sails among the clouds Turns the rifles into silver on the border On the border On the border On the border |
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3. |
| 4:26 | ||||
Nothing that's forced can ever be right
If it doesn't come naturally, leave it That's what she said as she turned out the light And we bent our backs as slaves of the night She lowered her guard and showed me the scars She got from trying to fight Saying oh, you'd better believe it Well I'm up to my neck in the crumbling wreckage Of all that I wanted from life When I looked for respect all I got was neglect Though I swallowed the line as a sign of the times But dealing a jack from the back of the pack They said-You lose again Oh, I said, who needs it? Well don't get me wrong now I tried to get on With the jokers that got in my way And I put on a smile and I tried all the while to be straight But they just wanted more all the time and I'm sure That you know what I mean when I say That I'm sick of the touch and there's only so much you can take. Well nothing that's real is ever for free And you just have to pay for it sometime She said it before, she said it to me I suppose she believed there was nothing to see But the same old four imaginary walls She built for living inside I said oh, you just can't mean it Well there was never a doubt that she had to get out She was just looking around for a way In the pit of the night there was nowhere to hide any more She was out on a limb, she was reaching for things That she wanted, but just couldn't say And she had to be sure that she wouldn't get caught like before. Well nothing that's forced can ever be right If it doesn't come naturally, leave it That's what she said as she turned out the light And she may have been wrong, and she may have been right But I woke with the frost, and noticed she'd lost The veil that covered her eyes I said oh, you can leave it |
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4. |
| 6:34 | ||||
It was late in December, the sky turned to snow
All round the day was going down slow Night like a river beginning to flow I felt the beat of my mind go Drifting into time passages Years go falling in the fading light Time passages Buy me a ticket on the last train home tonight Well I'm not the kind to live in the past The years run too short and the days too fast The things you lean on are the things that don't last Well it's just now and then my line gets cast into these Time passages There's something back here that you left behind Oh time passages Buy me a ticket on the last train home tonight Hear the echoes and feel yourself starting to turn Don't know why you should feel That there's something to learn It's just a game that you play Well the picture is changing Now you're part of a crowd They're laughing at something And the music's loud A girl comes towards you You once used to know You reach out your hand But you're all alone, in these Time passages I know you're in there, you're just out of sight Time passages Buy me a ticket on the last train home tonight |
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5. |
| 3:39 | ||||
Lucy worked a different club every day,
And though she put her mind to it, Her heart was never in it, She stayed around just long enough to get paid, She won't pass the time with you, she can't stay a minute, And all these changing faces never bothered her at all, They just existed like a back-drop or a pattern on the wall, Lucy looks like someone who is waiting for a call, She knows he'll come, but no-one else can hear at all, Lucy finds the dressing room and the bar, Hangs her clothes up, hopes tonight, The contract won't be broken, Well, they kick you round so much when you're not a star, Make you play all night just for a pittance or a token, But all these imperfections never bothered her at all, She says it sharpens your perception when your back's against the wall, There's something that enables her to rise above it all, To shrug it off, just when it seems to go too far, Hey, hey, hey, I think you almost, feel the pain comin' on inside, Hey, hey, hey, I think you almost, feel it now and you don't know why, You don't know why. The last time that I saw her she had given up the chase, Moved away to California, got a suntan on her face, She said that life was just another time another space, It's over now, she learned a lot, it's not a waste, Hey, hey, hey, I think you almost, feel the pain comin' on inside Hey, hey, hey, I think you almost, feel it now and you don't know why, Hey, hey, hey, I think you almost, feel yourself reaching out inside, Hey, hey, hey, I think you almost, feel it now and you don't know why. |
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6. |
| 6:16 | ||||
I was making my way through the wasteland
The road into town passes through I was changing the radio stations With my mind on you Oh your friends call you "Lily Paloma" But that's not the way that you are It's too much of a gentle misnomer For a shooting star But you and me baby I saw you there Straight away I knew There's really no hiding I'll tell you right now What we're gonna do We'll go collecting the days Putting the moments away You're on my mind like a Song on the Radio I remember the first time I saw you Alone in the dark with a drink With a candle flame burning before you And your thoughts closed in You were staring out into the distance Not seeming to hear what I said Why did you put up such resistance Like all the lights are red 'Cause you and me baby I saw you there Straight away I knew There's really no hiding I'll tell you right now What we're gonna do We'll go collecting the days Putting the moments away You're on my mind like a Song on the Radio I don't know what it was that was painful But sometimes it's there in your face There are times when you just look disdainful Of the human race Ah, but then on the wings of emotion We circle each other in flight Till together we roll like the ocean In its bed at night 'Cause you and me baby I saw you there Straight away I knew There's really no hiding I'll tell you right now What we're gonna do We'll go collecting the days Putting the moments away You're on my mind like a Song on the Radio You're on my mind like a Song on the Radio |
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7. |
| 5:10 | ||||
Before the phone hits the receiver
You're halfway to the door The voice said 'get out while you can, There's just ten minutes, nothing more' Time only for the essentials Better gather them and run The false name inside the passport, The gold bars and the gun And once again they've come out of the past And though your mind is cool your heart is beating fast You've been through it all before Each time you wish a little more that you could ask What do you want from me? What do you need from me? There's no rest for the running man Why can't you let him be?' It's a long and twisting journey From the sweeping northern plains To the outcrops of the jungle Bowed beneath the tropic rains In the customs hall the officer Takes you to one side And his eyes reveal no feeling As you hand over the bribe And once again you've bought a little time And once again you're fading out of sight Still the fox is growing older As he calls over his shoulder to the night: What do you want from me? What do you need from me? There's no rest for the running man Why can't you let him be? Here, come over here Beneath a sympathetic moon We'll sit and talk over old times without a fear Another beer, from the cafes of the night The tumbling rhythms of guitars ring loud and clear One by one they've nailed the others But you always got away What it is that keeps you just that step ahead No one can say In one last raid the agents Of the dawn break down the door Of a house where you were standing Maybe just an hour before And still the thread continues to unwind You take the hidden roads that only you can find And should they come upon your tracks There's just a question hanging back you left behind What do you want from me? What do you need from me? No rest for the running man Why can't you let him be? What do you want from me? What do you need from me? |
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8. |
| 2:41 | ||||
And I think of you now
As a dream that I had long ago In a kingdom lost in time In a forest of evening The archer is bending a bow And I see you bring him bread and wine Down the legions of years The invaders have taken this land And bent you to their will And the memories fade of the ancients And all that they had Though the magic lingers round you still Oh, who would walk the stony roads of Merlin's time? And keep the watch along the borderline And who would hear the legends passed in song and rhyme? Upon the shepherd pipes of Merlin's time |
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9. |
| 3:41 | ||||
'Oh I come from Pittsburgh to study astrology,'
She said as she stood on my instep, 'I could show you New York with a walk between Fourth Street and Nine.' Then out of her coat taking seven harmonicas She sat down to play on a doorstep saying 'Come back to my place I will show you the stars and the signs' So I followed her into the black lands Where the window frames peel and flake And the old Jewish face behind the lace Even now trying to get to see what's cooking Just John the Baptist in the park getting laid thinking there's no-one looking And its eighty degrees and I'm down on my knees in Brooklyn Her house was a dusty collection of rusty Confusion with landings and tunnels And leaning bookcases and spaces and faces and things Where twenty-five Puerto Ricans, Manhattan Mohicans And Jewish-Italian Pawnbrokers Lead their theatrical lives in their rooms in the wings While outside in the black lands The violent day runs wild And the black and white minstrels run through the crazy Alleys while the cops go booking And ruthless toothless agents sneak around and there's no-one looking And it's eighty degrees and I'm down on my knees in Brooklyn And oh, I'm back in the city again You can tell by the smell of the hamburger stand in the rain She spoke of astrology while muttering apologies For coffee that tasted of hot dogs I said 'That's OK, mine was cold anyway, and just grand' Then she lay on the bed while the radio fed Us with records and adverts for cat food And I looked at her, holding my thoughts in the palm of my hand And outside in the black lands The evening came and went And the bums in the street begging money for one last drink Are hanging round the liquor stores trying to get a foot in And the girl from Pittsburgh and I made love on a mattress with the new moon looking And in the cool evening breeze I was down on my knees in Brooklyn |
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10. |
| 3:47 | ||||
11. |
| 1:58 | ||||
12. |
| 4:46 | ||||
Prince Louis Battenberg is burning the Admiralty lights down low
Silently sifting through papers sealed with a crown Admiral Lord Fisher is writing to Churchill, calling for more Dreadnoughts The houses in Hackney are all falling down And my grandmother sits on the beach in the days before the war Young girl writing her diary, while time seems to pause Watching the waves as they come one by one to die on the shore Kissing the feet of England Oh the lights of Saint Petersburg come on as usual Although the air seems charged with a strangeness of late, yet there's nothing to touch And the Tsar in his great Winter Palace has called for the foreign news An archduke was shot down in Bosnia, but nothing much And my grandmother sits before the mirror in the days before the war Smiling a secret smile as she goes to the door And the young man rides off in his carriage, homeward once more And the sun sets gently on England Ah the day we decided to drive down to Worthing, it rained and rained Giving us only a minute to stand by the sea And crunching my way through the shingles, it seemed there was nothing changed Though the jetty was maybe more scarred that I'd known it to be And Mandi and I stood and stared at the overcast sky Where ten years ago we had stood, my Grandfather and I And the waves still rushed in as they had the year that he died And it seemed that my lifetime was shrunken and lost in the tide As it rose and fell on the side of England Prince Louis Battenberg is burning the Admiralty lights |
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13. |
| 8:15 | ||||
They crossed over the border the hour before dawn
moving in lines through the day Most of our planes were destroyed on the ground where they lay Waiting for orders we held in the wood Word from the front never came By evening the sound of the gunfire was miles away I softly move through the shadows, slip away through the trees Crossing their lines in the mist in the fields on our hands and our knees And all that i ever Was able to see The fire in the air, glowing red Silhouetting the smoke on the breeze All summer they drove us back through the Ukraine Smolensk and Viasma soon fell By Autumn we stood with our backs to the town of Orel Closer and closer to Moscow they come Riding the wind like a bell General Guderian stands at the crest of the hill Winter brought with the rains, oceans of mud filled the roads Gluing the tracks of their tanks to the ground, while the skies filled with snow And all that I ever Was able to see The fire in the air, glowing red Silhouetting the snow on the breeze (Ah, Ah , Ah) x4 (Ah, Ah, Ah) - all thru bridge In the footsteps of Napoleon, the shadow figures stagger through the winter Falling back before the gates of Moscow, standing in the wings like an avenger And far away behind their lines, the partisans are stirring in the forest Coming unexpectedly upon their outpost, growing like a promise You'll never know, you'll never know, which way to turn, which way to look you'll never see us As we steal into the blackness of the night you'll never know, you'll never hear us And evening sings in a voice of amber, the dawn is surely coming The morning road leads to Stalingrad, and the sky is softly humming Two broken tigers on fire in the night Flicker their souls to the wind We wait in the lines for the final approach to begin It's been almost four years that I've carried a gun At home, it will alomst be spring The flames of the tiger are lighting the road to Berlin I quickly move through the ruins that bow to the ground The old men and children they send out to face us, they can't slow us down And all that I ever Was able to see The eyes of the city are opening Now it's the end of a dream (Ah. Ah, Ah) x4 (Ah, Ah, Ah) thru this section I'm coming home, I'm coming home , now you can taste it in the wind the war is over And I listen to the clicking of the train wheels as we roll across the border And now they ask about the time that i was caught behind their time and taken prisoner They only held me for a day, a lucky break i say They turn and listen closer I'll never know, I'll never know, why I was taken from the line with all the others to board a special train and journey deep into the heart of holy Russia And it's cold and damp in the transit camp and the air is still and sullen and the pale sun of Octobe whispers the snow will soon be coming And I wonder when, I'll be home again and the morning answers never And the evening sighs and the steely, Russian skies go on, forever... |
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14. |
| 3:39 | ||||
15. |
| - | ||||
16. |
| - | ||||