Get all 10 Jack Carty releases available on Bandcamp and save 40%.
Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Time to Rest, Wake to a Bright Morning, The World, When It's Sleeping, Hospital Hill, Home State, Esk, The Predictable Crisis Of Modern Life, Break Your Own Heart, and 2 more.
1. |
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I found your name carved course and deep
In the branches of a boab tree
A tattooed, gnarled and twisted thing
Cut all around with memories
And though I knew you’d never stood
Beside that ancient, bloated wood
I thought of you and cursed the hand
Who stole your named and made it theirs
Ooooh
Time is a river, we are rain
Ooooh
The clock is a countdown, don’t delay
Well, time alone can separate
Two people standing in one place
And working with my nimble blade
I proved that I was there
Most of the time I’m never sure
If anything is real at all
We dance under the mirror ball
With thick smoke in our eyes
Ooooh
Time is a river, we are rain
Ooooh
The clock is a countdown, don’t delay
This place was a prison
Long ago
Roots chained to the ground
If time is our gaol cell we’ll never get out
The tinderbox, the atom bomb
The unborn child, the eldest son
All waiting for their chance to come
The day they are released
The boab stayed to meet us all
It’s scars mapping our mortal toil
And never needed any proof
To know that it was real
Ooooh
Time is a river, we are rain
Ooooh
The clock is a countdown, don’t delay
I found your name carved course and deep
In the branches of a boab tree
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2. |
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Don’t believe the hype
Let it hit you
And then decide
I might be an old man trapped in time
Maybe I’m jaded
Maybe I’m right
The window is my changing mind
Back and forth from day to night
Outside
So many shiny, pretty things
They’re gonna knock until you let them in
But everybody knows there’s nothing much inside
Don’t believe the hype
Don’t believe the hype
Let the turnstile spin
From the outside
Looking in
I’m wound up like an anchor
Dead weight falls
And I’m a man
Over bored
Dressed up like the olden days
But empty in a modern way
I’d say
So many shiny pretty things
They’re gonna knock until you let them in
But every time you do there’s nothing much inside
Don’t believe the hype
Don’t believe the hype
Plastic bags and plastic bottles
Racing through a concrete jungle
Dive until you hit the bottom
No connection
Constant comment
Such a shiny, pretty thing
They’re gonna knock until you let it in
But every time you do there’s nothing much inside
Yeah everybody knows there’s nothing much inside
Yeah everybody knows there’s nothing much inside
Don’t believe the hype
Don’t believe the hype
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3. |
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Eye’s on the horizon
And hands on the wheel
I gotta put in some distance
To know how I feel
And so I
Drive toward the fading light
Cut through the heavy night
And out the other side
You hit me like a dragnet
Deep below the surface
Caught up in your bullshit
Like everybody else was
I loved you like I meant it
You loved the way I said it
I’m caught up in your dragnet
And we’re going down
I picture you back then as the day starts to break
Still claiming the high ground
On the crest of a wave
But then we start to slide
Caught in the rising tide
And swimming our lives
You hit me like a dragnet
Deep below the surface
Caught up in your bullshit
Like everybody else was
I loved you like I meant it
You loved the way I said it
I’m caught up in your dragnet
And we’re going down
Such an empty thing
This early morning wind
So I fill it with the words I wanna whisper in your ear
“I wish we’d never been”
You hit me like a dragnet
Deep below the surface
Caught up in your bullshit
Like everybody else was
I loved you like I meant it
You loved the way I said it
I’m caught up in your dragnet
I’m straining ‘til I break it
You hit me and I felt it
Deep below the surface
Caught up in your bullshit
Like everybody else was
I loved you like I meant it
You loved the way I felt it
You hit me like a dragnet
And I’m getting out
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4. |
Autumn Leaves
03:34
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Autumn Leaves
I feel the warmth leaving me
The sun makes a slow retreat
And winter moves in
You and I
We hang like a lullaby
Our breath on the frozen night
It’s a trick of the light
And time
We could run for the equator
You could take a chance on me
I won’t let our love get buried
Under autumn leaves
Holding on
To days that have come and gone
You can’t stop the march of time
I know
I’ve tried and tried
We could run for the equator
You could take a chance on me
I won’t let our love get buried
Under autumn leaves
Earth is a spaceship
We’re on a big trip
And every year we begin again
I’m on your side
So let the frost bite
And bury us for spring to find
We could run for the equator
You could take a chance on me
Or you and I could warm each other
Under autumn leaves
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5. |
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Walking through a foreign city
Feeling like I’m going nowhere
Golden leaves crunch underneath me
Waiting for the coming snow and
I might never find the answers
To the questions my mind throws up
I am not as smart as I thought
The seasons change and we change with them
But that is not the same as giving up
All the news is fucking awful
People acting like animals
Are we all that capable
Of reverting to primal instinct?
At the very heart of me
I feel our shared humanity
A beautiful and scary thing
We cannot let the bastards win
‘cause that would be the same as giving up
Giving up
I fantasize about it all the time
Giving up
A path taken by stronger men than I
Framed within the bigger picture
I am such a lucky human
Born with love and running water
Taught to empathize and question
The wind blows hard between the buildings
Cuts straight through my old cardigan
I stub my toe and bruise my shin
And feel the darkness creeping in
Then look up at the starry sky
And think about the age of light
A million years to reach my eyes
And still it got here right on time
And never ever thought of giving up
Never once it thought of giving up
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6. |
Tell The Truth
03:12
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I watch the sun going down
In the middle of the day
There came a change in my heart
Relentless as a wave
Unhook the shackles of time
And I’m rudderless and free
I feel the order unwind
The relentless entropy
And I can smell the sugarcane on fire at my feet
What’s the point of anything
If we’re never as we seem?
Pastiche sweeter than a tooth
I want to live so I can always tell the truth
Sit on the rooftop at night
And watch the jet stream flow
Think of the thousands of lives
Up there flying coast to coast
And when they look down at me
Do I blend into the grey?
A pixel lost on a screen
On a retina display
The thing I love is boring me and driving me away
What’s the point of anything
If we’re never as we seem?
Pastiche sweeter than a tooth
I want to live so I can always tell the truth
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7. |
Do I Make You Crazy?
03:49
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First you don’t wanna talk
And then it feels like
You’re holding your breath
But it’s all in your head
I’m doing my best
To reach across the distance
But I can’t understand
Once in a while
There’s a break in the line
The big picture gets harder to see
Do I make you crazy
Like you make me?
Who’s gonna captain this ship
Across the wave crests and valleys
Looming ahead?
Shoulder to the wheel
And rain in our eyes
Raising our voices against the tempest outside
Once in a while
There’s a break in the line
The big picture gets harder to see
Do I make you crazy
Like you make me?
I met a little bird
Who flew halfway ‘round the world
To tattoo your name on me
Ink on it’s claws and beak
And you slept in fits and starts
A rainbow leaks from your heart
Somedays we work to get through
But I wouldn’t change it
And I always choose you
Once in a while
I can hear that you’re smiling
And nothing can come in-between
Do I make you crazy
Like you make me?
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8. |
Long Time Coming
03:17
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It’s been a long time coming
Down the line
I felt my will unravel
One more time
Kept under smoke and mirrors
Like some tired circus clown
Well I pull the pin
The clock starts counting down
I got a secret and I’m gonna let you in
There’s no promised land
It’s all slight of hand
You gotta get some notice
Get the look
Push your numbers higher
Bait the hook
Another blue-eyed baby
Is gonna move out to LA
With an Instagram and nothing much to say
I got a secret and I’m gonna let you in
There’s no promised land
It’s all slight of hand
Here honest conversation is as rare as dessert rain
It’s got me feeling like a washout
Got me circling the drain
I got a secret and I’m gonna let you in
There’s no promised land
It’s all slight of hand
And when the lights go out
The soul-searching begins
There’s no promised land
There’s no promised land
There’s no promised land
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9. |
The Wires Are Humming
03:57
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The wires are humming
All of the time
They won’t give me a moment
Or let me unwind
I’m just floating around
On a cloud in the sky
And the black hole will pull me in
Oh there is no gravity here
I just free-fall through everything that has ever been
A binary code that greets me like a friend
Leaves me anxious as anything
A cascading torrent
That never turns off
Gotta catch the Atlantic
In a watering trough
Now I’m rubbing my eyes
‘cause enough is enough
And the black hole will pull me in
Oh there is no gravity here
I just free-fall through everything that has ever been
A binary code that greets me like a friend
Leaves me anxious as anything
Oh there is no gravity here
I just free-fall through everything that has ever been
Oh there’s no humanity here
I just free-fall through everything that has ever been
A binary code that greets me like a friend
Leaves me anxious as anything
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10. |
Fleeting
04:42
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A fleeting touch
A fleeting glance
A fleeting fear
A fleeting chance
The knowledge everything will pass
Even, eventually, the sun
So, measure time with dripping taps
And notice as it bends and snaps
Now stretching out
Now springing back
Already past us as it comes
A moment is only a moment
A year is just one trip 'round the sun
And somewhere, from some distant perspective
There’s a way they can be seen as one
A fleeting change
A moments rest
A seconds time for second best
The here and now is all there is
Make a note to future self
To sum my life up in a word
An abstract noun, a gentle verb
An adjective, a soaring bird
I hope it will be “Loved”
A moment is only a moment
A year is just one trip 'round the sun
And somewhere, from some distant perspective
There’s a way they can be seen as one
I see the shadow of a gallows
Some nights, on the back of my eyes
Everyone’s posing for perfect strangers
But all I want’s a simple, honest life
I want it bad
I hope that’s alright?
The fleeting feeling you’re alone
And no one understands your pain
Can spiral you down like a drain
But it's almost never true
Think of the ones who came before
The false belief
The bloody wars
The mad king's reign
The surgeons saw
And yet, still, here we are
A moment is only a moment
A year is just one trip around the sun
And somewhere, from some distant perspective
There’s a way they can be seen as one
There’s a way they can be seen as one
Both fleeting, and ever-long
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Jack Carty Brisbane, Australia
Award-winning, independent Australian songwriter.
"The recently married Carty might well
have found his happy place" ★★★★ — THE SUNDAY STAR TIMES.
“These songs have almost a purity of spirit and certainly an openness of heart. You should own this" ★★★★ — THE SYDNEY MORNING HERALD.
“A sensational sophomore album. It marks him as a man to watch" ★★★★ — THE WEEKEND AUSTRALIAN.
... more
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