Get all 13 Steve Tilston releases available on Bandcamp and save 20%.
Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Truth To Tell, happenstance, The Reckoning, Ziggurat, Live Hemistry, The Greening Wind, Fully Chromatic, and so it goes, and 5 more.
1. |
This is the Dawn
05:32
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Say goodbye to the night.
This is the dawn.
This is the day.
All the demons take flight.
This is the dawn
This is the day.
And the first light brings
Joy as each small bird sings in the morn.
This is the dawn.
See the sweep of the hills.
This is the dawn,
This is the day.
As the hand of light spills.
This is the dawn.
This is the day.
Golden fingers spread.
Whisper thanks to bless the bread in the morn,
This is the dawn.
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2. |
Nottamun Town Return
03:31
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In Luddenum Town not a soul would look up.
Not a soul would look up, not a soul would look down.
Not a soul would look up,not a soul would look down.
To show me my way out of Luddenham town.
I saw a buffoon, a blonde headed mayor.
Rattling his chains and going nowhere.
Rattling his chains and going nowhere.
Eyes cold as ice, but blowing hot air.
Saw a man with two faces pedalling two wheels.
A tame pack of hounds hot on his heels
Hey Tally Ho! Hold the front page news.
Behind him a limousine bringing his shoes.
Saw sons and daughters rise to their feet.
Taking their empty bowls into the street.
And those who had gobbled their own cake for free.
Ordered them kettled without any tea.
Saw the Prince and his duchess wave from their car.
The crowd it waved back with insults and snarls.
Drive from the nightmare, back to the dream.
Back to the Duchy and rich, clotted cream
Bought a one way ticket, no turning back.
The right kind of snow, but the wrong kind of track.
Only one train that had not broken down.
Soon I was heading for Nottamun town.
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3. |
The Reckoning
03:22
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Here’s to all the grand children,
Yet to be born great grand children.
All your sons and daughters,
And your own grand children too.
I offer you my hand.
Out across the age’s span.
A misbegotten plan
To leave the reckoning to you
I must apologise,
if it’s written in the troubled skies.
We’ve been peddling lies,
Somehow forgotten what is true.
Though it’s buried deep.
Poison never sleeps.
Through the ages seeps,
To leave a reckoning for you.
We hang on to misguided dreams,
sleepwalk to the brink.
Hey ho, rue the day.
We’re going down in drink.
I have planted seed.
In vain to raise an apple tree.
To entice the bees
to sip the blossom on the bough.
But the bees don’t toil.
Around the tree a serpent coils,
Spits venom in the soil,
And leaves the reckoning to you
I raise to you a toast.
Should trouble come to roost.
For we ate the golden goose,
And left the reckoning to you.
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4. |
Pennine Spring
04:52
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All of you who walk the chain.
Must learn to love the wind and rain.
Dare to call these mountains friends.
Know the way the backbone bends
How the Welkin grips the soul.
Stirs some blessed rigmarole.
where the peaks and waterfalls.
Dwarf all man-made mansion halls
Veterans and pilgrims mark the chosen way.
Lengthening but loyal shadows follow.
Soon summer will embrace the day.
Soon across the heather skims the swallow.
The murmur of the pots and gills.
That honeycomb, the limestone hills
Over Malham’s cove and tarn.
Ancient herdsman’s pens and barns
Ah these pathways mark a trail,
Way beyond the Dove and Swale.
Ghostly legions weave and spin.
Brigantes and Jackobin.
Is that woodsmoke from a tavern chimney rise?
A welcome light a flickering from a window?
Turn westward face the salmon skies.
It could be a sunny day tomorrow.
A weathered tongue scolds and scores.
Comes keening up the valley floor.
Past the Withen’s ruined bones.
And wuthering erodes the stones.
Is that music wafting from an open door?
The chink of many flowing bowls and laughter?
Scrape the mud and weave across the floor.
Banish aches and pains to stumble after.
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5. |
Oil and Water
04:24
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I might never pass this way again,
I might never get to sing you this song.
By the time it turns to day again
Could have packed my dreams and gone.
Oil and water, my wheels are crying out for air.
This old engine is way past tender loving care.
Oil & water don’t mix well like whiskey and wine.
Some concoctions just get you no further down the line.
Smoke & Mirrors, we all see what we wish to see.
Sweet illusions, the way we would like things to be.
Smoke & mirrors, the truth gets no easier to read.
Spend a lifetime repaying those things we don’t need .
Down the backroads the scarecrows are guarding the corn.
They don’t scare the crows or any other creature ever born.
Some say scarecrows have hearts and other feelings too.
If I ever lose my way that’s a job I could do.
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6. |
Memory Lane
08:32
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I thought I saw a shadow,
of a former self.
Kicking over statues,
from a dusty shelf.
I’ve tried to find the pieces,
to put ‘em back again.
I scour the outer reaches.
Down on memory lane.
It’s in and out of focus.
The picture’s seldom clear.
Facts & figures choke us,
cut the atmosphere.
Yesterday was sunshine,
they say tomorrow’s rain.
I’ll see you on the sideline.
Down on memory lane.
The temple bell tolls and beckons us back.
Like sheep we cleave to familiar tracks.
The past tense demands we turn again.
Rebuild the bridges we burned back when,
All was split asunder, fire and thunder, all was turmoil and confusion, such confusion
away back then.
In a fancy I looked to find you,
where the best recollections belong.
An imprint of youth way behind you.
A small clue in the folds of a song.
Memory lane – the past tense beckons me again.
Memory lane – I’ll come running back again.
Memory lane – So I hurry back again.
Memory lane – and I scurry back again.
And the word from a mutual acquaintance.
You’d slipped these earthly chains.
If I look I know I will find you.
Somewhere on memory lane.
There’s places I have languished.
Stairways I have known.
Basements I have cherished,
dared to call a home.
Where daylight seldom ventured,
through a window pane.
Won’t you meet me around midnight,
Down on memory lane?
My memory sometimes falters,
my footfall not as sure.
Where was that window?
Where was that door?
There used to be a way here,
but I search in vain.
I’m going round in circles,
Down on memory lane.
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7. |
Sovereign of Tides
04:55
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I watch the moon.
The silent , yearning moon.
Riding the waves.
The restless, yawning waves.
Quicksilver path a shining on
sapphire, salt sea waters.
Ebb and flowing,
Sovereign of tides.
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8. |
Doubting Thomas
04:36
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You’d think by now I’d know the path to choose.
Still I’m confounded and confused.
You’d think by now that I would see the way.
Through the vale of tears to Judgement day.
Some may say that I am in denial.
A blind leap of faith can’t reconcile.
Some would send me to the flames.
Doubting Thomas is my middle name.
I don’t believe in miracles or fate.
I can’t get my head round heaven’s gate,
False -faced prophets pedal paradise.
Blind obedience is the going price.
Rich man thinks there has to be a way to buy.
To pass the camel through a needle’s eye.
The poor pass through this world in chains
Doubting Thomas etc.
Will I still be searching when this candle it burns out.
I didn’t choose to be confused or choose to doubt.
I can’t help the workings of my mind.
Sometimes it runs smooth and sometimes grinds.
One day my cup’s dry then overspills.
Sometimes I’m a slave to my own free will.
Who knows where this confused story ends?
I’d like to call the carpenter my friend.
Twisted words have warped the frame.
Doubting Thomas etc
Just say science is to blame.
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9. |
Davey Lamp / Fruit Fly
04:41
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10. |
Rio de la Miel
04:57
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El Capitan, he eats like a bird,
Always he leaves a half empty plate.
He picks at the bones of his prisoners’ fear
His true appetite is deciding men’s fate.
The table is cleared, the leftovers saved,
Secretly taken down to the cave.
Where the one he pursues watches and waits.
El Duende waits but a stone’s throw away.
Along the Rio, Rio de la Miel.
All of the honey bees have gone.
Along the Rio, Rio de La Miel,
Now with the red blood does run.
Deep in the shade he licks the plate clean.
El Duende dreams of sweet victories.
Republic restored, a full plate of meat.
Fascist dogs driven into the sea.
He hears the cries of his comrades in arms,
Held in the bowels of the old paper mill.
Where El Capitan, with precision he probes.
Only the minimal sweat it is spilled.
El Duende slips under cover of night.
A lonely outpost the chosen prey.
From high above he swoops like a hawk.
By break of dawn, he’s back in the cave.
El Capitan he leads his patrols,
Into the mountains, down to the sea.
He never does guess that right under his nose,
The scraps that he leaves, keeps El Duende free.
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11. |
Weeping Willow Replanted
04:05
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Take my boat down to the river side.
Weeping Willow weep for me.
Take a ride down to the rollin’ sea.
Watch the world go by through the hanging leaves.
Weeping Willow weep for me.
I believe this river’s bound to set me free.
Rockin’ Rollin’ drift with the shifting tide.
Weeping Willow weep for me.
Let the river decide, the way it’s meant to be.
The one I love’s gone to some other place.
Weeping Willow weep for me.
That special face will not let me be.
If this river was wine, oh it ain’t no lie.
Weeping Willow weep for me.
I’d drink it dry, cry a salty sea.
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12. |
Ijna
04:51
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Steve Tilston England, UK
Steve Tilston is one of our most celebrated songsmiths, widely recognised within the world of folk and contemporary music; the words, arrangements and subtle, quite superb guitar playing could be no one else.
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