Get all 10 John Ludi releases available on Bandcamp and save 50%.
Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of The Quiet Earth Orchestra-World Without Words 2, Mistakes Have Been Made, Rage (Remastered 2022), Obsolescence, The Quiet Earth Orchestra, Soft War, Rise Above or Fall Below, Hell's Laughter and Heaven's Ache, and 2 more.
1. |
Never Be
05:54
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Never Be
The Poet looks for an answer to a world gone awry
crafting words, sculpting notions...with every tricks he’s learned he tries
“I’ll trigger some buried impulse to pull us back before the brink,
the spread of psychic revolution: sleepers rousing to think.”
The Lover searches for his other...the missing part of who is whole.
He wanders through confused connections for one to compliment his soul.
“Here you stand now before me and our defenses come undone
something in your touch restores me, as if life has just begun.”
Never be, never see, the dream recedes.
Never be, never see, yet still complete.
The Seeker yearns for the connection lost when each of us comes here.
He longs for his ascension absent of limits, doubts, and fears.
“I remove all hesitations, to this final step resolved.
I then extend in all directions as my boundaries dissolve.”
Never be, never see, the dream recedes.
Never be, never see, yet still complete.
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2. |
I Was Never Here
05:00
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I Was Never Here
After all this time I've become a ghost...empty vessel, discarded host.
The young don't notice the pale gray men, just as single-minded as I was then.
It's like I've disappeared, faded and unclear...maybe I was never here at all.
My ambitions are old and tattered. My desires no longer matter.
My great dreams all lay in dust...corroding in my heart of rust.
Once a player upon the stage, now a footnote, a crumpled page.
Everyone just looks right through me, everyone just walks on by.
It seems that now I'm just a phantom, a silent specter with empty eyes.
It's like I've disappeared, faded and unclear...maybe I was never here at all.
I'm a song that's almost completed. Slings and arrows left me defeated.
Every line but the last verse sung. I once was vital, once was young.
Once a player upon the stage, now a footnote, a crumpled page.
Everyone just looks right through me, everyone just walks on by.
It seems that now I'm just a phantom, a silent specter with empty eyes.
I'm still here, I call.
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3. |
The Ground
06:03
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(Coming soon.)
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4. |
Gone
05:56
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The lidless eye of the sun
feeds the greening day
as vulture fly and falcons cry
for their daily prey.
Dry leaves dance upon the ground
restless in the wind
patterns shift in sacredness
unconscious of sin.
All this ebb and flow
the scented breeze that blows
could all disappear tomorrow.
The purring of the phone.
The welcome voice of a friend.
The music and the lights.
This web on which we depend.
All the stop and go
All the lines and roads
could all disappear tomorrow.
I will miss you, you will be gone...forever.
The musky smell of skin
The rapturous caress
The heat and the release
The ecstasy and stress.
All the to and fro
The way the passions grow
could all disappear tomorrow.
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5. |
The King of Silence
03:40
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The King of Silence
A hollow empty ghost
meanders in a lifeless place
with no purpose or point
and no expression on his face.
And he gathers dust, absent of all pleasure
as he slowly rusts measure by measure.
On his horizon: clouds
and in his past, sallow regrets.
His every step it aches
towards new disappointments met.
He hears other people always laughing, playing
as his face breeds wrinkles and his hair starts graying.
All hail the king, the king of silence.
The static emptiness.
The droning endlessness.
This wishing for a spark
or for the final rest.
Days pass so blankly,
pale hopes beg him stay.
Enough strength still lingers
to breathe another day.
All hail the king, the king of silence.
I am the king, the king of silence.
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6. |
Drift By
03:07
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(Coming soon.)
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7. |
Shooting Star
04:14
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Shooting Star
The time you spend and thoughts you share
the love you make, the soul you bare.
The hand you hold, the gaze you meet
stories you tell, thoughts you complete.
And is this real and is this true:
the road that beckons ahead of you?
And though your plans were far afield
to love you release, to love you yield.
What was before now fades away
a new life comes to fill your days
and though it could bring blood, sweat and tears
you hold its promise despite your fears.
There's beauty here in smaller things
and a comfort that it brings.
Oh shooting star, how far you've roamed...
has your wandering spirit found a home?
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8. |
Knife or Feather
05:01
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Knife or Feather
Help me to find you. Help me to find my way to you
I look in your eyes for a respite from worry
all that meets my gaze is reactive fury
Are you really there or are you a projection?
Was that closeness I felt or just self-deception?
Help me to bind this. Help me to just make this work.
I reach out to you, you push my hand away
and you twist and turn everything that I say.
I'd give all my ground to ending this impasse
diplomacy it fails and our peace it never lasts
And you're lookin' at me like I'm just a mistake
and much more of this and I'll agree with you.
Should I be the knife or should I be the feather
Should we together fly or should I cut the tether?
Help me to leave you. Help me to just go back home.
One more time I give up. Once more I retreat
Add it to the list of all my sad defeats.
Pathos it prevails...the patterns repeat again.
Will it be this way until the bitter end?
Should I be the knife or should I be the feather?
No matter how I try, I can't make anything better.
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9. |
The Veil
04:55
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(Coming soon.)
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10. |
Choices
05:55
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I thought of you today while counting the gray
and all the lines around my eyes
Creases upon my face, they each have their place
one of them is the mark of you.
Where has time taken you, how is your passage through
this life that works to pull us down?
Is your smile still a thing that could make the angels sing...
and did they ever sing for you?
So did you find a love and are you hand in glove
and did they give you what you need?
Is your heart warm and mild or is it strained and wild?
Was this world at all fair to you?
Has your light lost its shine, well so has mine...
all of this living takes its toll.
Remembering your glow, the grace with which you flowed
did that grace forge a path for you?
We are the choices we have made
you walked your road and I walked mine
what price, if any, have we paid
for one lone future left behind?
I’ve wandered all around but rarely saw the ground
where my roots could find a lasting home.
In soils both strange and fair I've found both woe and care...
did this world feed and nurture you?
Now I face my decline, I'm worn in heart and mind
with few dreams left to call my own.
I’ve felt both love and loss, living brings both joy and cost
has it cost anything for you?
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11. |
The End?
06:38
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The End?
Can I take it all back...return this life to the rack?
I've fallen so far off track. For every virtue, a lack.
Give it back, decline, retract (was any of it but an act?)
I suppose I'll get by, after which I'll likely die.
(How long should one try when the promise is but a lie?
“Be strong and belong, your reward won't take too long.”
I resist, but time insists...and little but regrets persist.
But I hear the birds outside and there's a song I'd like to try
and there's a bit of traveling that I'd like to do.
And I'm curious to see what the day will bring to me
and what sort of trouble can I get into.
How much more time in this frame? How long will I have this name?
The end grows closer by day as I lose the will to stay.
Fall away, all away...give it all up today.
Fade to gray, why delay...find that better place.
But there's all this work to do which I've barely gotten to
and there's all those friends that I really should call.
And the coffee is strong today and I've still got things to say
and so many miles before I hit the wall.
When I am called and it's time to fall
I will refuse, I will not move
Dig in my heels at the final reel
I'll fight to stay, you won't take me away.
When it's my time I won't stay in line
I'll fight and resist, I will persist
I'll claw and scream to stay in this dream
As my body expires I'll cling to desire.
Remember me
Remember me
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John Ludi Madison, Wisconsin
John Ludi is a musician/singer-songwriter with a wide array of influences and lyrical interests who was "Indie" before the term even existed. Working outside of the music industry by choice has given Ludi the ability to release songs of a level of lyrical depth that are anathema to the minds of the "suits". Ludi lives off-grid in a yurt in the woods of WI and will "fight the power" til he dies. ... more
John Ludi recommends:
Part The Second
by maudlin of the Well
An absolutely stunning album with more dimensions that I can list in 200 words. Moments of pure transcendent beauty commingle with outbursts of manic energy & lyrics about astral projection. A fave!
go to album
Sing To God Vol I & II
by Cardiacs
RIP Mr. Smith. An incredible work of absolute musical genius by one of the greatest musical visionaries in rock. Dirty Boy in particular is a spiral of twisted melodic intensity with few equals.
go to album
A brilliant collaboration between two talented musicians with some fantastic guitar and keyboard work.
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