Get all 14 Joshua and The Ruins releases available on Bandcamp and save 35%.
Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Techno Eyes EP, The Dreaming Season, Trespassion EP, The Collect For Saint Andrew's Day, From Paris With Shame, Stones For A Glass House [Single], Monolith, When This Was Paradise [Demo], and 6 more.
1. |
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It's getting weird. Weirder for me. Investigating all the footprints left by steps that I don't take. And it's hard, but it's easy to see all the manipulative little power plays that I could try to make to turn the tides of an ocean of tears to come crashing on my shores, just to peer into a few secret keyholes by slamming shut every open door. I can't honestly be serious. Neurotic isn't curious. Every person in my life has offered up the same advice: hang in there you’ve got this/it. Keep doing what you’re doin’. What else did you expect with something called "The Everest Ruin" but a failure the size of the biggest mountain on earth? You've spun nothing but compromise and lies since declaring its birth, waiting for the praise to assist you in assessing and appraising its worth, so that you can finally go forth, and give some direction to the life you thought you started moving north. You are walking beside me whether you know it or not. Down every empty littered street and every vacant, cluttered lot. Feet glued to the footsteps of my shadow of a doubt, as I smile and barely skim the surface of all I want to scream out. Every lie and every awkward fear pushing to the core, until the sounds as they invade my ears don't sound so foreign anymore. Maybe that’s what it means.
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2. |
True Colors
05:11
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Breaking hearts and making art must be the perfect life. Make your observations and your little white lies with the brush of your palette knife. And you go anywhere that you want, you do whatever you feel. If the whole world is your canvass, what’s left to render as real? It’s not your fault if you spill the salt. It’s expendable anyway. So throw those little boulders over other people’s shoulders, and be quick to say that you go anywhere that you want. You do whatever you feel. You’re the queen of your own little world behind your paint-stained curtain of steel. Head hung down, maybe she’ll come around if the decision alone is hers. Hanging by a thread, my friend, she’ll cut you down with her favorite pair of scissors. She goes anywhere that she wants. She’ll do whatever she please. She’d let you crawl after her for years just for the hues of the blues in the bruises on your knees. When everything is just fuel for the fire, I can’t believe you got me again. The ruins left by each tornado’s spire…. Why couldn’t I see?
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3. |
Arms
03:57
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Well I already paid my dues crying down by the riverside. And I ain’t coming home to you if there is no darkness in the corners where you hide. No, don’t go like this. Don’t go like this. Don’t go like this. Just go like THIS. And you can radiate all you want, because I know just how you shine. And there won’t be one more tear shed for this, because you will understand all of it in time. Just go.
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4. |
Double Helix
05:08
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There are two sides to every story, and from now on I’ll be on yours. A lovers’ quarrel is not fought for glory or keeping points and highest scores. When you feel it in your heart and in your head and what you thought was a doughnut turns out to be a whole grain loaf of bread…. Honesty is about conflict, and Intimacy about honesty. Your deepest fears are not for hiding nor conviction treating modestly. When you’re screaming in your heart and in your head, all you have to do is come back and share the same bed. Flailing in the fear of waves, frantically grasping for a breath in the top foot of the water over miles and miles of depth. But if you feel it in your heart and in your head, let not the whys and wherefores have your soul misled. No two sides can be alike, lest the pool go all but dry. One and one is always two, and We will still be You and I. And I feel it in my heart and in my head: to make you happy and make good on all the things I ever said. Like two dragons, wind and lightning, cyclones fly like never known, tethered close by celestial kite string to make a spirit all its own. And I feel you in my heart and in my head, so we’ll join our hands and walk, in the wonder of being wed.
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5. |
The Dreaming Season
03:55
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I feel like I'm making a gigantic mistake. I’m polishing the silver on the Titanic as I patiently wait for the iceberg sloping in the distance like a break-even analysis to end our voyage down the path of least resistance in a chilling paralysis. I didn’t read your email, but it looked like you had some good thoughts. When I say you’re a good friend and reliable, what I’m really saying is that I’m not. All I want in life is a little bit of ethical success. I need to cut ties with anything that looks like it will regress into a credit-destroying, excuse-deploying, god-awful un-holy mess--for if I spare the rod, I might risk implying caress. The business model is fine, we just don’t have any people. Don’t talk to me about feasibility when all that you have is feeble. I hate filling out W2s, but I think they get used for a reason. After all the scars I've perused you'd think I could tell a bruise from a lesion. The malady is: your goals and reality simply have no cohesion. So I won’t be the glue that gets you through the rest of your Dreaming Season.
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6. |
Predator
05:26
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When will I have my reward? When will I have my revenge? When will I have my reward? When will I have my revenge? The choice is mine to draw my line of best fit befitting in the sands of time. I think it's time I've left this shore. There is no need to wait anymore because: It comes when you do not want it. It comes when you get your act together. Hunter, when you become the hunted, just start with the good and it will get better. Arc shunted to ground, but you have found your spark remains unfettered by the storm. Despite this inclement weather, you still have one stunt to perform. It feels like I've been here before. It feels like I'm coming unhinged. When will I have my reward? When will I have my revenge? The choice is clear, if free from fear: It is time for me to steer and take ownership of this helm. There is no need to be overwhelmed because…. Why even try anymore? Why even try it again? It feels like I've been here before. When will I have my revenge? Though the waters toss we are not lost, as we loose the yoke of the albatross. The way is long, but life is short. There is no need to stay in this port because it comes when you do not want it. It comes when you get your act together. Hunter, when you become the hunted, start with the good and it will get better. Ark running aground but you have found your spark remains unfettered by the storm. Despite this inclement weather, you still have one stunt to perform.
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7. |
Heart Throb
04:32
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She says “baby, come back to bed. Close the door and block out the light. I need to spend some time in some of my favorite places. I didn’t sleep all that well last night.” And when I lay back down I can hear the sound of your heart beating for me, and it goes…. We get a late start to the day; a homemade breakfast, and a hike in the woods. And in the afternoon we let come what may, letting the evening evolve as it should. And when I lay back down, I can hear the sound of your heart, beating for me, and it goes….
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8. |
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I thought this was supposed to be anonymous. My glass half full was always bottomless until it dropped out, and I opted out without a drop left, embracing drought at the drop of old worn out hats just so I could drop my kids off at school. Coffee and cigarettes for a room of fools with nothing left but handshakes and hellos. I’m slurring my words through my southern drawl. I sure could use the comfort of a little bit of Southern Comfort for my withdrawal. Working class, TV and flask. To mask the alienation of my total self. Scraping together scraps as I pull on my bootstraps toward a life of wealth, and mental health, far away from the ashes of the bellows. Now, some would say the spectre moaning “exploitation” has hitherto been unable to rule. But its undertaker never intended it to be buried in the soil of a nation neo-feudal. Means to ends--to means of production. Relationships among a few close friends hinging on destruction and production crews at Fox News, to misconstrue an elevated view for the benefit of a few refined, refinery fellows.
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9. |
Life Of Plenty
06:21
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Uhh let’s call this, uh, meeting to order. First item on the agenda…let’s open the floor. You!? Go ahead. I’m feeling lucky I don’t give a SHUCKS, eliding my words and slurring my verbs. If you’ve got ‘em, you might as well smoke ‘em now, ‘cause there’s no work and I don’t wanna work anyhow. These years will go down in the history books of American life as some of the worst. I know the world is filled with fools and greed, but how do you give people the axe, and put the knives in their backs, and call them the tools they need? If I’m bored and listless why not just start a business? I’ll sell my gold and take the vacation of a lifetime! I don’t qualify for welfare, so I’ll pretend I still have healthcare. If I’m worth nothing, then doing nothing is just fine with me. All the time I’ve spent chipping away like a slave to the 1%, I’ve gotten nothing and just bent over reverently. But why lament? A crumbling government and no way to pay for the rent!? From now on I’m living the life of plenty. Oh, thanks. Thanks for sharing. Anybody else? Ohhh yeah, you. In the middle, with the haircut? Yeah. With the funding cuts you know we’re all like “shucks!” There’s no denying, I should be applying, but what has trying in this tilted system gotten you so far? Are you lucid enough for the American dream resting on a pillow, bursting at the seams with student and medical debt? Place your bets! It’s time to wake up if you haven’t yet. In your bipartisan schism, I’ll drive a wedge of democratic socialism: we finally got ourselves a piece of the Occupy. What happened to my freedoms? If they don’t join you beat them. Habeas is nothing but a corpse since the Defense Bill was re-authorized. All the time I’ve spent chipping away like a slave to the 1%, I’ve gotten nothing and just bent over reverently. But why lament? A crumbling government and no way to pay for the rent?! From now on I guess we’re all living the life of plenty. Absolutely phenomenal! Well hey, thank you so much. Well before we move on, we need to have our sponsor up here to say a few words! Take it away! This is your lot, rented though it is, so accept and man your station. You need not cultivate a sociological imagination. Just remain convinced that where you are Lies in the merit of what you do, and don’t pull your bootstraps up so high as to glimpse an elevated view. For there can be no top to an even playing field! And surely no one is skimming off the top of your labor’s yield! Just keep your nose to the grindstone, and everything will be fine. And we’ll use it as your gravestone when you collapse from the assembly line. Hey! The elevated view is simply not for you.
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10. |
When It's Published
08:18
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I stepped off of the plane into a state to which I would swear I’d never return. I was greeted by a man with a ponytail who told me of its downtrodden people and how they and their crops got burned. You know, I don’t remember his name. I don’t remember a thing he said. Remember his name. I only remember the foliage out the window looking subtly different than anything I’d seen in Missouri. I exited the shuttle and scuttled off to the lodge in an unnecessary, sophomoric hurry, and the cicada killers chased me away from my cabin door for four consecutive tries, and on the fifth I looked up and accidentally into your eyes. I returned with my laptop to the main foyer and quickly realized I was the youngest of all the new recruits, sampling the smell of 1980s perfume and the faded greys in the faded grey of broken-in suits. And the session topics were all myopic, and I felt foolish and lonely as I lamented the blunder of coming here all this way just to get an Abraham Lincoln impersonator’s cell phone number. I don’t remember his name. I don’t remember a thing he said. I only remember he was adamant about Illinois unjustly stealing all of the fame. About the tourism commission and their war of attrition over the rights to his historic fictitious name, and as I picked away at some unfortunate steak/snake, I divined helplessly for the wellspring of a common ground, making my uncertain rounds around the room when suddenly you turned around. We spoke for a while and your demeanor and smile made me feel ill-equipped and totally pathetic. The way the light hit your unusual green eyes and sweater told me they were wise, and it was synthetic. And in an instant I found my intrigue requited in a walk with your colleagues on which I was invited, and when they decided to turn back on the golf course mid quest and we pressed on, I felt the pressure mounting in my chest. I don’t remember their names. I don’t remember a thing they said. I just remember the city lights glowing from the top of a cliff overlooking that sad town. Sharing perspectives and the quiet excitement and the very real fear on the summit of plummeting down. And a moment of silence tested the spacetime of the three feet and thirty years between us. You know, we knew we could have done anything, and no one would have seen us. But we just stared into the starry night, silhouettes traced in light, marveling at the stones passing from one to the next like immortal Wood Elves right at home and all too aware of their diminishing fantasy. And we walked right back down that hill knowing full well we never would and never will in any other sense than that magical but long-past present tense that few have glimpsed and many cannot see. And the next day I attended a presentation on differences in volunteerism across generations. And now years later I wonder how our years influenced us in that situation, but I contend that age could have been transcended by those sensations, but…I don’t remember your name, don’t remember a thing you said. I just remember the business card you gave me as a souvenir of one of the strangest nights of all my days, on a mid-spring night’s awakening painstakingly trying to count just one of the hypothetical ways. But there is no comparison. The disparity in tallying the rings of our trees that we left in the forest on that sheer ledge will be the divide that separates the gentle breeze that pulls at their leaves from the roaring wind just over the edge. And they’ll be cut down when they’re older and chipped and shipped off to smolder in a pile packed into pulp and pressed into the pages about differing ages in an article by Ken Culp. And when all he wrote has finally been printed and pushed into a tote, the hints of that breeze will leap from my throat like the last gasp of the God Almighty. Yo know, come to think of it, I think his name was Jessie. I think his name was Richard. I think their names were Karen. I think your name was
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11. |
J. Edgar Prufrock
04:44
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“I did nothing of the sort!” I exclaimed in a miserable retort to the grievance my future self levied, with my conscience and albatross still growing heavy. I should have been a pair of wire strippers bouncing across the shop room floor. And I’d call it a sin, but I don’t think a peach this sour was one the tree of knowledge bore. I have nothing to report! I’m honing my edge and holding down the fort. An object at rest, I’m doing my best to suppress the waking pounding in my chest. Oh yes. I should have been a pair of shiny forceps careening across the operating room floor. I’d call it a sin, but I don’t think a peach this sour was one the tree of knowledge bore. Now, I always said as my last resort I’d shave my head and seek out support, rob a bank and thanklessly act out the last half of Groundhog’s Day. I should have been a pair of salad tongs bounding across that tiled kitchen floor. And I’d call it a sin, but I don’t think a peach this sour was one the tree of knowledge bore. I should have been a pair of claws scuttling across those silent floors, and I’d jump right in, but I don’t think a beach this shallow was ever fit to call a shore. I’d call you Success to your face. I’d call you a greater success if we traded places. I, we, you--could have, would have, should have been there--by now.
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12. |
Two Years (Interlude)
01:15
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Hey man, ...
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13. |
Hot Air Balloons
07:31
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I really want to wish you well. It’s something that I have to tell myself almost every single day; to let you go yours, and to go my own way. I understand you don’t think of it as often as I hope I won’t. But the hard stop of your ellipses has eclipsed the glory days with a woeful debt your lip service barely begins to pay. The winds are unrelenting on the moral higher ground. Where idle kings have lost better things on the steep paths tumbling down. I’d ask you for some decency but I’ve a shortage of my own. So I’ll pray for peace and to be released, and I’ll just leave you alone. It’s hard to say whether things might have gone a different way. It’s nothing. One day we’ll reconnect, say the amends we’re due as friends. We’ll replay each segment for half of the effect. I’m not going to write to you, I’m not going to rub it in. I won’t pursue my own success just to show you what could have been. Lest the fruits of labor rot, I’ve my own row to tend. I don’t ever want to see you, but I hope we meet again. Swords turned to plowshares, and hatchets in the ground. I’ll hum a different tune ‘til I’m not haunted by the sound. I’d ask you for some leniency, but I’ve a shortage of my own, so I will pray for peace and to be released, and I, I’ll just leave you alone. When I get on a roll I have to wonder what role I played: that’s everything. How what I meant got lost in the ways it was conveyed. Would it have gotten any better if either of us had stayed? Or was it me all along who shattered all we ever made? Looking back is easy once you’ve covered ample ground; to circle back when what has gone has time to come around. I’d tally your transgressions, but I’ve a long list of my own. So I will pray for peace and to be released, and I’ll adjust, and I will just leave you alone.
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14. |
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[It's nothing.]
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15. |
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You are like a cardboard box--I'll bet you wonder how. Because I’m ambivalent about keeping you around. You collapse at the first sign of legitimate pressure, and you fold, but you’re not easy to stow away, or just throw away. My current love affair asks me to get rid of you. She says you can find one of those in the alley behind any appliance store (I guess in that way you are less like a cardboard box). But what if I want to keep it to put things on—like misgivings and shortcomings? I’m sure I could find a use for it somehow. I could put a scarf over it like my stepfather did, just cover it up. Use it as an end table; furniture in the room. I guess I could store you in the attic, gathering dust and brown recluse spiders. Because you know you always want to keep the original package, in case you ever want to make a return. ;)
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Joshua and The Ruins Kansas City, Missouri
Joshua and The Ruins is the singer-songwriter music of Josh King. This website is the home of ALL his music--indie folk, progressive metal, video game music, experimental noise, classical Gregorian chant. Roll the dice and click on your new favorite song. :) ... more
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