Waves Don't Die (Everything Is Waves)

Spotting the titular graffiti on a fire exit door in central Gloucester somehow reminded me of Thomas Leer's latest song, Death Of A Dream, released in late January.

 

 

It also reminded me that a year ago yesterday (25th), I suggested that I might have a go at an Imaginary Compilation Album for The Vinyl Villain, focusing on Thomas Leer's work as a solo artist, with Claudia Brücken as Act and his collaboration with Robert Rental.

I am currently working on an ICA but not this one, which has been a work-in-progress for some time. For once, I'm kind of glad as my usual rabbit hole expeditions subsequently led me to the Future HIstoric site on Bandcamp. Here for the past decade, Thomas has uploaded "Collections of previously unreleased material spanning the last three decades & up to the present.", from full-length albums to standalone tracks.

Death Of A Dream is the 13th release to date, eight minutes of sweeping synth strings collapsing into pulsing beats, Leer's cracked, vulnerable and electronically treated voice conveying a world weariness. Seven decades on this tiny planet and the acknowledgement that we are "as big as life", but "as small as nothing in the universe".

 

It's an affecting song and I've been poised to purchase more of Leer's treasure this coming Bandcamp Friday. Great though it's been to discover the wealth of material on Future Historic, it'll make a 10-song ICA all the more difficult to decide on...

 

 

 

Death Of A Dream

I live on an island,

on the top of a building,

in a town I don't recognise.

I don't fear the devil, 

coz he lives in me, 

tempered by the good that's eating at me.

Don't feel sorry, 

don't feel guilt, 

you can't burn bridges that you never built. 

I'm ready & I'm willing & able to testify, 

to what I can see, 

the world's in a breach.

I am broken 

they finally got me, 

it took a long time to get here,

but I'm broken,

cut off at the knees,

I caught the disease & I'm broken.
 

Take it to the rain, 

wash it all away.

Sometimes I wonder if the worlds worth saving, 

when I look at the way you're behaving. 

 But I knew what I was doing & I did it anyway.
You got the way to say "Hi", 

to make me feel low.

You're my vision,

dear to me,

a good decision, 

on my part,

you're my vision,

like nuclear fission,

in my soul. 

How do you feel,

how do you feel,

are you hiding or do you want to reveal.

Death of a Dream, 

here I am as big as life,

as small as nothing in the universe.