Continuing from our last entry, by Aldous Harding, another vocalist with a special form of melancholy, with work from the American artist's fourth solo album, Empire Builder, 2016. There is something very particular about Gibson's folk-indie delivery – it keeps consonant sounds to a bare minimum, so her voice sounds like a gentle sax or brass instrument, and oddly beautiful. Empire Builder is a love song that evokes a long journey, not merely by the video. Meanwhile Two Kids trips along more merrily in a country style, but contains a cute vulnerability that has just as powerful a melancholy.
This is not an escape
But I don't know how to hold somebody without losing my grip
You'll say I was bound to leave
Since I first stepped across your borders
Since I crawled into your skin
Thought I heard you whisper in the dark
That you knew where the light would be
Thought I saw your shape against the black
Thought I felt you moving beside me
We are not alone and we are more alone than we've ever been
So hurry up and lose me
Hurry up and find me, again
So I'll pass the lumber mills
I'll pass the coal mines and the parks
And the dried up oil fields
I'll pass a thousand lonely pines that bend the backs against the sun
But I'll mistake the station birds for the sound of my phone ringing
Thought I heard you whisper in the dark
That you knew where the light would be
Don't wait for me to walk a straight line
You can only hold your breath so long
We are not alone and we are more alone than we've ever been
So hurry up and lose me
Hurry up and find me, again
But I am no less bound to you
Than when I crossed into your silence
When I held your solitude
But you never liked it
When I'd play dead
And you wondered why my love songs are always the grieving kind
Why I wander off to search for my reflection in the crowd
Oh, forget I said love
And also, don't forget I said love
We are not alone and we are more alone than we've ever been
So hurry up and lose me
Hurry up and find me again.
Two kids, no tricks, only rich in time
Saying "Never look back
Throw out every sorrow we've had."
Sneak a move, trade a roof for the open sky
Living on luck
Tethering our hopes to a pickup truck
[Chorus]
They'll tell us, honey
"You've gotta know, you've gotta know where you're going."
But you are my sun, my northern lights, my southern cross
And if we're gonna die young
We're gonna die with a love song in our mouths
Two hearts, new start, every card is wild
There in your arms, with the radio up and the windows down
Loose hands, slow dance under crooked stars
We were clumsy at love
It was a shaky two-step in a parking lot
[Chorus]
They'll tell us, dear
"You better fear, you better fear it all."
But you are my sun, my northern lights, my southern cross
If we're gonna die young
We're gonna die with a love song in our mouths
And maybe my darling
There's more than following an endless road
And maybe someday we're gonna trade
Our freedom for a better home
For a house and a yard, and a son and a daughter
And a steady job, but not today
Two kids, no tricks, only rich in time
Never look back, follow every moment we've got.
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