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Quitters

by Lauren O'Connell

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1.
Every Space 04:18
Well if it's better that way You'd be the first to say so Maybe I wasn't so sure But it doesn't matter who shot first It's not about what anyone deserves If you should ever feel bad Consider it a study In just how far it is Between a hand you touch and an arm you twist It's not about what was attached to it And when you start to tire You will look for something To fill some empty space Just 'til you empty it again It's a dirty trick It's a cold advantage But I wouldn't mind To be the steady hand that cuts the line It's not about recovering lost pride If it's better that way Why would I not just do that But I prefer to keep Every mistake I won't admit Keep it alive but keep it hid With bullets that I never bit Until I make them all again Lay it down, wait it out, I'll be around Lay it down, you need a quick way out, I'll be around Lay it down, wait it out, I'll be around I f it's better that way Why would I not just do that To know that living is Hearing every beat your heart don't skip Every end you don't begin Every sin you need not forgive And every space you don't fill in
2.
The door is shut but the walls are thin I hear somebody move within And I think how I could knock They'd open up, I'd say that I Was there to read the meter and I'd like Just two minutes inside They'd let me in I'd slip upstairs I'd walk around the rooms up there With no shoes on I'd run my hands along the paint I'd ask why they changed everything around And they'd ask me to leave You will lose a place that once was yours But you'd best not come around So if you don't want to feel rejected Assume that somebody tore it down My mind goes to other buildings Like the one that I first met you in And I think I could go to your place And ask who you have met since we Last talked but I must gracefully refrain 'Cos that's just what people do You will lose somebody that you love But you'd best not write or call So if you don't want to go crazy Assume that they stopped loving at all But your gut still knows that those stairs still creak And the walls still talk and the roof still leaks And a heart still wants and some looks still kill And a life lives on with a space to fill And it will, and it will, and it will… Holding on is just part of letting go But you'd best just walk away When your life stops being your business If just to prove you can keep busy anyway Yeah, holding on is just part of letting go That's what you said when you left town But I'm afraid that on my worst day I'll go myself and I will burn that fucker down Baby I will burn you down Baby I will burn you down
3.
If it was up to me to build this place Well I'd have made the miles it takes a little shorter And I think I would tell the hills to lay to waste And soak up all the Finger Lakes So I could straighten the lines Yeah, so I could straighten the lines to anywhere If I was told to know my place Well, I think I would choose a space closer to yours And I would use those lines I drew to get real close A finger on my pulse because I think that it's strongest there Yeah, I think that it's strongest there near you 'Cos I do not belong to the night Mystery or song or moonlight To be a far-begotten soul, I don't know what they do Don't know where such souls go I belong to you If the ground should start to break Well, I think I would allocate more of my bones To keep our legs up and the tiny ones inside our hands Would plant themselves in door frames And each other or at least I hope With each other, or at least I hope they would 'Cos I do not belong to the night Mystery or song or moonlight To be a far-begotten soul, I don't know what they do Don't know where such souls go 'Cos I belong to you If any part of us should start to die I'd dig a well and bleed it dry and wait there For something to breathe 'cos I believe or at least I try That nothing is just born to die 'Cos I think that we'd all just wait Yeah, I think that we'd all just wait if that were true 'Cos I do not belong to the night Mystery or song or moonlight To be a far-begotten soul, I don't know what they do Don't know where such souls go 'Cos I belong to you I belong to you I belong to you so long as this world allows me to
4.
I am giving myself headaches I am eating foods I hate So when I go back to things I do want I can appreciate the change Some days I will look up cities Where the weather's worse than here Invent the name of someone who lives there Feel kind of bad and have a beer And I can prove that I've tried No, I am resigned To the ways that things are alright I am making some new friends here Who I can like and then avoid So I can reaffirm my reasons For calling loneliness a choice When I revisit old feelings I declare them better left behind 'Cos I think love is just the act Of thinking you're in love at the time And I can prove that I've tried No, I am resigned To the ways that things are alright
5.
There's a rattle in the dashboard And it's arguing with me But I'm not sure if it's the voice Of anything better than vanity It says I'll remember every city For long after I leave But no matter what I do They will not remember me I want something returned to me But I have known some people These glowing singularities One square foot of ground so solid Unburdened and unburdening Oh, to be the single soul of an empire A willfully uncharted map To live and ask nothing of anyone And be content to get just that I want something returned to me Should I await some revelation Some great blessing from above So every memory be quelled Of anyone I might have loved And every mile the stuff of legend Every thought be pivotal Every move within my soul Be jury, judge and criminal No, I want something returned to me I want something returned to me ---------------- Some days I fear gravity Is gonna up and forget about me Some days I fear you Are gonna up and forget me too Please don't forget me I will be home soon
6.
There's a scar on my lip One that you can't help but kiss From when I was a kid I got it like this See, I was three years old, maybe younger still Crashed headlong into a window sill And was surprised when I broke instead of it That's the scar that's on my lip That's what you're kissing when we kiss When you leave, you will be fine You will be fine When it gets real late So late that it's not late anymore And I'm alone, awake Just creaking with the floors I can beg the sun to let me sleep Don't know what stake it holds in the hours I keep I'll push it down, but these burning hands won't seem to do All my efforts fall right through The morning makes me think of you When you leave, you will be fine You will be fine But if we're talking about distractions Everything is a distraction Except when your blood flows 'Cos your heart beats And when your ribs rise 'Cos your lungs breathe And if the earth moves Where would you be With what you love more Where does that put me When you leave, you will be fine You will be fine You will be fine
7.
I've been trying to quantify All of the wrong that one can pack into a lie And I've been trying to put on a scale Just how bad all of that wrong should make me feel Because they told me once when I was young That liars are as liars do And if you do, it's off to Hell with you No smiling, kid, I speak the truth But I've a sneaking feeling they were liars too So logically, then, we're all hypocrites But does it make it better or make it worse to be aware of it? I'm convincing myself that it's all relative And if there's a God, when He forgives, I think He must consider it 'Cos I've been noticing confusion in the laws He made The nature of the truth and where it bends and where it breaks And where I twisted it to my benefit When this man said he was in love with me And I thought that he was dumb to be So I pretended that I was asleep Called it free will what he willed to believe And it ended, so I guess it's just as well But that's why sometimes I think I might go to Hell And I worry too, how I never mentioned to you How I drove your car while you were gone A mile with the parking brake still on 'Cos it seems to me, you wait too long And you may as well have not meant well all along And I'm hoping hard if it's the thought that counts That you don't ever have to know what I think about And every soul can always fit through Heaven's door With the weight of things it never told anyone before
8.
I was thinking out scenarios with you I was thinking if you die before I do I'd lay my things out on the lawn With a sign I scrawled out front that says "Free to a good home, take it 'til it's gone" 'Cos I think all those things would be no use And I was thinking if I die before you do All I would ask is don't get mad I threw away my cigarettes No, that's a lie, but I won't buy another pack My eyes might dart My ears might ring But it helps to think we are made out of the same things And sometimes I get anxious being here Checking lists and putting things in gear I'm aware that paper cuts cut clean But one wound closes, there's another And my fingers bleed and drip recurring themes My eyes might dart My ears might ring But it helps to think we are made out of the same things And everything was beautiful last night I lost my glasses, looked around At everything reduced to areas of light And you and I My eyes might dart My ears might ring But it helps to think we are made out of the same things
9.
O holy ghost of eternal discontentment Help yourself to the helm, be an anchor when I let you in O holy weight, o tremendous radiant doubt Come blend in with something that I need till I can't pick you out 'Cos in every place I've ever lived in The same voices are talking from in the next room It's not so bad that I'd call it a habit Just something I can't seem to stop wanting to do There's chatter that's less of good luck and more of poor taste Some good fortune's no more than a joke or a blessing misplaced 'Cos in every place I've ever lived in The same voices are talking from in the next room It's not so bad that I'd call it a habit Just something I can't seem to stop wanting to do But even so I don't know How these shadows can grow When nothing ever casted them out How I came to be at the feet Of some dark deity No one ever told me about With every whisper of some slight absolution Every angle's begrudgingly laughing at me Every word is the joke that I've stolen But I've committed and truly it's all in the delivery
10.
White Noise 04:32
I'm taking syllables that I want to lose meaning And painting them in white up on the ceiling To swim around the air while I am sleeping And in the morning they'll be a little bit blurrier And one morning I'll be squinting from my bed To make out the letters overhead But they've blurred into a cloud up there instead And I'm inviting you to be white paint I'm inviting you to be white paint Where do you send things to When your heart ain't got no room I'm set on banishing My undying love Unwavering favor of All the wrong things Those syllables will sound against my skull To echo and overlap until they're dull To blend in with the hum inside the walls And I'm inviting you to be white noise I'm inviting you to be white noise Where do you send things to When your heart ain't got no room I'm set on banishing My undying love Unwavering favor of All the wrong things And I'd like to know how difficult is it To recreate established laws of physics To dwell inside the confines of a minute Where everything just drones, null and void And in that instant you are just white noise

credits

released March 2, 2012

Produced by Lauren O'Connell
Engineered & mixed by Oz Fritz at Prairie Sun Studios in Cotati, CA
Mastered by Paul Stubblebine
Album design and photography by Jeffrey Marini
All songs written by Lauren O'Connell

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Lauren O'Connell Los Angeles, California

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