A cover of Leonard Cohen's wonderful Hallelujah recorded in a couple hours to get back into using the 24 track.

Hallelujah

Words and music by Jeff Braine

So here we are dwarfed by the imposing marble foyer
Crushed by the gravity of this heavy pregnant silence
Ushered in, I stare at the well worn gavel
Listening to the legalese describing the way my life unravelled
You agree to the summary reflecting your intent
And I betray my soul and offer no contest

After the ink has dried on our last great hope for peace
And after the mutual character assassination has ceased
Can we ever quietly agree 
That we were both in part to blame?
With the caveat that we'll not correct our friends' misconceptions
Nor rob them of their fiercely loyal and stoic indignation
For the way I mistreated you
Or how you mistreated me

Can we at least agree
That we hope they take a lesson 
From our exaggerated lamentations of each other's failings
And find solace in the unknown unseen flaws of another's heart


Jeff Braine - A Chorus of One - Perceptum Ergo Sum

Words and music (c) Jeff Braine

Another word
Written on a dirty wall
In this filthy street
Where the rain blisters your skin
Faith? Faith comes to nothing
When all you believe
Is all you can prove
To yourself

	Label me blameles you’re only sleeping with the past
                   Where the only comfort is the promise of tomorrow
	Label me blameless, you’re the only one who sees
                   The shadows that you talk too aren’t cast by the sun……..  

Another lie written on the burning page
Of an invented history that says our fathers did no wrong
Blame? Blame comes to nothing!
Cos you can’t point 
Your finger
At yourself

	Label me blameles you’re only sleeping with the past
	Where the only comfort is the promise of tomorrow
	Label me blameless, you’re the only one who sees
	The shadows that you talk too aren’t cast by the sun 

You think it’s me…. 
It’s you….. 
You say it’s me… 
Its you….

Jeff Braine - Of Faded Flesh and Iodine - Label Me Blameless

Words and music (c) Jeff Braine

Through London’s filthy streets I wandered alone
No direction, destination unknown
My first words constructed walls of deceit
Saved me the trouble of finding my feet
But what I’d give to be living again
Just like back before it all came tumbling down

	I’m not looking for a little England again
	I’m not looking for a little England… no not at all
	Gone are the sleepless nights, worn out and pointless fights
	But I’m not offering you excuses

Chaos born of a butterfly wing
Panic hits then let the nightmare begin
Wringing hands and subtle furrow of brow
Revealed more than conceit would allow
What I’d give to be loving again
In your arms while it all comes tumbling down

	I’m not looking for a little England again
	I’m not looking for a little England… no not at all
	Gone are the sleepless nights, worn out and pointless fights
	But I’m not offering you excuses

	I’m not looking for a little England again
	I’m not looking for a little England… no not at all
	Gone are the sleepless nights, worn out and pointless fights
	But I’m not offering you excuses

What I’d give to be worthy again
In your smile safe when it all comes falling down

	I’m not looking for a little England again
	I’m not looking for a little England… no not at all
	Gone are the sleepless nights, worn out and pointless fights
	But I’m not offering you excuses

Jeff Braine - Of Faded Flesh and Iodine - Little England

One of my first real serious songs, written when I was about 17 in my mum's kitchen.
This version is deliberately over the top and features a lot of experimentation with digital orchestras.

Words and music (c) Jeff Braine

Holding memories to ransom
Making truth from fantasy
You conjure hate from jealousy
Acts of love from secrecy
The naked truth has got no place here
Cos it’s perverted in your eyes
And in the darkness of your evil mind
You weave your tapestry of lies

	You make me out to be an animal
	Coming home late out of my mind
	You lie so much it makes me sick
	Oh you go on like a lunatic
	And you weave your tapestry of lies

Home, that’s where the heart is
At least that’s what we used to say
But now for home is where my heart aches
While I try to start living for today

	You make me out to be an animal
	Coming home late out of my mind
	You lie so much it makes me sick
	Oh you go on like a lunatic
	And you weave your tapestry of lies

Jeff Braine - Of Faded Flesh and Iodine - Tapestry of Lies

Another early song, written when I was about 16 and on holiday in Scotland. This version features about the only recording I've done using (simulated) horns.

Words and music (c) Jeff Braine

I’m building castles in the sand knowing full well the tide’ll raise ‘em to the ground
I spend my time hiding my lies in places I know they’ll never be found
I’m just an island on a raging sea 
But the storm just seems to pass round me
My life is a fortress that’ll never be broken
My thoughts and my feelings never out in the open

All around me are the charred remains, lie rusting in someone’s yesterday
It’s all too familiar for me to find things out of sight lying out of mind
Standing at the crossroads of a wishless life
Sad wind’s fury cutting like a knife
A life that’s scarred by clifftop romances
Dashed on the rocks after too many chances

Inhibitions crawl away and drown themselves for another day
Last temptations held so close, communications still remote
Southern winds and northern lights 
Pass me by like summer nights
Another bottle, another glass, 
Another lifetime comes to pass

Jeff Braine - Of Faded Flesh and Iodine - Termination of the Void

Words and music (c) Jeff Braine

Let me take another photograph, this means so much to me
Sleep with clothes that she forgot, she means so much to me
Save her hair inside a matchbox, means so much to me
Provide shelter from your world, she means so much to me

Mother of war, come lead me through your trenches and your battlegrounds
Mother of war, point out your dying sons and daughters
Mother says she loves me, but she loves death just that little bit more
Mother says she loves me, but not enough to let go

Gazing down on city lights, it means so much to me
Kisses at the lakeside, they meant so much to me
Together in the dark night, it meant so much to me
Can't forget my first time, it meant so much to me

Mother of war, come lead me through your trenches and your battlegrounds
Mother of war, point out your dying sons and daughters
Mother says she loves me, but she loves death just that little bit more
Mother says she loves me, but not enough to let go

Mother, it's time to let go
Mother, your only living son is leaving
Mother, you smothered me with too much love
Mother, you walled me in your womb alone
Mother
Mother
Mother

All your children that came before
Their unmarked graves litter the world
Where they once played before the war
Where they once prayed before their lords
You separated and walled them in
And waited for the wars to begin
Shot and maimed the dove of peace
Its message never reached the streets
Instead their steel birds took the skies
Their rotor blades rang out the war cries
Mother of war
Kill your child it's the only way

Jeff Braine - Subliminal Bulletin - Mother Of War

Take two oddly tuned guitars, an ebow, some steel measuring jugs and a bored muso and this is what you get. Excuse the dodgy singing (well, dodgier than usual). Yes the outro goes on for a while, but it was a fun jam and I just didn't have the heart to edit it down.

Words and music (c) Jeff Braine

Chrome islands, neon seas
You turned your back, you didn't see
Shifting sands, glacial flow
You haven't been, you wouldn't know
Polar winds, Northern lights
I missed your warmth those frigid nights
Midnight sun, barren wastes
I curse your absense and my haste

Anything but this
Anywhere but here
Anyone but me
Any life but mine

Blackend sand and splintered keel
Molten glass and spinner's wheel
Icons hewn by bone and zeal
The fall of stone, the rise of steel
The broadsheets sing the victor's praise
As memory rots and truth decays
Hands are dealt and gambits played
And now we stride where once we strayed

Anything but this
Anywhere but here
Anyone but me
Any life but mine

Sleeping outside city gates
In tented slums the pilgrims wait

Jeff Braine - Subliminal Bulletin - Nomad Ten

Loosely, this is a slightly more modern take on the old "Bonnie Banks of Fordie" murder ballad where the false knight on the road with his pocket knife becomes a serial killer, and there's no hero to save his final victim - only winter's deathly hand to level its cold justice.

Words and music (c) Jeff Braine 

Stone upon stone upon stone.. he stacks them high and keeps the balance perfect
A perfect little cairn to cover the fruits of his day’s labours
He doesn’t smile, it would break the symmetry of his face
He’s got no reflection in the mire where the tall reeds grow

	Stone upon stone – so cold she couldn’t struggle
	Stone upon stone – so cold she couldn’t scream
	Stone upon stone upon stone – her body just container
	Stone upon stone... To a mind confined to dream
	And obsessed with symmetry

Caught out when the sun fails and the hills bleed fire
He sleeps with the scars he thinks of as angels
Years past he could have gone on for another hour or more
But the snow’s fingers grip him as they never have before

	Stone upon stone – so cold he couldn’t struggle
	Stone upon stone – so cold he couldn’t scream
	Stone upon stone upon stone – his body’s just container
	Stone upon stone... For a mind confined to dream
	And obsessed with symmetry

	   Each action is echoed 
	   In frigid cameo
	   A lifetime resounding
	   Throughout the void around him
   	   Nobody to witness
   	   Empty pleas for forgiveness
   	   That fracture the silence
   	   One final act of violence
  
	Stone upon stone – so cold she couldn’t struggle
	Stone upon stone – so cold she couldn’t scream
	Stone upon stone upon stone – her body’s just container
	To a mind confined to dream
	And obsessed with symmetry

Jeff Braine - Subliminal Bulletin - Obsessed With Symmetry

Words and music (c) Jeff Braine

I find her where the river goes
Within the oceans ebbs and flows
I stand alone (as one who knows) beside her

Within the ripples and the squalls
In this incessant rise and fall
I'll love and hate - it's all equal
I'm tidal

And sometimes when she calls to me
I feel, not hear, her empathy
and know it's time to join her once again
Within the comfort of her smile
I'll lie content and safe awhile
Her tears welt my skin with her farewell

We touch where ocean meets the land
The rocks, the pebbles, shoals and sand
(A testiment to her demands) reside here

Stinging from the sands of time
Dying starfish, silt and brine
This is no silent suicide
I'm tidal

And sometimes when she calls to me
I feel, not hear, her empathy
and know it's time to join her once again
Within the comfort of her smile
I'll lie content and safe awhile
Her tears welt my skin with her farewell

Sometimes
Sometimes to love you is to rub salt into the wounds
Sometimes
Sometimes to love you is all I ever want to do
