Name: Solitude by Julia Bloom
Duration: 2 min 4 s
Description: Week 34 #songaweek2020. Maybe the only completely instrumental track I've ever recorded! Photo is my lovely daughter this summer at a lake in northern Minnesota. If you listen really closely you might hear my rowdy backyard squirrels who "enhanced" the lead guitar track.

I was hoping to hear something soothing and calming before going in for surgery,  and boy was this perfect!

This is wonderful. Perfect soundtrack material. The piano and guitar parts work so well together 

This is stunning Julia.Want to sit back and watch the world go by to this

Lovely...just add movie montage 😁🎶👏❤️ from David Easterling

Ooooh, I am LOVING this, Julia! It reminds me strongly of David Vandervelde & Brie Stoner. An absolute delight to enjoy tonight, thank you. :)

A lovely instrumental -- the guitar and piano work perfectly together. Well done!

Words She Heard

Week 33 #songaweek2020. I gathered up a pile of lyric ideas and made this scrappy song, which feels very much like my mind this year. Image is a screenshot of a list of all the ideas from which I drew. Several of them are found lyrics - things people said that I thought, "that could be part of a song!"

Also I credit Senator Cory Booker for helping me tie up the chorus with "I still believe in love." He said “we are called to be a nation of love”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FjmTRm8LV2c

The other day in the middle of the night I woke up
I didn’t even think I was asleep 
I can’t say that I don’t miss Colorado
But here and now is where I want to be

Dates are just a blink
Times are out of sync
But I still believe in love

COVID doesn’t care about your feelings
Your politics, your freedom or your health
Everyone I talk to’s not a racist
a thousand fingers pointing somewhere else

I try to float like a butterfly on the warm breeze
But my mind is a swarm of bumblebees
Easter scattered snow over the tulips
Silent tears rolled down my baby’s cheeks

I wanted to write about woodsmoke and lilacs
And moonlight and wine
And stars in the farthest corners of your eyes

The hippies sang the times they are a-changing
Half a century back behind us now
I don’t know where it is we think we’re going
I hope we learn to care about the how

2020 (I Still Believe In Love)

Copyright 2020
All Rights Reserved

Lyrics & Music: Erin Wolf
Guitar & Vocals: Erin Wolf

Trigger Warning: This is a heavy song which alludes to conversations around suicidal thoughts and mental illness. It's no secret to anyone paying attention that the on-going pandemic, particularly here in the US, has taken a heavy toll on many people who were already in times of crisis beforehand. We need to be able to talk about mental health when we speak of suicide prevention. 

That said, the lyrics herein, while not referencing any one situation specifically (which was intentional), do not necessarily represent a comprehensive range of experiences depending on any given person's own context. If you or a loved one needs help, please, please try to gather your strength to ask for help so you and/or your loved one can receive the correct care needed. I promise--YOU are worth it. 

1-800-273-8255 - Suicide Hotline for the United States
www.suicidepreventionlifeline.org

five things you can see
can you tell me what you see
so i know where you are

four things you can touch
can you tell me what you touch
so i see your hands

three things you can hear
can you tell me what you hear
so i can touch the air

two things you can smell
please tell me what you smell
so i hear your voice

one thing you can taste
how bitter does this taste
'cuz i can smell your fear

the war's not over
but there are battles won
i know it's hard to keep pressing on
not just trying to keep you alive
wanna see you thrive, love

do you want it
do you will it

will you want it
will you will it
will you keep it
if you let it 

your life

can you can see it, touch it, hear it, smell it, taste it
your life

see it, touch it, hear it, smell it, taste it

do you want it
do you will it
will you will
will you keep it
will you let it
will you want
will you want it

do you keep it
will you let it
do you want it
do you live it

Do You Want It

Lochinver

Week 34 #songaweek2020. Maybe the only completely instrumental track I've ever recorded! Photo is my lovely daughter this summer at a lake in northern Minnesota. If you listen really closely you might hear my rowdy backyard squirrels who "enhanced" the lead guitar track.

Solitude

"This One Night Stand Could Stand Just One More Night" (#386-#389, 200817-200828)

 * co-written with Melvin Purvis * 

Buckled up my jeans slipped my timepiece on
Headed downtown to the honky tonk
Goin' where I know I can find a dance and a drink

As I pulled up in the truck I thought I spied
Pretty little cutie with those Monroe eyes
Said a quick prayer she was there lookin' for the same thing

I held the door open and she walked right in
Knowin' how tonight could end

Never mind the same old pick up lines
Just one question your place or mine
I don't even care if we close the blinds
This one night stand could stand just one more night

I went what do you say we grab a cold one for the road
She said you got game but this ain't my first rodeo
Yeah she saw me comin' from my watch down to my boots

Like an old time cowgirl she headed me off at the pass
Every time I opened my mouth she shut me down fast
Kinda' started thinkin' that I bit off more than I could chew

Sittin' there wonderin' how the night would end
When she grabbed me by the hand

Never mind the same old pick up lines
Just one question your place or mine
I don't even care if we close the blinds
This one night stand could stand just one more night

When we wake up tomorrow we can flip a coin
But we both know where this thing is goin'

Week 35a - This One Night Stand Could Stand Just One More Night (200828)

My heart just sank at the news today
Nothing to do
What can anybody say about it all?
At this the latest blow to fall
I sigh at the waste at the pointlessness
Shake my head, and I'm cursing as I turn a weary eye
To the earth and to sky

What sense to make except to be grateful for the gifts you gave?

Thank you for your service to your people
Cause you were a king - you were a king
In the vision of a world with all men equal
You showed the dream, you showed the dream
You showed a courage and a strength, and dignity though,
Too soon to go, too soon to go
The unfinished work of superheroes*
Must be our own, becomes our own

Surprised to learn how you knew of it
Long before your triumph, that this thing was inside you
That your days were numbered too
Love and respect the choice you made
To take the wave and ride it,
Dance along, crack a smile,
Live it all before you die

What sense to make except to be grateful for the gifts life gave?

Thank you for your service to all people
You were a king - you were a king
Vision of a world with all men equal
You showed the dream, you showed the dream
You showed a courage and a strength, and dignity though,
Too soon to go, too soon to go
I guess the unfinished work of superheroes*
Becomes our own, must be our own

* Credit where credit's due, I just wanting to acknowledge that this line comes from (indeed, is a reference to), Ben Harper's "the unfinished work of our heroes must be our own", from "How Many Miles Must We March". When I heard his line, I assumed it was an existing quote or a saying, but it looks like Ben Harper is just deep.

You Were A King

Copyright 2020
All Rights Reserved

Lyrics & Music: Erin Wolf
Guitar & Vocals: Erin Wolf

run run running around
run run running around 
in circles

let me take a moment
to explain myself
i know this is hell
quite a bitter pill

promise if you just
really hear what i'm saying
don't take it out of context
hear me out

then we won't be
run run running around
run run running around
in circles

i know it's hard to hear
that he lied with every word
how do you think that i had felt
when he'd done what he'd done

but then you cast me out
made me the villian in my own nightmare
i guess you gave me my way out
had my way out

i guess there'll be no more
run run running around 
run run running around 
in circles

i knew to be free 
it would take all of me
and i knew to be free
it would cost but i didn't know
it would cost so greatly

no more
run run running around
run run running around
in circles

Running In Circles

Artwork by the amazing Ayelen Molina ❤️

Lyrics:

I feel like I know you, know you from another life.
I think I already lived the moment of looking at your eyes.
And your voice, I heard it before you even made a sound.
I knew you'd be right here before you came around.

And this torture of feeling closer
keeps me here even when you disappear.
The silence that I'm fighting,
is it a dream or am I just pulling all the seams?

If I was a little bit smarter,
I'd wear all my tears as an armour.
You'd say it's ok to feel good,
but it's so far from fine.
Wouldn't take this any farther,
cause losing you is harder.
My broken bones still remember the war
from another timeline.

I'm walking back home, when it used to be your arms.
Every thought of you aches like stepping on thorns.
I hate I can't erase it, cause here I got nothing  to efface...
Just another glass of wine, spilled all over the place.

This torture, I'm at the border 
of saying your name as if you'd even care.
But I hold it till it overthrows me,
and our lines overlap, break a brand new heart...

If I was a little bit smarter,
I'd wear all my tears as an armour.
You'd say it's ok to feel good,
but it's so far from fine.
Wouldn't take this any farther,
cause losing you is harder.
My broken bones still remember the war
from another timeline.

(Say it's ok to feel good)

And I know it's too much
gin and sadness for the heart.
Living in blissful ignorance
(cause it never knew any different)
It's too much to take 
for the hall of fame of late night mistakes...
(gotta be a little bit smarter)

If I was a little bit smarter,
if I was a little bit smarter...

If I was a little bit smarter,
I'd wear all my tears as an armour.
You'd say it's ok to feel good,
but it's so far from fine.
Wouldn't take this any farther,
cause losing you is harder.
My broken bones still remember the war
from another timeline.

(Say it's ok to feel good
cause it never knew any different)

If I was a little bit smarter...
If I was a little bit smarter...
(cause it never knew any different)

Timeline

"IMAOKFUR" (#390, 200901)

RUOK
IMOK

FUROK
NIMOK

U84NUD
8S242C

L41N14L
SMT2CDN

RSNF4S2B
IMAOKFUR

Week 36b - IMAOKFUR (#390, 200901)

The words of the poet Robert Frost made into a song at the Shetland Songwriting Festival

The Aim Was Song

Before man came to blow it right
     The wind once blew itself untaught,
And did its loudest day and night
     In any rough place where it caught.
 
Man came to tell it what was wrong:
     It hadn’t found the place to blow;
It blew too hard—the aim was song.
     And listen—how it ought to go!
 
He took a little in his mouth,
     And held it long enough for north
To be converted into south,
     And then by measure blew it forth.
 
By measure. It was word and note,
     The wind the wind had meant to be—
A little through the lips and throat.
     The aim was song—the wind could see.

The Aim Was Song

Half of folk pop duo Cabin of Love. One-quarter of Americana band The Foragers.

Solitude

Julia Bloom

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