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False Friends EP

by Pete Davis

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  • Streaming + Download

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.

    Download includes .pdf of hand-written lyric sheet
    Purchasable with gift card

      $5 USD  or more

     

  • Full Digital Discography

    Get all 11 Pete Davis releases available on Bandcamp and save 20%.

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Hapax Legomena, False Friends EP, Commiato (a cappella), The Pottsville Conglomerate, Grace EP (demo), Emergency Response (demo), Algorithms and Anaerobics (demo), The Waterworks (demo), and 3 more. , and , .

    Purchasable with gift card

      $16 USD or more (20% OFF)

     

  • Limited Edition CD in screen-printed kraft-paper bi-fold sleeves
    Compact Disc (CD) + Digital Album

    Odd Petals, a screen-printing outfit from Sacramento, CA, approached me about making very organic CD sleeves for a physical release of this EP. As my first printed form of music for my solo work, I loved the idea of carrying the home-made theme. Thus all the text is hand-written, the sleeves and lyric sheets are screen-printed directly onto the sleeve stock, and the artwork was designed by the wonderful Billy Sours. A lot of work went into their creation, but the finished product is beautiful.

    Includes unlimited streaming of False Friends EP via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.

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1.
Wait for something Wait for snowfall Wait for something to change without shaping, Bait our escaping, Wave out your window Wave at your house as you go, As you drive on Cold glow cresting mountains in the distance, Owed no fulcrum of a sunrise Felt like if we just kept going… Waited for something But nothing was different You thought it was hardest Just watching your breath So you waited for sunlight But nothing was different You thought it was hardest Just fearing regret So you settled on nothing But nothing was different You thought it was hardest To sit in the darkness So night after night After night after night You would dream of the sidewalk And dream of the oak tree And dream of the parking garage Where you whisper And wait for an echo Wait by the table Stalled fragile footsteps I tried to stop it Backs to each other Sealed attic window So glad you called Hurried indices, off sincerity Air on your shoulders View from the top floor Study the ceiling Stayed by the front door How we'd never see there was nothing Each time we freeze I started "I...I... (wait there for someone) I mean, I don't..." Soft it fell Out our window Anvil swallow to hide a need Waited, but there wasn't any Cold glow cresting over To grant us our shadows (I've tried to reach you) Tethered to a light On which we can't rely (but I just dreamt of going) (waited for nothing, waited for nothing Thought it was hardest Just to keep thinking Just to keep focus Keep us from sinking Thought it was hardest Just to keep drifting Keep us from focus Keep us from thinking Found it was hardest Just to keep waking Just to keep waking Just keep decaying Waiting for nothing Waiting to come apart) Fulcrum stitch seam Float beneath us Grow between us Apart Apart
2.
Idler Gear 03:32
The buzzing in the trees Made you feel less lonely Until you thought how the cicadas had each other to sing And you didn’t have anything Now I know, Nothing I’ve ever done has turned out right Nothing we’ve ever wished for came true Nothing you’ve ever lost ever turned up again You said it’s best To let us pretend The empty shells by the leaves Made you feel less guilty Observing motion all around you Shadowing the idler gear Until you thought how the cicadas only had a few days And how much they could achieve anyway Its body grew The wrong way The molting strained Bestowed its grave And we can’t ask the rain Our spiracles to inundate And long for cover when it comes We thought we wanted what was best for us But nothing we ever learned we used again Nothing I ever penciled in Could be seen underneath so many drafts of pen I guess I could try To write it again And again And again
3.
Two Moths 03:57
Fake rock to hide the key Feign subtle secrecy We couldn't help wishing to be In places we shouldn't be You set with me Two leaves from the same tree Hundred eighty degrees Growing apart from each other Fake smile to cover my teeth Bed sheets to hide from me An ill we could not wish away The last message left on the tape I saved it always Two moths circling the flame Two moths patterned the same Stayed where the other could see Stayed where the other could reach me One moth entered the flame Returned to dust again Cover your wings with me And the flicker of light was all that made Your memory Don't think of us below Don't think of carried stone Don't think of what you left Don't think of what was unsaid Don't think of how hard you tried Only to let it out Don't think how things would have changed if you did Don't think of everything you said you'd save Don't think of how you said you'd never feel I felt it always Fake props to sell the scene Farewell synecdoche It wouldn't, what you wished you'd say, Have mattered anyway
4.
Dead fall Out your window We all saw it go You said you tried to stop You calloused your skin Purposeful And you swallow your voice And you swallow your protest And you swallow your blood Street cleaner jumped the curb Started buffing the sidewalk Tore up the road verge Displacing a mess of the earth It left worse than before Went searching for suitable strata To bury your body cozy and close, Decompose to eternally better view I regret that it wasn't much use I regret not all that I said, But what I said that wasn't to you I regret it's all I can do I guess there's something off about What's underneath us, I don't know I guess there's something else I could have done or left alone I guess there was some surface that We left perfectly still and when You saw our odd reflection, I guess that was the hardest part, I don't know
5.
If I just sit here out of focus, Can we at least still-frame our aging? Error in mindset, err in motion Listen how those raised in their cage won’t sing If you look past my attention span Will you recall where we used to stare Where we used to give our focus There must be somewhere else you dream of Authored in reverse, Our waking signaled a now unresolved Skew of stature Our walls grew ever nearer Nothing was there when you Asked of its nature, you asked of its ire You asked of us open, open, open but There was nothing Underneath our capture We saw light bend through the surface As we sank, as we dove deeper Howl, oh the wind tore over As we lied frozen on the hill we climbed To watch our houses shrink in darkness (bringing in the ill in darkness) Lied still and there recalled The sapling sprouting through the earth And steel and stone, so gradual It grew through anything (bringing in the ill through anything) We came to believe if we set there, If we stayed there Enough for it to have sprouted through The dirt, the earth, The skin under our shirt, our tissue Through our muscles through our Ribcage before our organs or Our spinal cord And all the way through it grew, it grew And it protruded Several feet high as there we lied, So there we lie It came to come true, we fed its roots, We bore its fruit From then there was nothing we could do Except to have just moved Move Apart, apart Nearer, nearer What grew In us In us You knew You knew You knew

about

This album was released exactly 5 years after The Pottsville Conglomerate. I tried to take a different approach with these songs than with Pottsville; I wanted to make something more concise in length, more simple in orchestration. This album consists only of vocals and occasional ukulele.

credits

released July 5, 2016

Music and lyrics by Pete Davis in Princeton, NJ

Artwork by Billy Sours in Christiansburg, VA

Physical packaging screen-printed by Christopher Knight at Odd Petals in Sacramento, CA

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Pete Davis Princeton, New Jersey

zany folk music for nerds

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