A Dog Called Man by Abraham Cloud
The eternal struggle between Man and God and Pleasure and Pain and Eternal and Now all seem to come to a head for me in this song, "A Dog Called Man."
Remember, " the missionaries left on fairies bound for foreign sanctuaries," and " the dog ate religion with soda and large order fries." I'm trying to remember exactly what I was thinking during the writing and production of this song. All I can really draw is a huge blank. I think I was in a huge funk as to the nature of humanity. Were we Dogs with Clothes or Gods with fur ? The Dog called Man seemed to be a combination. I really don't want to live in a Godless universe or a God-Controlled universe , I just want to relax on the couch of Leave It To Beaver drinking milkshakes and waiting for the evening paper.
Check out Cloud and a lot of other interesting music
The Children of the Milkman
The phrase, “Children of the Milkman” was running round my brain for years. At one point I had it stenciled on my table. I tried to write the song a million times . It would not leave me alone. I called my band “The Children of the Milkman” , I drew pictures , I suffered for the phrase. It really says a lot to me . My father left when I was a baby and I’m not sure I ever got over the Mystery of it all. He was alive and living in another state and made NO effort at all to contact me. It was a weird kind of hell. I had to wonder if he really was my father, and if not him then who ? The situation he left me in was treacherous. My mother was ruined by her alcoholic family and a nervous wreck. We had no money and her insane worry , depression and anxiety forced me to try to be the parent. My constant thought was if only he would come back , we could pay the bills and I would have someone who understood me. Anyway , as far as the song , I pretty much took the cowards way out and made it a bizarre comedy. Perhaps one milkman managed to father an entire city , while making his daily deliveries. Thanks for checking it out .
What’s So Great About Happiness ?
This is the song we all used to sing along too when getting drunk in College, “Whats So Great About Happiness ?” Its from the first Abraham Cloud CD , “Another Successful Breakfast.” This actually became our catch-phrase whenever something went wrong. Like when my friend found out he didn’t get the job he wanted at Google, we’d say, ” well what’s so great about happiness anyway ?”.Are you hiding in the great happiness space. ? “Happiness” was on our sing-along mix tape with the Beatles “Happiness is a Warm Gun” Radiohead’s “Creep” Nirvanna’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit” REM’s “Losing My Religion” and Psychedelic Furs “Pretty In Pink”. along with thre Fray and Super Junior It was killing me not to have this on Youtube. So here’s a fan video for Abraham Cloud’s ” What’s So Great About Happiness ?” -Video by Alex
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Company of Strangers (lyrics)
When news about Earthquakes , Tsunamis and Nuclear Fallout fill the air its pretty easy to start thinking about mortality. How long do we really have ? And how should we spend the time we have left, 'Company of Strangers,' is about how in the end, life really comes down to a moment or two. How 20 years can pass in a flash. And most of our lives are spent surviving instead of living. I wonder if any of the Japanese Earthquake Victims would have chosen to spend more time working if they had it all to do again ?
Check out the beautiful string arrangement by Nathan Crow on a truly classic Abraham Cloud song.
“Buckets of Rain” featured on Bones
Bob Dylan's song "Buckets of Rain" was recently featured on the TV show "Bones." It wasn't Dylan's version though. It was sung by the incredible Beth Orton and M. Ward. It was a great version and highlighted a surreal scene where Bones was falling into alcholic despair. Supposedly, Dylan heard the version and loved it. Oddly enough, the massive amount of web searches has neted some new popularity for Abraham Cloud's "Buckets of Rain," which is a pretty cool song itself, original and totally unrelated to Dylan.
Buckets of Rain
Buckets of Rain coming down my head
Buckets of Rain that was what she said, buckets of rain
All of my life I've been waiting here
Watching these headlights disappear, buckets of Rain
I've seen 'em coming with the Master Plan
Steal your wallet while they shake your hand , buckets of Rain
All that I want is to be left alone
What more can you take now that you've got my home , buckets of Rain
Outside, the neon lights are burning safe and warm
Business as usual , uneffected by the storm Buckets of Rain
There's Buckets of Rain for the Farmer's Field
and Buckets of Rain for the man who feels
Nothing is Right
Nothing is Right
Nothing is Right in the world tonight.
by abraham cloud
Click here for a free download of Buckets of Rain studio version
Open Windows
The first time I played this song to our drummer , Lee, he said it sounded like a suicide note. He equated the term , "letting go" with dying. I meant the exact opposite . It was about getting stuck, starting over, and realizing that you do have the power to change. I'm not sure how much choice we really have in our lives, but if all powers of mind and soul , along with a strong support community is involved, I do believe you can change direction. I've seen it in myself and others too many times to deny it. …
"every open window makes you cry "
I think thats probably one of the best lines I've ever written. To me it totally sums up depression. Its one of those few times when I feel that I really nailed it. Really found a way to express a universal emotion. The most frightening thing about a deep funk is that you do see ways out of it but you can't act, it's like you're frozen.
I've felt it , I think everyone has felt it. So trapped , so caged . so immobilazed that any glimpse of happiness or freedom made you cry. And although somehow you know the change you have to make, its impossible to do it. Johnny G did an excellent job on production, he often said it reminded him of his favorite band Yes. I don't reall y hear that. But I know it was a truly magical session.
Johnny and John Garwood are both huge Prog-Rock fans and both I think did incredible work on this song.
Click Here, Give it a listen and let me know what you think.
""
OPEN WINDOWS
Letting go’s the hardest part,
It’s easy just to stay, another day.
Holding on is killing you,
Clinging to the things that never let you sing
‘Til every open window makes you cry
IT’S UP TO YOU
ONLY YOU CAN MAKE THE CHANGE
ONLY YOU CAN TURN THIS SUNLIGHT
INTO DAYLIGHT, INTO NEW LIFE,
INTO DREAMS
You always thought they’re come a day,
When steppin’ from the haze,
Everything would change.
Tryin’ hard to carry on,
Even you can not believe
the beauty that you see
IT’S UP TO YOU
ONLY YOU CAN MAKE THE CHANGE
ONLY YOU CAN TURN THIS SUNLIGHT
INTO DAYLIGHT, INTO NEW LIFE
INTO SONGS I HEARD WHEN I WAS YOUNG HOLD ME NOW
GIVE ME WINGS TO FLY ABOVE
ALL THE SORROW
It’s up to you.
Another Successful Breakfast
I think this song will stick with me for life. It seems to be the one people really remember. It was totally autobiographical and kind of a diary entry , pretty much unedited. I'd been in LA for about a year and was realixing what a long way it is not only to the top but to even making a living at music. I remember walking around with absolutely nothing and wondering how everybody got so situated. They all seemed to have huge houses , lucrative jobs and glamourous lives and looked at me like, how charming , someone who wants to play the homeless poet to entertain us. I really didn't understand that I was in the entertainment business, I was trying to unburden myself of ideas, or connect with like minds and make statements, . Probably why I refused to sign anything. It always seemed like I would be signing my soul away. It is pretty absurd to be smack dab in the center of a world based on illusion actually ernestly looking for answers.
Miracle Mile
For some reason this ancient song went running through my mind today. I think I was trying to be Springsteen at the time and write a triumphant story of desperate characters lost in a world they couldn't understand. But It came out all garbled and weird . Something about a "Portable Girl" and a "rabit vacation". Well I guess these are pretty cool images, especially the "rabit vacation". If there are any psychoanalysts in the readership , I'd love to get a rundown on this……
Miracle Mile
My portable girl took a rabit vacation
Borrowed someone's car and took off across the nation
Haven't heard from her in quite a long time
Dangerous Dad was dealing with the problem
Lost the only woman that had ever tried to love him
So he ran through the streets where the people don't smile
Searching for his daughter on a Miracle Mile
Portable Girl met a Dangerous Dad
They were having such a good time the waitress got mad
She'd been working all night to support her child
She never understood it was a Miracle Mile
Miricle mile is waiting down the road
Miracle Mile won't be there when you get old
The road is calling , The chips are falling , Its gonna be fine on a Miracle Mile
It don't call out to non-believers
You need a little faith if you're gonna be leaving
You look to the sky and step on the gas
You realize all those bad times are passed
Miracle Mile is waiting down the road
Miracle Mile won't be there when you get old.
Stuart Pearson is responsible for the arrangement on this , and he did an increbible job geting the "lost parade turned triumphant" sound. Rory Anton is doing a great job on guitar and his friend John from John's Guitar and drum shop is playing some fantastic drums. I think Rick Elias is in there somewhere, at least I remember him being there. And the funniest moment of all was in the middle of our drunken studio revelry Stu dumped a huge cup of coffee all over the board. Quite possibly why we could never work in San Diego again.
Flying Over You
Flying Over You is one of I suppose many songs I've written as therapy. Trying to take a totally negative situation and turn it into a positive. I had absolutely blown a relationship and a pretty serious business opportunity and was forced to subscribe to the philosophy that life is for learning. This is I guess what we do in life. Screw up and look for the silver lining. What else can you do. I think a strong sense of denial is many times a survival tool. And there is truth in every lie. I had screwed up, and lost again and my reaction was to imagine the mess I'd created from a plane. You know how everything turns to neat agricultural squares from way up high. None of the details matter, there are no mistakes or failures, only a HUGE round earth that has spawned an ant-like virus called humanity. This is one of the simplest songs ever written. Nothing really but a desending bass starting on G. I imagined what George Martin would do and tried to carve a little Beatles into it. I especially like the Military Lennon Snare. That was a total joy and brings me right back to the first times I heard 'Strawberry Fields" and "I am the Walrus " Taken away into a new world of fascination , far from the trechary of day to day nothingness.
Flying Over You
Told me you were born to fly
And that’s just what you did
The night I told you what I really wanna’ do
Words were chosen hastily
They really didn’t really mean a thing
I guess I said enough to set me free
I’ll go flying
Flying over you
The only love I’ll ever show
And the only love I’ll ever know
Is the few notes I squeeze out before I die
So know someone, somewhere, somehow
Cared enough to say something
Look up in the night and hear me sing
I’ll go flying (we’ll start a whole new story)
Flying over you ( I’ll find a brand new glory)
I’ll go flying (unchained from my obsession)
Flying over you (I’ll see a true reflection)
Sometimes it feels like everything and everyone is wrong
I’ve got to get away, try to find a place where I belong
I’ll go flying (the shape of things to come)
Flying over you (the shape is everyone)
I’ll go flying (unchained from my obsession)
Flying over you (I’ll see a true reflection)
I’ll go flying (we’ll start a whole new story)
Flying over you ( I’ll find a brand new glory)
have a listen to "Flying Over You"
Company of Strangers
This song is real in every sense of the word. The working environment has always been strange and ominous to me. I always had to take part time jobs to support my Musical aspirations. These jobs usually revolved around one mans dream to get rich by employing a bunch of dispossessed dreamers to sell his garbage to someone. The lines were always pretty clearly drawn between the winners and the losers. The winners were always vacationing and the losers were doing all the work to buy the umbrella drinks for the bosses. An environment that by its very nature spawns truck-loads of resentment anger and ruined lives. I was always astounded how little I had in common with my co-workers, and even how little they had in common with each other. It was almost always as if we were all wandering through the desert looking for scraps of food and we happened upon an air-conditioned office with free snacks. The song is positive though. It calls for a joining together of the underdogs . Why don't we start our own company ? but unfortunately it realizes that this probably wouldn't work either , because it would have to be called , "The Company of Strangers," If you'd like to hear the original Symphonic version that appeared on "Another Successful Breakfast" click here . Below you'll find a live acoustic version.
Abe with Rory on guitar filmed by Randy Morgan. One of the most classic Cloud tunes , deep shades of Bowie and Pink Floyd with a haunting Lennon-esqe type theme
Company of Strangers
hi, how are you ?
how was your weekend ?
and what are we going to do. today ?
No. I'm OK. It's just that this office is starting to feel like a cage.
in the distance, it shines like a beakon. offering shelter to the lost and the weakened.
but here. in this room. I've whiled away hours and planted the flowers of doom, in my life.
smiles, like they say, can wipe away saddness, but this little game's here to stay.
FOR AN INSTANT I thought I knew you. That day you broke down and smashed up the cooler.
crystal cool water drencend all the carpet. wild nervous laughter filled out department.
as you screamed out,
" Hey what you say ? Why don't we start our own company, and we'll call it the Company of Strangers."
for twenty-five years I have sat by your side typing letters and memos for people who hide behind doorways with titles in hallways of horrible crime. we never had time for the things that we wanted to do when we saved up enough to be happy. it's true in the end all you have is a moment or two.
but, "Hey what you say ? Why don't we start our own company, and we'll call it the Company of Strangers."
