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Colder Than Mars

by Maiden Name

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Gregory Walker
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Gregory Walker Killer musicianship and vulnerable yet entertaining lyricism. The kind of record that makes you appreciate/savor another human's earnest processing and idiosyncratic living of life. I look forward to hearing more from this artist. Favorite track: Funeral.
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1.
top of the world bourgeois at least it’s clear it’s engineered for folks like me top of my game, I mean top of the game but then again from my end I didn’t really have to compete white, straight, master’s degree cards lined up in hand, so it’s guaranteed that this world will work for me, was built for me my demographics is my skeleton key, at least this system runs so let’s tweak it gently yeah, when the Kingdom comes, let’s, let’s change things gently power isn’t a problem gotta get it in the right hands fingers in front of me are fit enough just watch, I’ve got compassionate plans let’s raise wages just enough don’t raise the prices and don’t lower my salary or take away any of my write-offs we’ve basically arrived, right? seems like it from where I stand at the top the game, it’s good offer the less fortunate a helping hand justice vs. compassion, take the latter every time it feels better to give than to pay a proper dime let’s raise the valleys without tearing the mountains down I want justice to roll down like river but I’m afraid I might drown I’m opposed to violence and I’m opposed to not feeling safe and when those two come head to head I’m still not sure which choice I would make and I used to avoid paying war-taxes by keeping my income low enough but with both of us working can’t bring myself to donate the surplus and my neighbors next door yeah, they’re on the run from war while I’ve been sitting on my sofa writing theology behind closed doors yeah, I’m safe and I’m secure, even in my neighborhood they say it’s the hood, hood but I know that I don’t look like you’ll think I’m up to no good so I walk down dark streets and I don’t look over my shoulder, and if there’s no one I have to meet then I’ll walk a little slower without a worry or a care I take my walks without falter maybe that’s the reason why never had any use for the Psalter chorus question: can I ever be saved? you know my face looks enraged but I have slave trade chocolate silently running through my veins before we give these valleys a raise, let’s wait cause I’ve escaped the curse at the cost of inequality’s iron rod of others being crushed by the weight of a system I did not create but I’ve bought into it in a literal way my money for products at a low wage my vote working in what I pay my heart in exchange for what I gain my soul in exchange for what I save I’ve never worked the ground from which I was made -can I ever be saved? Up on a mountain looking down you only see loss so when the Kingdom comes I know it will come with a cost I know it cost someone like me a lot I want to justice to roll on like a river its current to flow strong and mighty but I want to keep my feet dry and from what I hear that’s just not likely what did I go out into the desert to see? a wind-swayed reed? did I hope to stay as I am? or did I hope to be redeemed?
2.
Mixtape 03:56
3.
I’m an ecumeneical anarchist until he comes and fixes this as long as the system’s broken, I’ll have one foot out the door loyal to a community, not a Sunday service always in the back of my head, asking “what good is this for” yes, the temple was ordained and it was still full of snakes why do we think that things have changed just ‘cause the structure’s been rearranged they say “don’t give up hope, the church is being redeemed” but that’s used as a trump card like you wouldn’t believe, yeah when it doesn’t sit well, don’t you think you should say something without a wrench in the gears, they’ll just keep that machine running you call it God’s house, but he’s been evicted you know he made a break for it, the day when the curtain ripped yeah, I know where Jesus is no songs to invite him in he’s just hanging out in the neighborhood that you never got around to visitin’ this new wine won’t fit in old wine skins, no let’s burn it down to the ground no stone left on another, no so why polish the brass of a sinking ship? and put new coat of gloss on your house of worship? it’s a nice event, all those smiling faces but I keep thinkin’ who would so feel out place here invisible fences, race and income sets ‘em your sign might say welcome but does mean that you meant it? watch the show, go with the flow a worship so synthetic take good notes, so you know how white men have always read it who knows what goes on behind the scenes? not you or me, no, they’re so discrete head filled with stories that I can’t repeat delusions of legacy, manifest-destiny whose Kingdom are you really trying bring? pissed off at white men, but rather scoff at system profits off of congregations by [limiting] participation all the attendants watch a few folks in “ministry” while the rest of us sit passively, taking it all in, disengaged, none of you should be called a teacher, none of you should be called a leader let’s roll on down and take an axe to that old cedar, yeah none of you should be called a teacher none of you should be called a leader false dichotomy between the fed and the feeders I try to give church folks second chances logs in my eyes I could easily build a cabin with but when it comes to pickin’ apart a system I won’t stop critiquing until we stop and listen
4.
we go to malls when it snows and we don’t buy a thing and hold keys to cars we don’t own on our rings and when we lie down, I can feel the oxytocin flow like the Missippi...runs in the spring if we’d stuck to applied sciences, we might have ended up with better appliances but anthills pop up through the carpet, yeah our apartment’s kind of an armpit, yeah no pork at our parties, chicken is safest, and in mini-apple, sambusas are the greatest orange fanta, sans-ice, goat, basta, injeera, rice I haven’t mastered that Minnesota accent cuz nearly no one in my neighborhood has it its the new minnesota and that’s just fine, that’s the minnesota that I have on my mind we shop at the co-op, pick up supplements at the foodshelf we buy what we can from the farmers, and then get what we can where we can wherever else. pita or pancake ? why is everyone snacking on my sidewalk? spiced with ginger and mandrake! I’m not gonna pick it up, and ingest it quick we drink what it see, drain it down, even up to the dregs let it sit deep within us, like fruit juices in giraffe’s legs what if to submerge is like the Abyss? I mean the film from 1989 that I watched in 7th grade, with horror, as that rat’s eyes met mine he shrieked and tried not to drown, but he couldn’t resist, such a struggle in the brine his lungs filled with water and he survived with clenched fists its colder than mars here, and we import snow by the pounds and doors are locked and closed, from the first snow til the thaw of the ground we’re all gonna die of loneliness, cozy with just ourselves, only ourselves and a bottle of vodka taken down off the shelf across the hall, paper thin walls, our salvation is bound up together it’s not what we saw, but we heard the falls, as we waited day and night through the weather and if the sun ever comes out to greet us, we’ll beat it with a brick and threaten, if you ever try to defect again, it’s over we’ll finish the job, and this time we mean it.
5.
Roots 03:52
in the fullness, this old amygdala will finally get fixed and some theocratic regulation will find its way into the mix I won’t be flying high on endorphins, brain producing dope just oxytocin my D.O.C., as you and I draw close I used to be a jetsetter. China. Thailand. Minneapolis. L.A. this generativity vs. stagnation stage has got me stayed got me lying on the floor, hoping for a reprieve in my young age from the drivenness that’s got me sore, from the motivation that’s got me plagued I went out for the protest / but I didn’t pause to confess our march diverse and immersed among a variety of hues but despite my goodwill, I’m still sitting in homogeneous pews I want to disolve into some dough....like a pinch of yeast minister behind a curtain….like a levite priest feast my eyes on the trees growing out of my own street smiling and crying with my neighbors until my eyes are creased we were once a dry sponge put to the grunge of a rusty old door our good-intentioned and ill-will expunged only by the Lord we had hoped to be wrung out...and then somewhat adored we had hoped to have been cleaned ourselves by the corroded pores but now I’m ready for some roots and I’m ready to be fifty to sink into some saggy skin that will finally fit me. to look down at the ground, and find that I still have feet to look down at the ground and find that its holy to sit at your feet, instead of setting the table Jesus, I am weak, I can only wave sabals take me across the border, you’re the good coyote through the desert, against the law, to the land that I wanna be cuz the feistiness of self-righteousness isn’t all that becoming I’ll be the quietest quietest to make up for all this gunning to be the brightest little light at the start of the day who’s gonna wear that starry crown? Oh Lord, show us the way
6.
Funeral 05:14
No need for masked metaphor now and similes have no purpose I saw you at grandma’s funeral service and I was a little surprised to see how I’d surfaced it still took a whole lot of courage even though you were balding and I was bearded, quite a contrast to years ago, when you drew close as I grew nervous and I’ve tried and tried again to let it all go that day I really wanted to give you a shiner, but pacifist’s a pacifist’s a pacifist so I did my best to hold back my desires besides, it would’ve been against grammy’s wishes we walk into the church, you hold the door for me, you smile broadly and reply in a british accent and I can’t for a second find it funny, but I think about stabbing you with chopsticks, like I dreamt and your wife is there, and you’re talking to young children I want to shout aloud, “do not trust him” you take the podium, and try to draw our tears but the family’s eyes roll, like we have been for years as you drew close, and I grew nervous the smell of sleeping bags still makes me feel so worthless by the time we drive our cars out to the stone and all mutter hymns in the wind despite my diagnosis of your syndromes I’m feverish and my fervor’s gone dim we talk of grammy, most stories funny and brief and I pray for an unadulterated grief but my ire sparks like a forest fire posing for pictures, I smile with my teeth my ears pop and my forehead grows warm and the snow can’t begin to cover the swarm of thoughts rising, like my chest is cracking someone’s ripped it open, through it my heart is leaking chorus yet for a moment, I saw you as my brother not by relation, but by creation and wondered at the possibility, the sneaking possibility of forgiveness the thought twisted my insides out and my outsides in and it passed like a plastic bag in the wind who knows, it may come around again until then, I’m stuck carrying your sin until then, it turns out, you continue to win I run for my life, and you lassoe me in like Whitaker said: love and hate are strangely akin they lurk deep in your heart like a siamese twin and until I stop hating you for what you did I’ll keep the wound you began when I was a kid Jesus, teach me to love the enemy who knows exactly what he did
7.
Interlude 02:00
8.
Hygiene 03:11
Toothpaste isn’t what it used to be crushed bones, oyster shells, dragon’s blood, lobster teeth we kept our new bathroom scale in the kitchen for weeks out of laziness? most-likely is it something subconscious? maybe we took it from the packaging and left it on the faux beech never thought it might seem like a pathology between our skin and the sea never think too much about those things the vineyard will be trampled and left in ruins. I heard the heart of Sodom and Gomorrah’s sin was mistreating the wayfaring alien I once saw Isaiah 6 posted in an air-force chapel by an air force chaplain both the plaque and the place were incredibly troubling serving spiced coleslaw to the mid-to-lower bourgeois folks at a shared table, try to not go after kinfolk folks if I am able but those vintage bowls would be worth their age in gold if you poured them out to the poor, if they could tear down walls and open doors what can I say, but John the baptist didn’t go into the food desert because he was bored I can’t escape the system, but at least I can curse it I need to be forgiven, that is one thing that this certain against my best wishes, I’ll eat taco bell this week where the chicken is caged and the labor is cheap I’ve never killed a man, but my cold blood can never needed to, already got a game plan fit for duty, one-hundred-and-twenty thousand I mean, one-hundred-and-twenty million, that’s no straw man.
9.
Foxes 03:43
death has been stalking the neighborhood in such uncreative ways but the Kingdom’s here, taquis and art and children’s play are footprints in its wake and you don’t have to squint, you don’t have to break pace, to see resurrection every day and looking around at the signs , there are hints here, of some bit of yeast working away there are foxes stalking the neighborhood making more tracks than is strictly needed minute details jotted into our palms and hearts weaving them through like string sprouts shout out, coming up from the ground, so lets get that old oak out of the way lets cut it down, and mulch it up, and spread it through the garden in hope of what will grow in its place We’re watering this garden with our tears, but the salt helps it grow up from bulbs and sprout ears and one day, we will know where those aquifers go how they drained and filled us both I walked on a wall, took a chance for a glance and I balked and I crawled, before I stepped into the dance I worried about the safety of this place and so ashamed, I confess, my own racism shows it face I’m just glad to get out of the sprawl and remind myself its in Jerusalem where they kill the prophets after all Don't you think it's time to give up on being safe in hope of being saved Put your hand in mine we'll put roots down in the place, trusting we'll see his face

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Maiden Name's debut release

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released March 29, 2016

Thanks to Ryan Lane for mastering & help with album art, Danielle for being supportive over this three-year process, Anders Lundberg for getting me started on the process, and all my friends who have given feedback along the way.

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Maiden Name Portland, Oregon

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