Almanac (Vinyl Edition Now Available)

by Emily Barker & The Red Clay Halo

Almanac (Vinyl Edition Now Available) Cover Art
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    Almanac Vinyl

    Beautifully packaged 12" vinyl pressing of the album, featuring Daniela Terrazzini's artwork at a size you can really appreciate!
    Includes limited edition art print of "Little Deaths", also by Daniela Terrazzini.
    The vinyl is in a black poly-lined inner sleeve.

    Includes immediate download of 12-track album in your choice of MP3 320, FLAC, or just about any other format you could possibly desire.

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    Almanac CD

    In this almanac appear stories of love, renewal, the importance of community and our relationship to the earth. Shadowing these lighter themes are darker truths of untold atrocities committed by settlers on indigenous Australians during colonisation, the mass hysteria regarding a Scottish witch-hunt, flourishing love and good old-fashioned heartbreak.

    The album weaves a compelling musical tapestry balancing contemporary influences with classic, folk-rooted song writing and is the third studio album by Anglo-Australian quartet Emily Barker & The Red ... more

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  • Digital Album

    Digital download of the album ... thank you for supporting independent music!

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credits

released 07 February 2011

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tags: contemporary folk singer-songwriter wallander alt folk chamber folk contemporary folk United Kingdom

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Track Name: Billowing Sea
Billowing Sea

You'll just move on with nothing much darker than the beat of guilt in your heart
nothing more heavy than sorry in your soul nothing sadder than goodbye in your mouth

don't know why I held onto something that's been broken for so long
could have been for the reason of all we once were or for faith in what was to come

Could have been for the reason I knew that your decision
was based on a moment of your heart's contradiction
don't know why I held onto something that's been broken for so long

For every sun I poured over you, for every silence and song
for every cloud I blew away, everything I have done

there will be a billowing sea of light and liberty
I gave my all and even more for the sake of the giver in me

Now all my bridges have fallen in the water
and all my hope has reluctantly gone under
there will be a billowing sea of light and liberty
Track Name: Reckless
Reckless
Water drips and sings softly in coves where grief and love combine
caches full of untold fables fall over unknowing minds
I'll find my breath in the coastal air please slow down and I'll meet you there
we can love and mourn at the same time
we can love and mourn at the same time?
On the steps of a new door with the past still flying open
all the winds tumble around me from the north and from the south
but no rules do I follow, to deny will land in sorrow
does this story have no start nor end?
does this story have no start nor end?
Chorus:
There's a reason to be reckless when a new hope hits the shore
I've been drinking all those questions I don't wanna ask no more
For every whole that broke and every height that fell before
I'll risk it all again for the giddy sake of more, the giddy sake of more, the giddy sake of more

To leave behind that day in folds, I'll follow with my eyes closed
fingers crossed in an hour of loss, pray bust this heart wide open
for nailed upon my memory hang moments slow to set me free
but where we go know goodness we’ll find
where we go know goodness we'll find
Chorus
Track Name: Ropes
Ropes

In the month of May, your past began to bust open it's graves (in the month of May)
and our love became a dance floor for your demons and mistakes (our love became)
and truth it went the way of thieves, it stole your soul from under our feet

by the month of June I was tiptoeing around your gloom (by the month of June)
so I took my light and I shone upon your hiding places bright (with all my light)
but the woods were old and you were buried deep and I could not persuade the dark to leave

Chorus
my heart could not hold him any closer
nor bend any more than it did
with ropes we set sail, in threads we land
thank you for the good times, damn you for the bad

by the month of July was when all my strength began to die (by the month of July)
and the only thing I hadn't tried was to pull your conscience close to me and cry (that one I hadn't tried)
but my tears were like the dew in spring and to you they did not mean a thing

Chorus

the month of August saw us leave behind a love we swore we'd keep (a love we'd keep)
and I can afford no hope but I do wish that you find yourself through losing me
and I will rave and flutter with a broken wing
and mend me through this song I sing
Track Name: Little Deaths
Little Deaths

On a word I could fly if it was for you and I
just a "we'll be fine my love"
but I look up and down and find you are not around
nor the hope I'd hoped you'd find

All the plans that did land like butterflies on my hand
have all now flown from reach
and this luxury of fine choice is leaving
a debris of abandoned dream

Chorus
It's the little deaths of ideas
that dash me against the rocks
fill me full of wings
until my heart stops

Over the wall and into the wild
all is unfamiliar
Give me light! Give me laughs! Give me something I can grasp!
and a blameless place to hide today

Chorus

On a word I could fly if it was for you and I
just a "we'll be fine my love"
Track Name: Dancers
Dancers

Hide me in the wings a while
let me catch my breath
wipe the weary from this brow
stretch the tired from these legs
before I dance across your roads
and underneath your streetlights
before I move upon your stage
in front of crowds made up of dancers

Chorus
Gulls drop into the sea
I'm not sure where I should be
waves crash through the streets
leaving dangers and doves
leaving loathes and loves
by my feet

Take me to the river's edge
where the city opens
lay my eyes in silhouettes
and angles of the horizon
there winds are freed from a
jail of glass walls
and sirens drown in the sand
there I remember how to dance
and stop fighting for places to land

Chorus
Track Name: Pause
Pause

Who am I now without your love?
Who am I alone in a day that has gone?

Without your love to return upon,
I'm a featherless bird in a sky so absurd

Why oh why's there so much movement
When all I long for is to lay down in love's pause

And dream I know something of truth
Oh hide me deeper in your peace further
and lose me in this greed I've found in your need
Track Name: Openings
Openings

The future lays unwritten
by hands that held power in the past
mouths of those who listened find voices in the words you've lost
the cracks that have begun to show will be the wings on which we soar
so pass a tool prise it open and a pen to write the future now

Stone in the water for every choice a consequence
like a ripple to the shore for every move can you defend
these dreams we've rolled over again in our fingers can begin
if we seek to live by a society we want to create

Chorus:
There an opening lies
there a hook to hold us
there an end that finds
a start to reasonings of a new kinds

Our minds were enticed first by colours that kept our hearts at bay
then secondly were taught to compete and not co-operate
the ones who possess little are much less possessed so praise be to a
moderate poverty and everything else is unnecessary
Track Name: Calendar
Calendar
will we hold onto the light or just play until it fades?
will we draw a curtain across the sky and count down all our days?
will our veins be filled with sand and our hearts be filled with ache?
when the desert takes the land and the ground begins to shake
ground begins to shake, ground begins to shake
Chorus:
No! Let's sing us a song 'til all seas become calm
'til all selves become one another
then let's sing it again to remember where we've been
all we lost and all we’ve learnt from each other

Will the winds above the lake and the flowers in the glen
one night sleep and never wake, one night dream a darkened end
will all power turn to pain when the birds take flight and leave?
will our intellect come save us or fail us when in need
or fail us when in need, fail us when in need
Chorus
To the long-forgotten fields where your childhood memories lay
to all the trees you ever climbed and the rivers where you bathed
to all tomorrows shores that your children will all comb
to the comets and the stars that they’ll be wishing on
they’ll be wishing on, they’ll be wishing on
Chorus
Track Name: Light
Light

Burnt leaves rode the winds that blew like ghosts through shivering trees
and battered against the windows like thieves that were trying to get in
then you broke through the glass and light fell in shapes on the ground

Clouds built a storm despite us, still you said you'd wait for me
and I took some time to get to where you said the shelter would be
then we woke up the flowers and boundlessness roars all around!

Chorus
You wend your way like a dove through dark
throwing faith at a dangerous hearts
now every silence finds the words to shout
truths we knew nothing about

Blind-cornered and mapless
the crash was as soundless as the instinct of seas
light shook and it splintered
and the water reflected all the beauty of that scene

Chorus.
Track Name: Witch of Pittenweem
The Witch of Pittenweem

Every morning I'd go with the dawn to the harbour
where the gulls fought for guts, where the boats bayed and echoed
where the waves wept and stormed like my heart that was stolen
when a curse as cold as the sea pointed it's finger straight at me

Chorus:
Cruel Lord/ she has stalked me in dream
You abandoned me/ The Witch of Pittenweem
Left me to hang between the shore and the sea
And the waves did rear/ and the bay did burst
When they swallowed your lies/ when they heard my cry
left me to roll between the earth and the sky

In the dungeon deep, in the company of thieves
I was pulled, I was pushed 'til my blood danced in mirrors
'til my life almost left, ‘til my words did confess to
a crime I'd never commit in the cold month of January

Chorus

I escaped in the dark on the mercy of a guard
to the house of a friend Oh but betrayal let 'em in!
I was dragged through frozen streets with a rope around my heels
then tied to the mast and the stones I could feel
‘til they cut me down, buried me under a door and the red waves lapped the shore

Chorus
Track Name: Bones
Bones

The ghosts moored their boats upon the shore
with hands and ropes they plucked the trembling stars
and the sound of bones rattled on the wind
and the salt of tears dropping in the sand

The bones of birds and children beneath me lie
the blood of stars, the blood of stars

The whispered sin on a guiltless knife
the silenced ring of a bullet in a life
we hid ourselves in the stitching of a myth
we hid by words in the history we bid

The bones of birds and children beneath me lie
the blood of stars on your hands and mine
the blood of stars, the blood of stars

when the fight was lost
they fell with broken hearts
a wound of a thousand cuts
and a scar to last the ages
Track Name: Emily Barker & The Red Clay Halo - Billowing Sea
You'll just move on with nothing much darker than the beat of guilt in your heart
nothing more heavy than sorry in your soul nothing sadder than goodbye in your mouth

don't know why I held onto something that's been broken for so long
could have been for the reason of all we once were or for faith in what was to come

Could have been for the reason I knew that your decision
was based on a moment of your heart's contradiction
don't know why I held onto something that's been broken for so long

For every sun I poured over you, for every silence and song
for every cloud I blew away, everything I have done

there will be a billowing sea of light and liberty
I gave my all and even more for the sake of the giver in me

Now all my bridges have fallen in the water
and all my hope has reluctantly gone under
there will be a billowing sea of light and liberty