Get all 12 ilyAIMY releases available on Bandcamp and save 50%.
Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Chords of Courage Volume One, Live At The New Deal Cafe, cicada, Seasons (Chris Cornell cello cover), A Message In the Mess, Another Life/Another Live, A Gift For Saint Cecilia, Between Lover and Twilight, and 4 more.
1. |
Georgetown
04:18
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They took my father's eyes
Left me brown & colourblind
Twisting in the wind
Like he'd never been
They took my father's eyes
Down in Georgetown on the water
Fog rolls in off the river
The winter's dying
A velvet death
Drowned by college kids &
epithets
But they took my father's eyes
left us in the red
Left us waiting for a sign
Left us waiting on the dead
Georgetown is underground
In all our favourite ways
You can tell in the price of beer
And MRIs
You're not good enough to Live here
They took my father's eyes
Left me blue & colourblind
And twisting in the wind
Like he'd never been
They took my father's eyes
They say this is just history
Water underneath the bridge
But you & I we've got this history
And they've got my father's eyes
Down in Georgetown they make promises
Down in Georgetown they tell lies
Down in Georgetown they said they'd save his Life
They didn't meet my mother's eyes
Couldn't meet my mother's eyes x2
They couldn't meet my mothers's eyes x2
©2016 rob hinkal
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2. |
Glom of Nit
05:15
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Out of Savannah
Up through the Carolinas
The rhythm of the pines
Reminding me the finest things are moving
The finest things are moving
Quick
In & out of Richmond
Strings & things & fingers fast
Unload break down & then repack
Rinse spit repeat get paid come back
If the finest things are moving
We get finer by the hour
Yeah if the finest things are moving
We get finer by the mile
[Doppler as ilyAIMY flies by... ]
I had a home for seven years
Two cats & a yard
Wifi re-fi the neighbour's kids said "hi" every morning this time they say that they are moving
I can't wait until they're moving
Next stop up the road
It's Washington DC
One big monument to status quo & cash & greed
Their roads are just a symptom
Of the overall disease
We give that town a wide wide berth
The traffic & the companies
We keep on moving
God knows that they ain't moving
Turn left
No rain nor snow nor gloom of night
can keep us from our task
no Hell high water rising tide
can still our restless hands at last
the rivers crush the mountains
but our voices never tire
our bodies movement is the finest thing
and our music is a fire
our fire
©2015 rob Hinkal
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3. |
Common
05:13
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Look at them all cautious now
Every one a wallflower stone
You & I we're dangerous
Coveted unknowns
But take them by the eyes like this
And make them understand
"I'm here for you & only you"
darling till I pass
there's nothing to be said for waiting
there's nothing to be said for standing proud
there's nothing to be said for watching what has passed
cause none of this will last
look at them all twisted now
I'm nesting in their skulls
Gather this around us now`
And pull & turn & shift
Wrap them thick around us
To keep us from ourselves
Get Gordian & Labyrinth-like
Never let them cut them out
There's nothing to be said for growing up
There's nothing to be said for standing still
There's nothing to be said for waiting till you're asked
Cause none of this will last
Work the room & shine & cover them in lies
Let them see the prize
There's something to be said for taking what is mine
Cause none of this can last
Look at them all quiet now
They feast on what they're fed
None of them are sated yet
But you know they'll learn to Live with what they get
Sure God will get their souls
And some spouse will get their flesh
But eyes & flare & flash & fire
Yeah, the dreamers get the best
There's something to be said for shutting up
There's something to be said for diving deep
There's something to be said for going very fast
Cause none of this can last
©2016 rob hinkal
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4. |
HARM
06:03
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you know I'll Live to be 19 forever
the careless harmless flirting
fretting for an uncaring world
19 I may be too young
but then again I've always been too young
you say I've got so much growing up to do
well I say never
You know I never wanted to
and you say maybe just an inch or two
and I say never, you know that I will never do.
you know we all were artists
so careful with our eyes
you know we all were Lovers
so careless with our hearts
you know I Love to watch you sleep
it's flattering to see you spill yourself
so near to me
and I lean in
I Love to watch you sway,
though you sway away from me
it's flattering just to be here
morning marches in
the bedside clock is kicking in my head
with every tock
we do not talk
the morning sun
you know it leaps up oh so high
I will be the one
to leave your lips untouched
you know we all were artists
so careful with our eyes
you know we all were Lovers
so careless with our hearts
you know I was never harmless
and you were never wrong
but I was never heartless
and I never meant no HARM
some days I don't plan to see 29
the careless harmless flirting
leads to harm
too old maybe
but then again baby you know
it's better than being too young
you know your dance was torture
with every twisting left I was left right out
and I lean in & I Love to breathe you in as you breathe out
but your breathing's burning in you
it was the only thing ever burning in you
you know we all were artists
so careful with our eyes
you know we all were Lovers
so careless with our hearts
you know we all were artists
so careless with our hearts lets
not romanticize
we were careless with our thighs
and no I was never harmless
and no you were never wrong
with your good byes.
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5. |
Cicada Summer
03:41
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One syllable each
Every year in the earth
Cicada haiku
This was our cicada summer,
when we could not escape their desperate humming
and the daytime heat roasted the honeysuckles
so at night the air smelled thick and sweet.
Glass sparkled and steamed in the Baltimore street
under a perpetually sherbet sky.
On my way into the city, I murdered quite a few
as they flew right into my car like tumbleweeds.
Frail as paper, so unimportant, why would I swerve to avoid them?
Still flinching with each flat thud against my windshield,
trying to feel only proportionately guilty.
Until I picked up a hitchhiker on my driver’s-side mirror.
The wind kept whipping him mercilessly, though he sought shelter,
blowing his wings at unforgiving angles that made me shiver and wince,
cringing from my shoulder blades and feeling sympathy pains
though I am so far from wings.
Until, not wanting to watch it rip away, I was doing thirty on the highway
and had to laugh as I prayed:
“God, can’t I just have this one to save?”
Funny how it’s different when there’s just one.
When you can’t help but connect with that last desperate flutter,
that final deep breath.
At that level where it doesn’t seem to matter,
that it’s only just an insect.
Because a lot of cicadas are just noise,
but one is more like a vocalist
singing the only song he’s ever known.
Like the one who saved the Greek, Eunomos,
by landing on his broken instrument
and belting out his Gods-given tune in seventeen succinct notes.
His haiku went something like:
Dad left me orphaned
with only this song of his
to sing like Grampa.
Because a lot of cicadas are just noise, but I know one is more like a poet
who just wants to recite his haiku,
begging you to find the letters hidden in its wings:
“W” for war. “P” for peace.
Tell me what this year will bring.
It’s said cicadas were once men
who loved music so much it was their only obsession, their only sustenance,
until their hands were as thin as twigs and their hearts so full of beauty
it threatened to crack their chests wide open.
The Muses took notice,
gave the frail bodies wings, made them their servants.
Messengers to report on the world of men and the art we should be creating.
And maybe this messenger on my mirror
is reminding me that there is a poem I haven’t finished in more than a year.
These are ugly angels, and yet
how many angels have to dig their way up from hell for redemption?
Eyes bloodshot from straining to see Heaven,
body dark from the soot and the Earth you’d been digging,
arms whittled to sticks from the scrapes and the bruising,
losing your memory with each handful of dirt,
until only the pursuit of the light is what’s driving you up,
praying you don’t die before you reach the top.
And how easy it would be to just give up, stop,
stay in the earth, skipping birth and burial.
But you can’t ...
because all this time you’ve been dreaming of wings.
Golden, paper-thin forgiveness, shimmering like fresh-cleaned stained glass.
So fragile, so fresh, so gently given,
they almost look wrong on that body
you’re trying to drag into Heaven.
This was our cicada summer.
And as so many lives flickered around us, dying out,
we should count ourselves lucky that, though earth-bound,
we are not yet in it,
and our lives are not lived to reproduce and die,
breeding and leaving our abbreviated legacies to fly,
And as he passed,
the summer’s last cicada spent a precious moment in my hair
to hum his haiku in my ear and die:
How we envy you
That you have time to compose
More than just three lines.
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6. |
Secret Surgery
05:41
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I hear there's a secret surgery
To cut all I ate right back out of me
You know it'd finally let me be free
I'd let them dive right in
I hear there's a secret surgery
To cut all this want right out of me
I could have it all or not have enough
And I couldn't care less
They could dive right in
It's eleven
The nightly news says
Nothing good and
Nothing important
Tiny Lives are
often over
Nothing more than
140 characters
Almost nothing now
And headlines no more
Do the screaming
Everyone now
They do the yelling
And even I can't help
But to dive right in.
I hear there's a secret surgery
To cut all the sin right out of me
To cut all the hate & cut all the rage
And help me turn away
And so I'd stalk the streets concave
And swallow down
All the spite & the pain
An automated martyr
Filled with surgical light
I'd let you dive right in.
And it's seven
The morning news says
Nothing good
And nothing important
Tiny Lives are
Just beginning
Still nothing more than
140 characters
We're almost nothing
But still we're screaming
Every headline
Does the yelling
No time for subtlety
You know we just can't help
It's time to dive right in.
©2015 rob hinkal
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7. |
Ode To a Heat Vent
04:38
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Our bathroom had a heat vent
A dusty vision of heaven
No clothes no needs
just an envelope of heat
And a steady firm belief that
Nothing ever changes
I'm never going to leave this place
Where nothing ever changes
It's home
We had a hammock
And I would ride it
Like a ship in to the storm
between the two old oak trees
Cicadas made it treacherous
Those alien things and
Eventually we grew too big
To pretend that nothing ever changes
I'm never going to leave this place
Where nothing ever changes
It's home.
We had this dishwasher
It rumbled & grumbled but it kept things clean
And I would lean
Rest my head & dread the ending of the cycle
You know what that would mean
Chores & homework
nothing ever changes
I never get to leave this place
And nothing ever changes
It's home
And off to bed
I would dread
The long dark walk
Down the hall
Where I was sure
that shadows crawled
Behind me
From the closet
With the hidden door
I can make it back to my bedroom doorknob...
Watch the clock and
Listen to my freedom tick away
Midnight came & went
And dawn's so far away
I can't sleep
What was I supposed to say?
Pray for death
In my sleep
I don't want Him to take me
Now my bathroom has a radiator
I need to clean it & it costs me cash
Still that envelope of heat
Is something you know it might just get me through the night
nothing ever changes
I don't want to leave this place
nothing ever changes
It's home x2
©2016 rob hinkal
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8. |
Looking Back
03:33
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I can't open my eyes today
all the scars are fresh & the memory won't go away
I can't quite manage a civil tongue in my head
I guess I best stay in bed anyway
it's not like you're ever around
not like we even share the same coast now
not like I've even got reason to bring it up now
but you do stick in my head anyway
CHORUS
I don't recall just when you gave up
but I know when I threw in the towel
and I don't know when you finally gave in
but I remember I was fucking tired
I always knew I was second place
a forlorn example of all you escaped from
you always knew you had a place you could cum
and I let you use up my time anyway
I wonder do you even remember cause
it all seems so far away
swing sets & heart strings & words that were meaningless
I bet you'd just say we were just kids anyway
CHORUS
So I don't care who he was
I don't even care who he is
I do hope he treats you
as good as I should have
and I hope that he never gets tired
Yeah, I hope that he never gets tired.
Well I can't open my eyes today
My Life is pretty good but I can't face it anyway
I wish I could call you & tell you the news
but you wouldn't remember me anyway.
©2016 rob hinkal
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9. |
Friday
03:44
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Dear...
It's a sweet sweet moment
The sun rise is lingering
Keep finding a way
To stall this day
Dear...
It's a sweet sweet movement
the birds are straining their sounds
to lend some charm to Charm City's clouds
CHORUS
the power's out, and
the lines are down
The roads are out
It's gonna be long slow day anyhow
Dear...
It's a sweet sweet moment
the sun's bright & lingering
Keep finding a way
To stall this day
Dear...
It's a sweet sweet movement
I Love the curve & the sway
The birds are unnerved
and all have escaped
CHORUS
The calendar tells
The day & the date
And this old sailor knows
Just why you gotta wait one more day
Let's stay in & wait
Out this stay-in date
Keep the world outside
Friday's just got to wait
No cotton or fleece
can silence the screams
of your feet
if you hit the floor running dear
The world's still spinning
So we're not headed out
Nobody needs us
on a day like this
I insist
I can sweeten the deal
With my hand on your wrist & my mouth right here
It's a whole day gone but I don't care to care
It'll only get better when we stay right here
The power's out,
The lines are down
The roads are out, but
The heat is on
The coffee's drunk & the calls are made
It's gonna be long slow day anyway
But if the power's back
we'll keep those lights turned down
The roads could still be out
It's gonna be long slow night anyhow
© 2014 rob Hinkal
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10. |
Terms
05:41
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Stocks jumped
And so did the brokers
What a jolt
What a ride
I just found out I got skin in the game
And I've been hitting F5 like an amateur
I'm showing my age
With my subjects & glances
And my choices in logos & pants
I just found out
I got skin in the game
And I've been screaming my loudest with the rest of them.
Yeah screaming my loudest with the rest of them.
My vote is in
And so are the taxes
I'm still waiting on the roads & the pot holes & patches
No one else gets it
We got skin in the game
Y'all just duck & blame all the rest of 'em
Flint is choking but at least now they got coverage
And California is bleeding but at least they've all got insurance
Volkswagon's grinning cause at least it's deductible
So they'll pay up & smile like the rest of them.
Yeah just pay up & smile like the rest of them.
What, you gonna sit back & laugh?
Thoughts jumped and so did the lyrics you know
Inspiration only gets you so far
I just found out I've got skin in the game
And I've been playing my heart out for hours
Waiting by the phone & the road & the courthouse
I'm waiting all alone & with saints & with rapists
We all found out we got skin in the game
But it sure seems like nobody gets it.
Yeah it sure seems like nobody gets it
You all sit back & laugh
Well I've come to terms
With my place in the country
my privilege, my hatred, my well-deserved currency
The air waves are filled
With the absolutely surety
That nobody matters
And freedom's a fallacy
majority rules SURE
But it don't mean you know me
It's no zero sum game
till everyone's bleeding
What, you gonna sit back & laugh?
Wrap it up!
I just found out you're as sure as the rest of us
And I can't wait till you figure out why
I'm hoping you'll soon get as sore as the rest of us
And I'm thinking that you'll figure out why
Now I'm showing my age
With my first-person narrative
I just thought I had something to say
Turns out I'm just a product of all of you people
And I guess that sort of makes us the same
Yeah I guess that sort of makes us the same.
Don't just sit back & laugh.
Cause I've come to terms...
©2016 rob hinkal
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11. |
Natural 20
04:49
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My woman she likes to tug on my beard
She says it helps keep a handle on me
And I can see that
As long as she's gentle
I am a delicate thing
I only like the rough & tumble
When it's time to come & level up for the occasion
And so I'd say
That when I need some direction
My woman, she can tug on my beard
CHORUS
And I say to myself
"How'd I get so lucky?"
And my friends they all say
"Man, how'd you get so lucky?"
Well with Life I kissed the dice
And I rolled a natural 20
My woman she likes to drive
My woman she likes the sci fi
She drove us round 695 & down 29
To see Star Wars eight or nine times
But my woman she's got her rage
She's got opinions on lanes & Rey & orks
We blasted past soccer moms & swerving husbands
And we were screaming
"That's not how the Force works!!!"
CHORUS
My woman she's independent!
Kind of worried about singing "my woman" when she finally hears this
She's either gonna love it or she's gonna hate it
And if she hates it, no-one else will ever, ever, ever hear this...
Maybe if I gave her a solo?
Not one of those pizz parts that she hates but one with her bow?
So by way of preemptive apology
For accepted song forms with possessive terminology
Here we go with Kristen Jones on the cello!
My woman she just likes board games
No RPGs no PC games no TV sports no psychodrama
Scrabble yes, Paranoia no, she don't even care about Fallout... Fo'
She just don't play those games.
CHORUS
I rolled a natural 20
©2016 rob hinkal
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12. |
Negative Space
06:38
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It's in the lack of tone
It's hard to find the ones you've missed
It's in the lack of colour
It's hard to find the ones you've missed
It's in the resignation
It's hard to find the ones you've missed
It's in the changes & the spaces
You'll find you lose the ones you've missed
You had to set his face on fire
To call for help
It's the sin of missing days
You'll find you lose the ones you've missed
It's in the eyes of those who still insist
You'll find you lose the ones you've missed
It's in the bruises on her wrist
You'll find you lose the ones you've missed
It's in the eyes of disbelieving mothers
You'll see the fates of those you've missed
You had to set his house on fire
To call for help
I saw the lack of tone & colour
You'll see the fate of those you've missed
I saw the resignation & the bruises
You'll see the fate of those you've missed
She insisted she was to blame for all of this
You'll see the fate of those you've missed
I screamed at your disbelieving mother
And then we lost the one we'd missed
You had to set yourself on fire
To call for help.
©2016 rob hinkal
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13. |
Stay Close
05:16
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I've been searching the mirror
And every day it is a new face
A little older than the old face
You are not welcome here
And every day I use a new tool
A little sharper than the old tool
Cause scratch the surface doesn't cut it
You are not welcome here
You'd think the feeling was familiar
With common cause could come an instinct
But you just don't seem to get it
You are not welcome here
You signed up for the mission
And signed on with your children in tow
Committing crimes of omission
You are not welcome here
Starved on redaction
Yet grown fat on the fiction
Still hungry for action
You are not welcome here
And now you've come to convince me
Or at the very least to judge me
I say "you & what army?"
You are not welcome here
And now you've come to the table
And pretend that you'll listen
But it's clear that you're wounded
And we both know how this ends
I'm still searching the mirror
And every day it's still a new face
A little older than the old face
And I'm still using the same tools
Using the same fools
Losing the same wars
But I'll draw you all close to me
I'll keep you all close to me
But I need to keep you closer still
closer still
Closer
Still
You are not welcome here
And now you've come to the table
I'll pretend that you'll listen
But it's clear that you're wounded
And we both know how this ends
©2015 rob hinkal
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14. |
Spring
04:51
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I can't believe
This is the way it's going down
Glass houses on the ground and
Stones thrown all around
The only way that that can play out
Is on a flat flat earth
On a round round world
It's bound to come around again again
it's bound to come around around again
I can't believe
this is the way it's going down
rage & rape & rhetoric
But we monkeys like our vengeance quick
But you think it's justice
Even when it's "just us"
But on a round round world
It's bound to come around again again
it's bound to come around around again
Spring will come
I can't believe
This is the way it's still played today
White man jumps and
Black man pays
One man Trumps
all the sense around the world today
Whether weather withers Texas
Or whether Mississippi drowns today
I see someone serving up a toast
Drunk & stinking seeking sense
But you just have
To go & do the math
It's bound to come around again again
it's bound to come around around again
Spring will come.
MADD OX verse:
The way it's going down
The sky attacks the ground
Teen spirit
smells like sadness
Just to move the world
Push the Earth
off its axis
Outrageous tactics
Ghetto Acrobats onna pissy mattress
The simple fact is
The struggle ain't cute
it's filled with asses
Corporations
Apply'n lashes
Make it rain ta separate the masses
We all need a little sunshine
But the ways of man
Keep fuckin wit our mind
Before you, defined you,
You're already defined
Break'n the chains
Make up your mind
What conquers the hurt & the pain
is the moment you shine
I can't believe
Two two sixteen
Cold war's back
But it's just a meme
Oil's cheap
The sun is bright
It's a February spring
It's bound to come around again again
it's bound to come around around again
Spring will come
©2016 rob hinkal
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15. |
ilyAIMY Baltimore, Maryland
ilyAIMY is a percussive acoustic rock animal hailing from Baltimore, MD. Mixing genres from rock to folk to soul to bluegrass; flavours as varied as jazz and hip hop curl through what is undoubtedly one of the most exciting sounds in today’s folk(ish) music scene. Instrumentation includes acoustic guitars, cello, djembe, cajon, Irish bones, keyboard, bass, drums & harmonies. ... more
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