We’ve updated our Terms of Use to reflect our new entity name and address. You can review the changes here.
We’ve updated our Terms of Use. You can review the changes here.

Blinking and Breathing

by Simon van Gend Band

/
  • Streaming + Download

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

      $7 USD  or more

     

  • Full Digital Discography

    Get all 5 Simon van Gend Band releases available on Bandcamp and save 25%.

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Suffer Well, Blinking and Breathing, Guest of my Feelings, Pocketsongs, and Unhinged. , and , .

    Purchasable with gift card

      $21.75 USD or more (25% OFF)

     

1.
i’m just a little bit scared of something i can’t hide but i can run the taste of love still lingers on even though the love is gone keep the whistle but blow the horn love the feeling love the form rivers freeze but blood is warm gather in here comes the storm am i the worm wriggling through the ground soon to find the sun? i’m just a man without much means like to wear t-shirt and jeans time for dinner eat my beans too much oil not much cream love the city but not the slums see the world it’s overrun see the buildings hide the sun all the children have no fun am i the worm wriggling through the ground soon to find the sun? so long ago could’ve been ok, i know could’ve been ok, could’ve been ok, i know yesterday i got some news broken window girl abused broken life no way home got to stumble ever on smiling with a broken face eyes that shine through her disgrace soon forgotten long misplaced elbows out i’ll win this race am i the worm wriggling through the ground soon to find the sun? all i ever wanted was a home to breathe and feel my loss raise a garden green with love feel the rain feel the mud listen to the pouring rain hear the windy window pane maybe find a place to be the roots that hold the weeping tree am i the worm wriggling through the ground soon to find the sun so long ago could’ve been ok, i know could’ve been ok, could’ve been ok, i know
2.
ants on fire 03:15
something to say is never enough it’s something to feed on when we can’t find love it’s always the same, nobody’s to blame for feelings of falling inwards, like in some strange game now, endlessly playing the surfaces here they keep me away i’m trying to find my way beneath your words i’m simmering now, i’m out of my head i’m pulling away from tortions, feelings won’t play dead now, they won’t kow-tow feels like ants on fire that are burning me now now if feel it feels like sunrays shining up from below can you feel it? i’m coming to taste a piece of your heart i’m coming to find the dreams that shape you i’m burning alive with all i can be i’m needing to set my sights one some new shining horizon, to swim with poseidon i’m tight as a drum, too long in the sun i’ve got to find waterfalls and breezes i’m bitter and cold, i wish i was kind i’m wondering if what you might say could save my life now, or maybe not right now feels like ants on fire that are burning me now now if feel it feels like sunrays shining up from below can you feel it?
3.
oh i think it was a friday when she told that that she no longer needed me in her life so i put the kettle on, knowing i’ve got to carry on watching shadows falling complicating my life i’m torn and broken again she’s all i ever needed all the love that couldn’t get in these eyes too sad to receive it won’t you put the kettle on? please me the way you rattle on keep away those shadows complicating my life i hope that i never can shake you that i never will chase you anywhere but closer into these arms when i’m torn and broken again she’ll be all i ever needed all the joy that couldn’t get in these eyes too sad to receive it so when i seem to be shaken or like i think i’m mistaken don’t let me be complicating my life
4.
brave ones 04:08
flashes of fire in songs of rivers and rain there’s nothing wrong with feeling alive to a lingering pain and out of your mind with things you know are real that only you can feel far underneath the sea in a dream, her loveliness lies crawling through the earth in a stream of laughter and sighs she’s entered a world that only brave ones know where only brave ones go tonight i’m going to head out alone to see if she’s there i’ll breathe her in and make her my own and drink up her tears ‘cause when we’re alone, there’s nothing we can’t be and nothing we can’t see
5.
see me sink see me rise heavy on the outside i get so tied up crawling up the walls on my inside so hard i try to get by, to get by where’s the thorn in my side? spinning all around all the more i feel it spinning till i fall down to the ground and then i cry the feelings fly, the feelings fly caught in my own headlights trying to be near what i need so badly slipping into fear when i find love’s lake’s dry and a blue blue sky a desert dry, a desert dry i know i wasted your time but how can we be sure when we need so badly something that we lost and may well never find please, please be kind when it gets so dark and we get so blind
6.
soon you’ll go and i will say you’re wrong to even try gone like air i’ll be aware of days that pass me by keeping the strain in the days that remain i’ll be breaking to pieces inside but stone-like silent spaces will keep me alive cautious now i step somehow to where i know i’ll be when i’ve grown into the life that somewhere waits for me slipping away at the end of the day i’ll be breaking to pieces inside stone-like silence raging like rivers inside summer ends still we depend on what we thought was free the understanding comes too late it’s left a hole in me the lessons we learn when the house starts to burn and bits of us float in the sky but stone-like silent spaces still keep me alive now i’m alone inside this home where broken voices come to echo down beneath the ground untouched by winter sun moths in my hair keep the sleep from my lair but the lightening morning will come honed by endless fire i’ll burn till i’m done
7.
i can remember a scene from when i was only four, i was walking with my brother and his friends along down the road i was only looking for a way to feel safe once more everybody was safe one time before the blinking and breathing and crying and then my brother and his friends began pelting me with stones, i cried and i ran back to the house, there was no one at home i was only looking for a way to feel safe once more everybody was safe one time before the blinking and breathing and crying i ran through the gate and i ran through the door i called up my mom where she worked at the store she said don’t call here i’ve told you before i was only looking for a way to feel safe once more everybody was safe one time before the blinking and breathing and crying i ran to my bed and howled at the wall i screamed and i cried till my body was sore and then i decided to hide in my core i decided that i wouldn’t cry any more i was only looking for a way to feel safe once more everybody was safe one time before the blinking and breathing and crying
8.
happy home 02:38
someday i’m gonna build myself a home complete with love a cornerstone there’ll be no anger to shake the walls therell be no space for loneliness at all seven in the morning down for a swim run to the ocean, jump right in back in the car with a soggy hound these boys are finding out what life’s about a tiny thought engages me tells me that is not to be the thought gets bigger as they day goes on then she comes home and i resume the song out in the waves i can hear the moan of the days i’ve lost or never known but fresh as a sliver of the morning sun i understand they thing that i’ve become sometimes i think that i can see what it is that’s killing me what is that drags me down but every time her love can turn me round seven in the morning down for a swim run to the ocean, jump right in back in the car with a soggy hound these boys are finding out what life’s about
9.
who am i to say i don’t need your love anyway you come out spinning your fine line in my springtime my oh me oh my take this love and give it a try hide it somewhere inside you, deep in your sky blue so, i think that I feel that i need you you know it, you feel it and so i’ll weasel you out and i’ll tease you can’t you see that i’m sure i’ve seen the things that love can endure i’ve been broken a few times, lost from my sunshine you’re my will and my way don’t be scared if there’s nothing to say ‘cause i’ll be laughing beside you and inside you so, i think that I feel that i need you you know it, you feel it and so i’ll weasel you out and i’ll tease you was hard to be here today thoughts of you kept making me stray into the seas where you wander, pull me under much of what i believe falls away like sand in a sieve but somehow part of me knows how things will go now so, i think that I feel that i need you you know it, you feel it and so i’ll weasel you out and i’ll tease you
10.
oceans 03:35
oceans swimming inside of my sleep green grass floating away with my feet striding like a masai in the sun, shaking this heart beat i’m dreaming a tune, whistling a dream no longer at war with my peace red lights looming ahead but i can’t stop freed slaves jumping for joy till they drop someday my soul may be sailing on the sea’s chop and i’m dreaming a tune, whistling a dream remembering all i forgot haven’t you been around the bend and back again without a friend to honour you at all? and why, and what on earth, is all this living for? oh she’s so much of pressure release feel free to give her a squeeze in the street the easiest pleasure to please i feed her with my heart beat and i’m dreaming a tune, whistling a dream no longer at war with my peace love me when i return from the war sleep tight knowing what freedom is for it’s not what you say with your words it’s what’s in between and i’m dreaming a tune, whistiling a dream floating away on the stream i hope to find the rest i need inside the belief that you’re staying but deep beneath the sound of your words i can hear what you’re saying i’m trying to hear what you’re saying
11.
i come for you my sword on high i try for love oh how i try i dream at night of frozen lakes i give my lonely giver’s ache oh slowly i take a moment to be lonely, then i run from there like a believer in something i can never hold oh take me, sweetness, back into your fold and then a little later on, with lonely feelings growing strong and all that could ever be weighing down so heavily time takes me a little further down the road to where i learn to breathe a little slower i take a little more than i can give so i can hold onto the things i need to live for freedom’s call not wage this lonely bitter war i walk alone in thorny hills i lie awake on window sills burn now to the embers in my core i feel like i am closer than i’ve been before but as i grasp at it it slips away and so i stumble off into the day light where the feelings grow the light inside so soft and slow i dream a lonely dreamer’s song and reassured i stumble on
12.
i saw you waiting with your alsatians down by observatory station like kings of the railroad they seemed to be life’s culmination the gifts of creation in the steam on their breath and the droplets of sweet salivation quivering gently with violence’s anticipation the game we were playing was watch out for love, it’s the one thing we could not believe in standing in shoes that were cobbled for lying and thieving long ago a young boy was ruled by his one joy a bicycle, a christmas tree but love wasn’t spoken it was nailed to a totem for all to see, but not for me it’s hard now to trace her, adjusting my eyes to this darkness without any flavour and if you must know there was nothing to do then to save her do me a favour, when she is holding you look for the gifts that i gave her she might not be better but hopefully she’s become braver long ago a young boy was ruled by his one joy a bicycle, a christmas tree but love wasn’t spoken, it was nailed to a totem for all to see, but not for me the daylight was graying, and all we could hope for was not to be awkward in our leaving so much for friendship i’m moving along now to grieving

about

Cape Town-based singer-songwriter Simon van Gend's fourth album, with the Bande A Part (Eric Michot on bass, Ross Campbell on drums), produced by Australian indie-producer Ian Pritchett, well known for his work with Australian acts Angus and Julia Stone and the Beautiful Girls.

credits

released June 10, 2013

Simon van Gend - vocals and acoustic guitar
Eric Michot – bass guitar and backing vocals
Ross Campbell – drums and backing vocals
Chris Letcher – synth woodwinds, brass, organ, etc. on tracks 1, 5, 10 and 11
Ross McDonald – horn arrangements and trombone on tracks 2, 4 and 11
Lee Thompson – trumpet on tracks 2, 4 and 11
Gene Kierman – french horn on tracks 2, 4 and 11
Frances Kierman – backing vocals on tracks 9 and 12
Brendon Bussy – mandolin on tracks 9, 10 and 12
Nielen Prinsloo – banjo on tracks 5 and 8
Dave Ferguson – harmonica on tracks 7 and 8
Gustavo Fasani – bandoneón on track 7
All songs written by Simon van Gend and arranged by Simon van Gend, Eric Michot and Ross Campbell
All songs produced, engineered, mixed and mastered by Ian Pritchett
Recorded at the SAE Institute, Church Square, Cape Town, South Africa
Album artwork by Lauren Fowler

license

all rights reserved

tags

about

Simon van Gend Band Cape Town, South Africa

Simon and the Band à Parte are an introspective indie/folk/rock band from Cape Town, whose music has been described as a unique blend of folksie foot-tapping red wine fireside poetry. This trio, with Simon on vocals and acoustic guitar, Eric Michot on bass and Ross Campbell on drums, has released 3 albums to date, with a 4th due to be released on 30th June this year. ... more

contact / help

Contact Simon van Gend Band

Streaming and
Download help

Redeem code

Report this album or account

If you like Simon van Gend Band, you may also like: