Get all 3 HUCK releases available on Bandcamp and save 25%.
Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Alexander the Great ― Act 3, Alexander the Great — Act 2, and Alexander the Great — Act 1.
1. |
Alexander
04:38
|
|||
|
I was a bored little boy
With the night and the day in his eyes.
I told myself I’d seen it all.
But all that I saw, I was shown—
I’m as blind as a bat on my own.
I long to hear some echoed call.
Dull dusk of the soul…
Dawn of the dead as a dodo…
So put Dionysus to rest,
Let Apollo be put to the test
Under a tragicomic pall,
And we’ll find his fatal flaw.
Low to New Mexico’s ground,
Where the ghost of a crow may be bound,
I’ll take what’s left of Johnny’s love
And raise a new idol in dust.
Something tells me my god will be just.
Is that a lightning bolt above
Or a crooked eagle claw?
Dull dusk of the soul…
Dawn of the dead as a dodo…
With a baby in its craw.
|
||||
2. |
The Body
04:38
|
|||
|
Upon his release by the New Orleans Police, Alexander fled the confrontation with his father. But the feeling of relief died young at the hands of the thought that to be free was to be damned. Alone for the first time, our hero felt so small that to distinguish life from death was to split hairs. This would be his last night in the city—one last adventure in the throng.
To dull his pain and oil his tongue for what had happened to Johnny, the boys got him good and drunk and ferried him through the streets. But Alexander’s pall lifted only to let out the occasional despondent little laugh. He passed out at dawn, whereupon the author of his fate, like the Angel of the Lord, appeared before the young man and told him what to do—he would save what he could of the body of his friend.
The entrance to the derelict was covered in police tape but Alexander slipped through and climbed the stairs to the Bird’s Nest. The squat was mostly undisturbed, the stash had not been found. And nestled in the bags of weed, screwed-up bills and fake IDs—the needle he had hidden from the cops. A plume of blood persisted, burgundy through gold, in the dregs of the fatal resin shot.
The footsteps on the stairs sent him flying out of the room and into the next, where he hid behind the rotten door. “We think around half a dozen were living here,” said the Lieutenant, “including your son and the Indian kid.” Nobody noticed Alexander making his descent… In the street, he forced the bad window of his father’s old Ford, climbed into the driver’s seat and fired up the engine the way Johnny had taught him.
By dusk, his drive had eroded all civilization but the road. Here was the desert his friend would eulogise—on the Texas-New Mexico border where the Ford had broken down. In the sky, a diorama of Greek Gods bandied with the legend of the Caddo brothers who turned into stars.
He rolled the car off the road and set it alight with the doomsday kit his father kept in the trunk, then lay on his back—sizing up the firmament, syringe in hand—and took the germ of Johnny’s body into his.
|
||||
3. |
The Spirit
04:42
|
|||
|
For I have dreamed a dreary dream.
Oh who is free of sorrow?
For my love was dead on a leafy bed
Beside the River Yarrow.
And many men did come and go,
And all were armed with knife.
They’ve slain, they’ve slain my own dear swain,
They’ve twined him of his life…
They’ve slain, they’ve slain my own dear swain,
They’ve twined him of his life…
The song you heard when in the womb—
Your mother sang it often.
The spirit of it stayed with you,
The gone but not forgotten.
Now I become the dreary dream,
But I will hear no pity,
Though I lie dead on an icy bed
Beside the Mississippi…
Though I lie dead on an icy bed
Beside the Mississippi…
|
||||
4. |
Letter to Louise
05:41
|
|||
|
Sweetheart, I ain’t coming home to you.
I know what to be, not what to do.
I still belong halfway
Between night and day.
Some streets name themselves for other towns.
Some feet guide themselves by lovers’ sounds.
Maybe one day I’ll stop,
And you’ll walk right up.
We’ll meet by the bones of a burned out car,
And trade our traditions below a lonesome star.
You’re not serious when you’re fifteen—
All that talk of immortality.
Let’s have a boy out here,
And let’s hope he’s queer.
We’ll live where the rules are like old stone walls.
We’ll fix them with bricks of our own, or let them fall.
|
||||
HUCK Oxford, UK
Humphrey ‘Huck’ Astley | Singer with The Xander Band, The Handsome Fee, et al | New solo EP coming 2020 ✌️🤞
If you like HUCK, you may also like:
The Brooklyn band deliver a blissful psychedelic rock album steeped in sci-fi and spirituality, awash with organs, strings, and reverb.
go to album
Echo Dancing
by Alejandro Escovedo
The legendary Alejandro Escovedo returns with another country-rock scorcher.
go to album
24th Street Blues
by Tom Heyman
Tom Heyman documents life in San Francisco circa 2023, refusing to succumb to easy characterization & instead capturing the city’s nuance.
go to album
An Evening at Macri Park
by Seán Barna
Singer-songwriter Seán Barna writes a moving and tuneful character study of the dimly-lit Brooklyn queer bar.
go to album
Out on the line
by The Blue Highways
The slashing roots rock on “Out On the Line” always makes its way to the kind of triumphant chorus that quickens the pulse.
go to album
Passion Fruit Boys
by Passion Fruit Boys
Nashville’s Passion Fruit Boys nail the effervescent janglepop of ’80s college radio with bright guitars and immediate hooks.
go to album
Soulful indie pop with an ambient twist, the latest from Deau Eyes is ghostly and bewitching.
go to album
