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New South Blues EP

by The Restoration

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  • Digital Album
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  • Poster/Print + Digital Album

    Maria Fabrizio's gorgeous New South Blues artwork featuring a crown of thorns and cotton: a digital print on 11x17" heavy stock paper. (

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1.
I’ve got a pocket full of moonbeams, A noodle full of bad dreams And melodies that never went anywhere. I swear, I’ll stop poking the bear (right after this). You’ve got a castle made of sawdust, A mattress for a bank trust And a blaze of glory in the mind— You’ll find you may spend a while in line... Lo the Facebook lamentations About the “spoiling of the nation” And how the good ol’ days are gone. Oh? They never mention ol’ Jim Crow. “In the past, turned the page” Muslim witch hunt, Proposition 8 This is the new South Holy wars, tapas bars Hipsters, chillwave, hybrid cars This is the new South I keep my memories in an iPhone Right next to that old ham bone That I’m trying not to eat. See, piggies squeak and it makes me feel guilty Yes, I know, you also follow your own code But I pause to ask how thorough Your study of its context has been Ah, excuse me, there I go again. “YOU LIE!” Boeing Jets Don’t tread on Neo-Confederates This is the new South Nanobots, Leviticus Trickle down ignorance This is the new South I’d like to write a science fiction Where history is mentioned And we learn from the past. But who’d believe it, so I guess I’ll pass In all fairness, the South has no monopoly On ignorance and bigotry You understand We just have the most trusted brand Magnet schools for the Arts Crystal meth, Earnhardt This is the new South Literary legacy Bobby Jones University This is the new South —I hate to tell you.
2.
I hear this whispered conversation On a cellphone in a bathroom stall: "You know my wife and kids are at home And I don't know why you'd call. You knew how it would be— You knew it from the top with me. No matter how I want to I can't come and keep you warm. Now, I'm not one to pluck The speck in someone's eye— You'd never get his name out of me, See, I'm an accomplice in his lie. From two stalls down to myself While stiffing a cough— See who knows who has hooks in who out there And who knows where it stops.
3.
4.
Nobody cares who you are— And I mean that in the nicest way Because it applies to each of us, everyday. Yes, nobody cares who you are And I mean that in a cosmological way You’re probably not going to have your say. You say you’ll be a big star Well, I say in a couple billion years You’ll be back exactly where you are— With nobody caring who you are And I mean that in the most pragmatic way You don’t have long but, hey, you’ve got today. It may seem a noble cause To bring yourself more applause, But you gotta remember the big picture, Take the long view and listen: Nobody cares who you are— And I mean that in a very real way You're part of a genome that's better each day. You've got to keep that ego in check. You’re a pretty cool card in a trillion-card deck. You're the universe knowing itself— But, hey man, nobody likes a universe that's full of itself. It may seem a noble cause To bring yourself more applause, But you gotta remember the big picture, Take the long view and listen: When the sun burns up in 5 billion years Do you think they'll say, "It would be alright, If only Brad Pitt were here"? That's why nobody should care who you are Except for the ones you love Right here where you are.

about

From a band that usually writes narrative concept albums, consider the New South Blues EP a collection of nonfiction.

Each song on the EP carries the persisting stamp of the blues and each is about the real live South—the home we live in and draw from for our historical fiction. There is no grand arcing Faulknerian narrative here, calculated to climax around a social lesson. Nobody dies on the knife of symbolism. The darker side of the human journey does not prevail only to plead to the listener, "please, learn from this and don't be an asshole."

Instead, these songs are a stroll around the South Carolina tri-state area, right here in 2013. From the SC State Fair's surreal cacophony of laughter, screams, and heavy machinery, to an overheard phone conversation in a public bathroom between a cheating husband and his mistress, most of the narratives here are small and found as-is, with a few pieces of observation and satire thrown in for good measure. This approach allowed for a wider canvas, an embrace of the everyday moment, and the discovery that if you press record in a public place in 2013, in less than five minutes you'll still capture something like an elderly woman lamenting her husband's decision to not let her wear a sweater to the Fair.

As the band prepares to dive back in to complete our next historical piece, the 19th-century-based A Voice Wild & Strange, we took a great deal of care and pleasure documenting a few anecdotes from our everyday lives in what we hope is a fun and rewarding 30-minute journey through the new south.

credits

released December 6, 2013

Band recorded live onto 2" tape by Zac Thomas at Jam Room Studio

Tracks 1, 2 and mixed by Zac Thomas

Overdubs, "Sketches of the State Fair" and "Nobody Cares Who You Are" recorded and mixed by Daniel Machado

Mastered by Zac Thomas at Jam Room

Cover illustration and design by Maria Fabrizio
www.studio-ria.com

Check out individual tracks for detailed credits

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The Restoration Columbia, South Carolina

We write concept albums about the American South.

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