Get all 29 James Jefferys releases available on Bandcamp.
Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Lifetime for the Shy, So Now He Hides, Songs For People Who Keep Their Heads Down, Or a Hollywood Movie, All Is Worry, Now I Can See Exactly Where the Sea Begins, Gone is Trouble, Stand Outside Your House, Face the Street and Shout, and 21 more.
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James Jefferys - Lexi (It’s All Just Words)
I find it hard to grasp that you’re a liar
If I was quick this would spell certain death
Germs wouldn’t burst if they were singing
Then nothing on his planet would make sense
Posture for necks
Soften for sex
In an office complex
Lexi,
Lexi,
Lex
I found it hard to grasp that time
When you left me on the platform with the food
Your train rolled off in silence, you laughing
Your hungry teeth will need these soon…
Show more, bury less
From the core, under your vest
We’ve said before, we’re very impressed
Lexi,
Lexi,
Lex
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2. |
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James Jefferys - Lily (Of What You Will Be)
If we look carefully, Lily
We can see you skittering
Through the thicket of tiny hairs
On the backs of my fingers;
The good news in her pupil
Which brings a real glimmer –
Our direct touch of hands
That connects up the strands
Of what you will be
And when it’s your turn,
One evening you’ll learn
From some kind of brother
That everyone hates each other.
But Earth isn’t wrecked
We just lack respect
And devote our love
To the push and the shove
Of what you will be
Just let life leaven you,
Make you rise to the kind of Heaven
That only you found
And can understand
Some will keep your young tongue dumb,
Try to shut you up and then
Say the hour will never come
When you are better than them.
Every day you hear their pleas
That they could be this naïve
And do all in their shaking power
To destroy the acorn tower
Of what you will be
Just let life leaven you,
Make you rise to the kind of Heaven
That only you found
And can understand
Yes, there will be flies on you
And one day, you’ll die too
But time down here (and don’t deny it)
Is no time, my child, to be quiet
Just let life leaven you,
Make you rise to the kind of Heaven
That only you found
And can understand
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3. |
Lizzie (Down & Out)
02:41
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James Jefferys - Lizzie (Down and Out)
When Lizzie looks down on me;
Prince of the gutter, hearts a-flutter
My chin unshaved tends to pave
A path to the paltry, sweaty and sultry –
A prince and nutter, clench and mutter,
Blaming the menials for the crown of doubt –
Changing the meaning of down and out.
When Lizzie looks down on me,
Like she doesn’t care how it makes me feel,
This clever fella will never tell her
What it does to me, and the buzz it brings;
King of the dirt – singing in a shirt
Raining his genius around the drought,
Changing the meaning of down and out.
If I don’t turn up,
Doesn’t mean I’m busy
I’m just imitating Lizzie
If I rip my lip
When you try to kiss me –
All I know, I learned from Lizzie
When Lizzie looks down on me,
Queen of the moulded, curating blindfolded
Banging my stitches, hanging those pictures
In a weird kind of deluded fashion
So no-one can see them enough to judge
Brings pain for redeemers, bound and devout
Changing the meaning of down and out.
Lizzie chucks out her meaty hand
An olive twig – my driest land
Swivels around, shows her hole
A muggy night, the blackest coal.
If I don’t turn up,
Doesn’t mean I’m busy
I’m just imitating Lizzie
If I rip my lip
When you try to kiss me –
All I know, I learned from Lizzie
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4. |
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James Jefferys - Lakshmi (For What They Are)
A western ascension
Destined for mentions
On the crests of
My best intentions…
Be what you can’t –
A leaf on a branch
A wreath from the plants
Seeing all parts
For what they are
For what they are
For what they are
Is boring, by far
Lakshmi provides,
Shares and divides
I smell orange peel,
Perfumes, lavish meals
Of kedgeree and spicy veal
All to see and try and feel…
Of course this whole place
Is more than a way
Of forcing this day
To afford you a taste
Of what they are
Of what they are
For what they are
Is boring, by far
Lakshmi provides,
Shares and divides
Lakshmi of dusk
Let the sun never rise
Just leave your pink musk
And the warmth of this night
For what they are
Is boring, by far
Lakshmi provides,
Shares and divides
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5. |
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James Jefferys - Louise (I’ve Had to Change My Mind)
Watching
Tides come in
Does wonders for the states of some things
The sea knows I’ve been blind
Thinking with my mind…
Only people
Mess around a break each other
The waves have guessed enough
I feel them gently judge
No-one
Has this gift to bring –
It has to come with time
If I’d been away,
I’m back today
I’ve had to change my mind
Here’s me,
Kneeling
Before you, afraid and lonely
My cares have changed, of course
I hope you’ve not changed yours
Sitting on the beach last night,
Just me and the sand
Still, it didn’t feel quite right
Without you at my hand
No-one
Had this gift to bring –
It had to come with time
If I’d been away,
I’m back today
I’ve had to change my mind
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6. |
Linda (No Memento)
03:01
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James Jefferys - Linda (No Memento)
A big, unfed and spacious day;
Dig instead into the Cretaceous clay
But loyal to the course of curses
You, buoyant, bobbed up to the surface
To check whose lives you’ve yet to hinder
Yet we’re deprived, lovely Linda
Why am I forever explaining
To the clever as well as the layman
Why she is all that’s cancerous?
Mean, appalling, rancorous,
Linda
You’re bubbles in the catacombs,
A Jacquard loom of out-of-tune
Beads falling from a broken necklace,
And me in the distance, calling you reckless
Why am I forever explaining
To the clever as well as the layman
Why she is all that’s cancerous?
Mean, appalling, rancorous,
Linda
I condemned as pathetic
When lesser people, almost magnetic
Followed the famous too far –
Mocked your ballistic frenzy
Until the mystic chose to send me
Under that bar…
When the house of your head is broken into
Linda leaves you with no memento
Of life as it was
And what’s pittance for some
For you will come
At a crazy kind of cost
Why am I forever explaining
To the clever as well as the layman
Why she is all that’s cancerous?
Mean, appalling, rancorous,
Linda
Kick back, now… Isn’t it nicer
To admit this is part
Of a long, hard cycle?
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7. |
Lucy (Fill The Sky)
02:53
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James Jefferys - Lucy (Fill The Sky)
The tenor sings at proscenium arch
A selection of his songs. His
Audience of swaying trees need his touch
In the forest of the filthy conscience
The tryptophobic corpse goes thin
Afraid that this one’s for him
Lucy sings on the empty stage
His mind inclined to rhyme, not business.
But this pie in the sky will decline with age
If he minds the orb of scissors
The tryptophobic corpse goes thin
Afraid that this one’s for him
I don’t want to dig these holes
I just to fill the sky
The tenor sings to sorry and worry
With melancholy his sorry folly
He and music are in no hurry –
Slow jazz curls around his body
Lucy’ll know when that times comes
The time when she ceases to twiddle her thumbs
In the middle of fiddling around with tonnes –
Lucy, I’ll hold you close to my lungs
For Lucy the idea of having nerves is
Like swerving without purpose, or joking –
It’s no thing to further - a real dearth of service
Unless the patient enjoys such hypnosis
The tryptophobic corpse goes thin
Afraid that this one’s for him
I don’t want to dig these holes
I just to fill the sky
I don’t want to dig these holes
I just to fill the sky
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8. |
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James Jefferys - Lucretia (Worst Case Lothario)
As oceans lapped her yellow umbrella,
She searched for scraps that perhaps could sell her
The she was me – crying all the while
Feigning the rain, crocodile smiles
No impressing, verily
Row this vessel, merrily.
With a sneeze, this scene
Is no longer seen
I thank my panicking allergies.
I can always rely on my over-wrenched defences
To a provide a ride for analogies
So instead of the sea
And me as a pea,
I loom is a room,
Nursing the curtains,
Cursing a person…
Some hi-falutin
Guy in a suit
With a tie to boot
My, how cute
But I’d rather it were me
(Me, me, me, me, me, me, me)
No calm for me today;
I’m welcomed to a world
With someone else at the helm
And in this childish vessel,
Seldom do I wrestle with land at all
Just fall in a mess – the helm is the handle
No calm for me today
She’s alone in the clouds, fucking wailing
On my own, doubled-down, quick bucket-bailing
She’s shown me she’s found a dock while I’m sailing
I am a worst-case lothario
I make my way South
Into his gaping mouth
My head starts to fly
It wasn’t a tie –
On closer inspection,
A towering erection.
A natural charmer.
His suit was armour
Brutal and fierce
The only thing cute was me trying to pierce
The only thing cute was me trying to pierce
I am a worst-case lothario
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