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Come, Come to the Sunset Tree 1

Cover of Come, Come to the Sunset Tree Back of Come, Come to the Sunset Tree

Released: 2005
Label: 4AD

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Lyrics only — sorry!

Apologies, but I haven't had the chance to annotate this album yet — if you'd like to help, please email me! This page is just a placeholder so that you can read the lyrics, and full annotations, liner notes, and the rest will come when the page is fully annotated.

Liner notes

come, come to the sunset tree
an album by the mountain goats

this vinyl edition of the sunset tree consists of songs recorded at home in north carolina

respect to the flying man: we've got your back

Come, Come to the Sunset Tree is the bonus EP that came with early preorders of The Sunset Tree.

Table of contents

  1. You or Your Memory
  2. Up the Wolves
  3. Dilaudid
  4. Collapsing Stars
  5. Dinu Lipatti's Bones
  6. Love Love Love
  7. High Doses #2
  8. Lion's Teeth
  9. This Year
  10. Song for Dennis Brown
  11. The Day the Aliens Came

You or Your Memory

You or Your Memory is annotated with The Sunset Tree.

Up the Wolves

Up the Wolves is annotated with The Sunset Tree.

Dilaudid

Dilaudid is annotated with The Sunset Tree.

Collapsing Stars

Collapsing Stars is annotated with Dilaudid.

Dinu Lipatti's Bones

Dinu Lipatti's Bones is annotated with The Sunset Tree.

Love Love Love

Love Love Love is annotated with The Sunset Tree.

High Doses #2

We all woke up that morning
Claw marks on our little faces
The dull thud from the treetops
The echo in the hollow places

Rose up high and lonely
Wringing my hands, grinding my teeth
All the triumph overhead
All the disaster underneath

Spat out my morning prayers
Desperate pleas and vicious lies
Felt the sunlight through the grating
Covered up my eyes

Woke up feeling awful
Shook my head to drive the ghosts away
This is just a flesh wound
And it will clear up any day

But the present I got planned for you pricks
Is gonna be a little harder to fix
Thank God for small favors
In high doses

Heard the voices through the air vents
Listen to them squeal
The great big world is out there
The hidden one beneath my heel

Called up my sister in Reseda
Left a message at the tone
All the points where contact fails us
All of the dead spots in the zone

And the acid in my throat
Every time I try to talk
The songs that keep me up at night
Standing on that solid rock

Rose up high and dry and lonely
Stumbled coming out the gate
This is just a paper cut
And it will scab over, just you wait

But the cuts that I'll shortly begin dealing out
Are gonna give you something to cry about
Thank God for small favors
In high doses

Lion's Teeth

Lion's Teeth is annotated with The Sunset Tree.

This Year

This Year is annotated with The Sunset Tree.

Song for Dennis Brown

Song for Dennis Brown is annotated with The Sunset Tree.

The Day the Aliens Came

"Hey, Mr. Hughes and Mr. Vanderslice. Uh, this is a new song I'm really excited about, and uh, and so since I wrote it on my old Cort guitar instead of the new one, I wanna play it on that just for purposes of — 'cause I've been writing it and so forth, so that's why it sounds a little beat up and flat and everything because these strings are old and everything, so sorry about that. Uh, it's in A. I think I'm tuned to an A. It should be called 'Hawaiian Feeling', but probably can't be called that. Um, OK, right. All right."

I will wake up at 6 AM again
And I will find my way to the front door
Like a soldier crawling through the smoking carnage
Smoldering bodies at my feet
I'd love to stick around, but I've got someone to meet
And I will put my best foot forward
And I'll thank God I made it out of there
On the day when my new friends come

I will present myself in my nice white tuxedo jacket
And I will look out at the day through my dark sunglasses
And take in the scene
The house behind me and the people in it
Will all go up like steam in just a minute
There's gonna be a redefining of some borders
And I will receive my orders
On the day when my new friends come

The rooftops and the sidewalks
Will all melt like plastic
And oh, friends, old friends, dear friends
I'm gonna look fantastic

There won't be any reason left to cry
'Cause there won't be any people left to cry for
My memory's gonna vaporize itself
And my Italian shoes, well, they will be to die for
I believe I can fly
Why don't you look up at me and wave goodbye
On the day when my new friends come

Credits

Thanks to Wil Hall, who transcribed this EP along with many of the other more recent albums. Strong work!

To Caliclimber the bold, to whom I owe my firstborn child thanks to his excellent Flickr album from which the album art for this page was taken.

Footnotes

  1. Come, Come to the Sunset Tree had multiple different covers. The cover depicted here is one of the two owned by Caliclimber (see above), but many others exist. The liner notes are the same, but the art painted on each album differs. This particular copy is #184 of the 1,000 printed. Many still remain which have yet to be painted and sold by John. Caliclimber's other copy is #660; you can see it on his superb Flickr page. ↩