CARDBOARD CUTOUTS
Words and Music by Andrea Wittgens (copyright Trapdoor Escapade Music 2008)
It’s the scratching around that’s gonna take us down
We’re getting much too dirty for the diamonds in the rough
Fake your stuff and be a poster girl of something
But that’s how I landed in a corner on Monday
I was slouching round with cynics running off my mouth
I can tell you how it is but then I sit it out
Uh huh huh huh
And the cardboard cutouts say you’re saving face but
They don’t really know how it feels
The Cardboard cutouts say you’re losing faith
They don’t really know how it feels
They don’t really know how it feels
So let’s snap to attention and forget all of the mention
Of the diamonds in the rough cause if you dream it hard enough
Well then it must be true and we all gonna go home happy
I can be the cake and eat it too
Or I show up naked with my label sticking out
Like a beta kappa martyr gentlemen start your engines snarling
I get off on the races but I won’t come clean
Uh huh huh huh
And the cardboard cutouts say you’re saving face
They don’t really know how it feels
Gotta nerve coming round this place when
They don’t even know how it feels
They don’t even know how it feels
I just want to know how it feels
Don’t you wanna know how it feels?
I know what they’re gonna say I know what they’re gonna say….
Who says it should be that way who says it should be that way…
And the cardboard cutouts say you’re saving face
They don’t really know how it feels
Gotta nerve coming round this place when
They don’t even know how it feels
They don’t even know how it feels
I just want to know how it feels
Don’t you want to know how it feels?
MARCHING ORDERS
Words and Music by Andrea Wittgens (copyright Trapdoor Escapade Music 2008)
Que sera sera what will be will be what?
(Shuffle it up)
You get to where you get
On the backs of those you trust
Life is pretty
Life is Jobim in a glass
(swallow it down)
From nitty gritty
Comes law and order
There’s more than one way to get to Mordor
It’s hard to shake
These marching orders may just be stapled to my
DNA
‘Cause I keep on going
Going til there’s no where left to go
Us n them n him n her like oil n vinegar
Brother Love your royal doves have turned to packs of dogs
Do you feel frisky?
This is clearly déjà vu
(play it again)
I know it’s risky to be faithful and happy
From cradle to grave
Just when you think you can’t believe in anything
It’s hard to shake
These marching orders may just be stapled to my
DNA
‘Cause I keep on going
Going til there’s no where left to go
Are you tender-hearted? Are you wicked in the hand?
Or just (a little) fancy-footed when it comes to making a stand?
Don’t take it serious
Life’s a rabbit in a hat
(Where did it go?)
And aren’t u curious
downright delirious
Can’t stop from spinning around the same thing
It’s hard to shake
These marching orders may just be stapled to my
DNA
‘Cause I keep on going
Going til there’s no where left to go….
CREATURE FEATURE
Words and Music by Andrea Wittgens (copyright Trapdoor Escapade Music 2008)
What we need
Is a dream
And the good sense to think it through
The courage to make the move
But what we are
What we really are
Cartoon heroes taking calls
from deserted phone booths behind the mall
Ominous skies streaked with things to come
Happy mutations for everyone
Til the day, til the day the dream goes sour
And turn to poison visions of lizards tearing cities down
Creature Feature
Look at what we’re breeding in the backyard pool
Creature Feature
What started out as innovation
Quickly turned into an invasion
It begins
With a simple sin
A vague suspicion
That everything worthwhile is hidden
In the cracks
Of your wall
Poetry and dreams will follow
And swallow you whole
We could be drama queens in poker face
Strike a deathly pose just to raise the stakes
This is it - our finest hour
Kiss your television and pray for science fiction
Creature Feature
Look at what we’re breeding in the backyard pool
Creature Feature
What started out as innovation
Quickly turned into an invasion
La la la la…
In the skyline
There’s a lifeline
It’s like a loop hole
very few find
when the world moves
it’s something to escape to
somewhere out of bounds
your mind is running over
with visions that you found
Strange enough to make the world go hush
Tongue-tied and stupefied and waiting for the rush
Creature Feature
Look at what we’re breeding in the backyard pool
Creature Feature
What started off as innovation quickly turned into an invasion
Creature Feature
Look at what we’re breeding in the backyard pool
And on the rooftops
all the broken-hearted people
Holding up a sign saying “take me, take me take me”
Creature Feature
Look at what we’re breeding in the backyard pool
Creature Feature
What started off as innovation quickly turned into an invasion
La La la la
EMPIRES OF STRAW
Words and Music by Andrea Wittgens (copyright Trapdoor Escapade Music 2008)
Nothing spells disaster
Like trying to show you’re good to go
Hoping that your master
Will notice you and all you do for the sake of love
But love was like a mother
Who can’t be found or won’t come round
And you just want your comfort
Soft and strange like rebel angels following to cover you
Following to cover you
Go on set your fires on empires of straw
Go on let your fires lay waste of us all
Even the oceans of blue
Can’t help but burn for you
Maybe you’re a fighter
Staring down your battleground
Frozen by the sight of
A thousand wounds it’s what we do
For the sake of love
For the sake of love
Go on set your fires on empires of straw
Go on let your fires lay waste of us all
Even the oceans of blue
Can’t help but burn for you
Instrumental
If I could find a way to thread an army through a needle into my veins well then maybe I could be that heroine
Go on set your fires on empires of straw
Go on let your fires lay waste of us all
Even the oceans of blue
Can’t help but burn for you
Even the oceans of blue
Can’t help but burn for you
BLUE-EYED FOOL
Words and Music by Andrea Wittgens (copyright Trapdoor Escapade Music 2008)
“I tried to give you everything that you asked for”
She told you every single day
What an ordinary question to ask her
“When can we go out to play?”
The room smells too much like your damn cigarettes dear
And you could use a little air
Cause London’s Calling and the gangs of stealthy lads with flashy teeth are more than you can bare
So you’re out the door to look for more
(What was that stashed in mama’s closet?)
Hold me close and love me most
Not a word of what she told is true
My blue-eyed fool
Her tongue’s a funny place where flocks of fancy words
Are perched like the birds of paradise
Always singing, but never leaving her mouth
Til the smile is not a smile no more
You’re out the door to look for more
(What was that stashed in mama’s closet?)
Hold me close and love me most
Not a word of what she told is true
My blue-eyed fool
It’s true everybody’s chasing a secret
Wearing down their Sunday shoes
One day you take a well-deserved leave of absence
Then the rest is up to you
You’re out the door to look for more
(Who took the cash from mama’s closet?)
Hold me close and love me most
Not a word of what she told is true
My blue-eyed fool
WRECKING BALL
Words and Music by Andrea Wittgens (copyright Trapdoor Escapade Music 2008)
This place is new to me
Strange as a prairie scene
The witch is underneath the house
Nothing but her stocking feet sticking out
Oh no
Well, that’s one way to get to Oz
Radical weather and a catchy song
But I’m in need of simple plans
Blueprints even baby understands
Home, there is no place like home
And strong winds will blow
Uh Oh
Like a wrecking ball
It sometimes takes a wrecking ball
I build it up but afterall
It took a wrecking ball
If this seems like a violent end
It’s just that I needed to start again
And I’m a girl who loves extremes
Never had a knack for living
In between is the place where the “good girls” go
Halfway to Sunday on a yellowbrick road
Funny how you build a space
And something else will always come in its place
But no place like home
And strong winds will blow
Uh Oh
Like a wrecking ball
It sometimes takes a wrecking ball
I build it up but afterall
It took a wrecking ball
Here’s how the story goes
I take a step
I miss you so
Fine day for the great unknown
But come tomorrow I make my way back home home home
No place like home
And strong winds will blow
Uh Oh
Like a wrecking ball
It sometimes takes a wrecking ball
I build it up but afterall
It took a wrecking ball
SUMMER ESCAPE
Words and Music by Andrea Wittgens (copyright Trapdoor Escapade Music 2008)
This year’s vacation it’s postcards of airplanes for you
Everything’s balmy but I’m bored as a palm tree for you
Poolside philosophy is all very flattering
I’m brilliant in flip flops and cooked by high noon
Who’s going to save me from melting away
It all depends
On you my friend
The star of my summer escape
This year’s vacation it’s snapshots of Vegas for you
But I’m out of focus cause all I can picture is you
How is it possible to feel so nolstagic
For somebody’s face I haven’t even seen yet?
You’ll come in your finest of hot air balloons
It all depends
On you my friend
The star of my summer escape
Here’s the thing
It’s the trickiest thing
Oh it’s magical
In my mind we’re larger than life
Can we live up?
Can we live up to this?
Great expectations, it’s all very baffling
Like reading your epilogue before the first page
Or maybe your blockbuster’s made for TV
It all depends
On you my friend
The star of my summer escape
BEAUTIFUL YOU
Words and Music by Andrea Wittgens (copyright Trapdoor Escapade Music 2008)
I’ll move onto higher ground
Can you hear me now
Am I in your thoughts somehow?
No routine or rhythm to keep
And I try to sleep
But my body’s steeped in you
You’re so beautiful to me
So beautiful
Black crow in a dove’s disguise
My eyes seem to see
But they lie obsessively
Show me an atrocity
Or the sweetest thing
And I’ll only think of you
You’re so beautiful to me
So beautiful
So beautiful
So beautiful
I give my only breath to this last confession
I scatter to the wind my slim possessions
I lost my shadow to this strange obsession
Obsession
I’m sure I’ve crossed the line this time
You’re a perfect liar
You make my failing eyes untrue
No sense in these thoughts I fear
Like a house of mirrors
In a circus made of you
You’re so beautiful to me
So beautiful
So beautiful
So beautiful
PUNCHLINE
Words and Music by Andrea Wittgens (copyright Trapdoor Escapade Music 2008)
If we were living in a joke we’d know exactly how it goes
Cause we’ve heard it a hundred times
You know the one I mean…
The bear in the bar on the trampoline
While the bartender says something politically a propos
Remember the time I kissed you hard on the mouth
I think I knocked you off your guard
You said I laughed like bells tinged with melancholy
Funny, that’s how I feel now
But where do we go from here
Where do we go from here?
I think the punchline is somewhere in the silence
The punchline is everything I meant to say
But lost my words
Or found a flaw
So here we are
If we were living in a joke we’d know exactly how it goes
Cause we all have a part to play
You’d be the debonnaire with the top shelf drink and a cold hard stare
And I’d do tapdance just to see if you could laugh….
But the punchline is somewhere in the silence
The punchline is everything I meant to say
But lost my words
Or found a flaw
So here we are:
Waiting on a punchline
EVERYTHING IS RELATIVE TO YOU
Words and Music by Andrea Wittgens (copyright Trapdoor Escapade Music 2008)
If I’ve got slightest notions
They say you are the one
Two Three Four Five and counting…
If you are inches from me
Or off my hemisphere
This pleasure’s for the measuring
Lately everything is relative to you
Maybe all the laws of gravity will change their minds and all that binds us to
Tragedy
If I’m so wise and cryptic
Why can’t I crack the code
Each time I try I stumble
And this feels like revolution
This feels like everyday
Matter a fact
And rough n tumble
Lately everything is relative to you
Maybe all the laws of gravity will change their minds
and all that binds us to
Tragedy
Someone’s counting all our days
Facts and figures every hour
The only numbers I hold true
Distance from you to me
From me to you
Lately everything is relative to you
Maybe all the laws of gravity will change their minds and all that binds
Lately everything is relative to you
Maybe all the laws of gravity will change their minds and all that binds us to
Tragedy
STARRY NIGHT
Words and Music by Andrea Wittgens (copyright Trapdoor Escapade Music 2008)
No need to make it, so complicated
Try hard will drive your babies away
Pushing for something rewards me with nothing
Better off letting those tides roll in
Tides roll in
Honey run and grab a shovel baby’s gone and lost her marbles on the side of the road
Started off with good intentions but then in the end I kind of lost control of the load
It’s so comical, what we do to fit in
Sweat with the best, race the rat out the nest
I can run it faster than you
Well it’d feel so good to say Bye Bye world
I’m leaving you
Pack all my hopes in a box for good
I’m off but –
Starry Night I know why I can’t be through with you
Starry Night I know why I can’t be through with you
Rocking and raging may keep me from aging
But it’s not going to keep those demons away
Building a rocket can pad both my pockets
But who’s going to teach my children to play
Beg as they may
Honey run and grab a shovel baby’s gone and made a fortune selling trash for the king
Drag a dirty dollar out from underneath your collar
Buy your love and all seven sins
It’s so trivial what we think should matter most afterall
Gather up your little tokens, smash then til their bruised and broken
Find your own way home from the ball
Well it’d feel so good to say Bye Bye world
I’m leaving you
Pack all my hopes in a box for good
I’m off but –
Starry Night I know why I can’t be through with you
Starry Night I know why I can’t be through with you
