regression /rəˈɡreSH(ə)n/. An instance of regressing. A return to a previous, less optimal state. A traveling back in time. A mode of therapy in which the behaviors of an earlier stage are reenacted to facilitate healing. A measure of the association of one or more independent variables with a dependent variable. An equation that characterizes a relationship such that one variable can be estimated from the others. The reappearance of a flaw that had previously been addressed. The fourth album by The Long Afternoon, released by Problematic Audio recordings.
For this document, The Long Afternoon comprised:
Eston Martz: guitars, keyboards, vocals
Jeff Edmunds: bass, vocals
Greg Elliott: drums, vocals
Jean-Pierre Mulley: guitars, vocals
Recorded February 2014 to May 2016 at Problematic Audio and 7 Spruces by Eston Martz and J.-P. Mulley. Produced by M&M. Mastered by Bob Klotz and Klotz Audio Productions.
All songs by Eston Martz except “Year of the Cat” by Al Stewart and Peter Wood.
For word and deed
An open channel
For planting seeds
Natural instincts
Nurture retrained
Phantom movements
Kneejerk, profaned
Programmed reactions
Perchance to scream
And so receive
Incoming signal tripping wires
Autoresponder
Connecting dots to make straight lines
Autoresponder
Look not ahead look not behind
Autoresponder
You can tell everyone you’re fine
Autoresponder
If you’re named ‘captain’
Or ‘Bernardinе’
At higher levels
You work thе same
Don’t think about
They aren’t alive
Reptile instincts
Transistorized
Far detonations
Call and response
Collective loss
We say the word and off you go
Autoresponder
The lights are on but you’re not home
Autoresponder
If this, then that
If this, then that
If this, then that
Preemptive orders keep you free
Autoresponder
Symbionese psychology
Autoresponder
Triggers in everything we say
Autoresponder
All words are viruses and clay
Autoresponder
Something that makes it more than random
Just clear enough to spy some shape behind the glass
But not so plain as to be certain
Just subtle shadows on the dark periphery
But close enough to keep you wary
Is there some web connecting all these sad events
Buried by time and sublimation
Set into motion and sustained by loyal ghosts
Still wearing uniforms and jackets
Silk strings deriving from some origin unknown
A hidden network for the tragic
Never saw such graceful lines
Never dreamed I’d have the power
Never dreamed this could be mine
Never heard a purr so lovely
Never saw a course so sure
Never felt so dry and empty
Never gonna reemerge
Let’s go crash
Let’s go crash
Let’s go crash
Nevеr had a golden moment
Nevеr had a second thought
Never saw the point in playing
Never wanted what you got
Never tried to hide the damage
Never tried to call for help
Never tried to safeguard others
Never tried to save myself
Let’s go crash
Let’s go crash
Let’s go crash
Let’s go
Let’s go
Let’s go
Arcane and esoteric
Mundane and by the way
Revel in repetition
Revel in shades of gray
Pushing toes to floorboards
Everything seems okay
I see the lines go blurry
I thought I heard you say
Let’s go
Let’s go
Let’s go
Let’s go
Let’s go crash
Let’s go crash
Let’s go crash
And there’s no reuniting eyes
And there’s no listening like before
The tapes are filled with warning signs
How can I ever take it back?
It’s just a murmur in the roar
The girls won’t wait for April next
They’ll patch the holes with ice and leaves
And summer songs that come around
No matter if you’re there to hear
How can I ever take it back?
It’s just a murmur in the roar
You didn’t get what you desеrve
But you got just what you deservеd
You didn’t get what you deserve
The dateline’s coming round again
Is it because you’re twenty-four?
Feels like December in the sun
And I wish you weren’t so unkind
Now you can never take it back
In a country where they turn back time
You go strolling through the crowd like Peter Lorre
Contemplating a crime
She comes out of the sun in a silk dress running like watercolor in the rain
Don’t bother asking for explanations
She’ll just tell you that she came from the year of the cat
She doesn’t give you time for questions
As she takes up your arm in hers
As you follow her your sense of which direction
Completely disappears
By the blue-tiled walls near the market stalls there’s a hidden door she takes you to
These days, she says, I feel my life
Just like a river running through the year of the cat
Well she looks at you so coolly
And her eyes shine like the sun and the sea
She comes in incense and patchouli
So you take her
To find what’s waiting inside the year of the cat
When morning comes and you’re still with her
And the bus and the tourists are gone
And you’ve thrown away your choice
You’ve lost your ticket
So you have to stay on
But the drumbeat strains of the night remain in the rhythm of the newborn day
You know sometime you’re bound to leave her
But for now you’re going to stay in the year of the cat
Lyrics by Al Stewart
You gotta play with all your stuff
You gotta change your clothes and head out to the club
You gotta satisfy your lusts
You gotta change the channel cause your show is coming down the line
You gotta take a nap and maybe later you can rest your eyes
Don’t tell me you don’t have the time!
Don’t tell me you don’t have the time
You gotta call the doctor then take all your pills
You gotta go fill up your glass
You gotta have some lunch and ride in your DeVille
You got 10 years before the mast
You gotta change thе channel cause your show is coming down the linе
You gotta take a break and maybe later you can tranquilize
Don’t tell me you don’t have the time
Don’t tell me you don’t have the time
You got it
You got it
You got it
You got the time
And hidden powders in the mail
Dirty pillows with plates stashed underneath
Left there in case there’s something waiting
Just keep talking like it still matters what you think
Just keep walking from sour dream to sour dream
There’s no hidden majesty
No whisper in the breeze
There’s just the sun
In the end you’re a wreck like all the rest
Contacting ghosts about your problems
Take the papers and hide thеm somewhere safе
If there’s a time when no one’s watching
Just keep talking like it still matters what you think
Just keep walking from sour dream to sour dream
There’s no hidden majesty
No whisper in the breeze
There’s just the sun
Just the sun
Just the sun
Just the sun
Just the sun
Bottle of ether and a question or two about the
Right path to follow. It’s like pure jet propulsion
Here comes total immersion in the ancient system
The ceremony seems to set the silver sky to smiling
Ten potent reasons to believe the light is always shining
A candle in the circle
A shadow in the mirror
A ring of rays and petals
A glass to see it clearer
A deck of cards and portents
A ripple thereupon
A page of silken cyphers
Unlock the golden dawn
The middle pillar in the small temple garden is so
Blindingly brilliant bathed in words of Yeats and Machen
Stuck in the shadows with the book of the law
Do what thou wilt shall be the stick in thy craw
Ten potent reasons to believe the light is always shining
The ceremony seems to set the silver sky to smiling
Black veils and ruby roses
Beyond the outer order
Adepts and secret chiefs
And streams of secret splendour
A ritual of reasons
In dreams to carry on
Following promises
Into the golden dawn
Beyond their condemnation
Beyond initiation
Into the exhalation
That removes the filters from
The light that shines too brightly
About a girl who couldn’t lose
And then one day she stood accused
Her photograph looked just like you
You seemed to have it all in hand
They took your word as high command
But it didn’t end up like you planned
And now you don’t know where you stand
You had to see it coming
You had a long way down
From glory in the highest
To where your friends are silent
To where you won’t be found
To where there’s no more trying
See you around
Last Tuesday night I saw a friend
He heard that you were back again
But I didn’t have much time to spend
And nothing left to recommend
Two years ago when we last met
You didn’t look like you had slept
You fumbled with your cigarettes
I told your ma you looked like death
You had to see it coming
You had a long way down
From glory in the highest
To where your friends are silent
To where you won’t be found
To where there’s no more trying
To where your friends are silent
To where you won’t be found
To where there’s no more trying
See you around
And plan the crime
You bring the dirty baby
We’ll make her shine
She’ll be a queen
Decked out in green
Or maybe blue or who cares
You know what I mean?
When the bar is on the ground we don’t need to give back
Anything
Put the horse inside the cart
And the cart inside the
Big box
Let’s rig the game
The lion’s tame
When all the teeth are plucked out
Ain’t that a shame?
You be the king
I’ll pull the strings
She’ll be the pretty girl who
Just likes to sing
