Great voice and the greatest of the old religious songs from the south
Wandered the halls of the nighttime
My body burned
My legs ached
But you never came to bed
You just left me there awake
You kept me wanting, wanting, wanting
Like the wanting in the movies and the hymns
I want the pharaohs
But there’s only men
Neko Case Masterpost
Neko Richelle Case is one of the most talented songwriters of our time (and all time), with a peerless voice that can only be described as divine. Beginning her solo career (with Her Boyfriends in tow) as a benchmark name in the alt-country canon, her music has evolved to inhabit its own, singular genre with elements of country, folk noir and gospel. She has announced that a new album (tentatively titled The Worse Things Get, the Harder I Fight. The Harder I Fight, the More I Love You) will be out later this year, so I figured now was a good a time as any to get you all up to speed on her remarkable discography.
The Virginian (1997)
She fell away, she fell away
She fell away from the side of the Lord
And she was free to do what she wanted
With clouds of her ownFurnace Room Lullaby (2000)
Well I’ll see you in the future skipping time
While the eyes of all the faithful rest in peace
And tonight I see the highway
Like a cheetah underfoot
And someone’s singing my life back to meCanadian Amp EP (2001)
Last night I dreamt that I hit a deer with my car
Blood from his heart spilled out onto my dress and was warm
He begged me to follow
But legions of sorrow defied meBlacklisted (2002)
Don’t feel sorry for yourself
Highways wait for you
Your ghost is a light show at night
On the Grand Coulee Dam
The river is watching you
At the drive-in tonight
Who will they comfort now
Since I’ve gone away?The Tigers Have Spoken (2004)
Was the last time he had felt alive
When he saw that brown-haired lady
She fed him with a bottle as a baby
And he recalled her face and smile
They shot that tiger on his chainFox Confessor Brings the Flood (2006)
Girl with the parking lot eyes
Margaret is the fragments of a name
Her bravery is mistaken for the thrashing in the lake
Of the make-believe monster whose picture was faked
Margaret is the fragments of a name
Her love pours like a fountain, her love steams like rage
Her jaw aches from wanting and she’s sick from chlorine
But she’ll never be as clean
As the cool side of satin, PaulineLive from Austin, TX (2007)
I walk this world forever in a dream
Or is this the land of the living?
Or is this your way to tell me
That I could’ve saved you?
I couldn’t save youMiddle Cyclone (2009)
Mockingbird sings in the middle of the night
All his songs are stolen so he hides
He stole them out from the whip-poor-wills
And screaming car alarms
He sings them for you special
He knows you’re afraid of the dark
Come on sorrow, take your own advice
Hide under the bed, turn out the light
Artwork for Neko Case’s Fox Confessor Brings the Flood (2006)
“That’s Who I Am” by Neko Case.
From the almost-assuredly-going-to-be-terrible forthcoming Stephen King/ John Mellencamp/ T. Bone Burnett musical, “The Ghost Brothers of Darkland County.”
Anyway, this song’s pretty great.
Balancing on one wounded wing,
circling the edge of the neverending;
the best of the vanished marvels have gathered inside your door.
More than begin but less than forget,
but spirits born from the not happened yet
gathering there to pay off a debt brought back from the wars.
We thought we lost you,
we thought we lost you,
we thought we lost you…
welcome back.
Sleeping for years, pick through what is left —
through the pieces that fell and rose from the depth,
from the rainwater well deep as a secret nobody knows.
Less than forget but more than begun,
These adventures in solitude never done.
To the names of our wounds,
we send the same blood back from the wars.We thought we lost you,
we thought we lost you,
we thought we lost you,
it will all come back.I know you want to run far away from one more,
And that it’s comin’ at a bad time.
Some cold place, heartless ways
for all we know…
I know you need to breathe through,
Come back, come too,
but it’s comin’ at a bad time.
Tangled day, for all we know…
I know you want to run far away from one more,
And that it’s comin’ at a bad time.
Some cold place, heartless ways
for all we know…I know you want to breathe through,
come back, come too,
but it’s comin’ at a bad time.
Old scarred face, survivor’s guilt
For all we know…
Hold On, Hold On — Neko Case
Now it’s the devil I love
And that’s as funny as real love
actually Neko Case is my preferred kind of being-sad-about-your-hoochie-life singer because she mostly does it in first person, and like me she possesses an inability to talk about bad things for long without invoking nature and the supernatural