Nothing Left For Us to Find

[Reileen]

Vienna's one-hour song from Sagebrush Valentine, which can be seen here on Vimeo: http://vimeo.com/2945345

I really like this song (it feels like another slice of shadows from the strained relationship depicted in "Antebellum", both musically and lyrically), so I decided to try and transcribe the lyrics. There's a lot of parts I'm not sure on, though.

-

Nothing Left For Us to Find
by Vienna Teng

blue of an evening, crumbled and crushed
smell of the rain and the oil and dust and tar

pavement busted under our feet
brown ball glass fragments wink like stars

we've come looking
two ghosts come haunting

but there's nothing left for us to find
just barren branches, abandoned chances
nothing left for us to find

words come crashing out of the dusk
ricocheting off of the rusting cars don't start

what was the match that caught in the field
what kind of ancient tinder yields
that hard yellow spark

we've come looking
for what we have no business wanting

but there's nothing left for us to find
just blackened houses, a voice without says
there's nothing left for us to find
of what we might have been

i think this might be freedom
one small glimmer

'cause there's nothing left for us to find
we burned it clean down, can't be seen now
nothing left for us to find
so we move on

yeah, nothing left for us to find
we burned it clean down to the green ground
nothing left for us to find

there's nothing left for us to find
there's nothing left for us to find

[roofboy179]

I don't wanna be that kind of person... but...

"Brown ball fragments wink like stars" maybe?

I can't figure any more of it out x] I think we may have another question for this year's Q and A.

[Steve]

I hear "Brown bottle glass fragments wink like stars"

as well as...

"Just barren branches"
"Ricocheting off of the rusting cars"

(I guess I am that kind of person!)

[roofboy179]

I hear "Brown bottle glass fragments wink like stars"

I'm pretty sure that's correct

[Reileen]

Made the suggested edits. The one line that is really getting to me is the one I currently have as "what kind of ancient hidden reeled/that heart in those sparks". I can't make sense of that line at all.

[tanthalas]

what was the match that caught in the field
what kind of ancient tinder yields that hard yellow spark

[Reileen]

THANK YOU, tanthalas! That makes so much more sense than what I had. XD

[tanthalas]

I'm also pretty sure the first line in that verse is "what was" and not "where was," because both lines sound exactly the same at the beginning.

[Fred]

Thanks for posting this, Reileen. I really like it too. Vienna said it means nothing...words just came out. However, much of its imagery, even its title, are eerily parallel to a novel set in a grim, postapocalyptic landscape that I read not too long ago. Spooky coincidence. Amazing what Vienna can do in an hour--what talent! Also interesting to see how she can build something substantial and coherent out of the merest fragment of an idea. Reminds me of the story she told during her show in January about starting to write Blue Caravan in her head while waiting for her blue Dodge Caravan to be retrieved from a parking garage.

[Rotkehlchen]

Thanks for your transcription, Reileen!

On the basis of the lyrics, my alternative title for Nothing Left For Us to Find would be:

Kansas Revisited.

I imagine a return to "Kansas" many years later, in the hope of re-discovering and re-kindling the almost-magic once discarded.
But many others have since lived out their lives in that place, and have in their turn moved moved on elsewhere.

The old path can never be re-traced.

This is the same place - no not the same place...

I'm also reminded of Australia's recent bush fires mentioned elsewhere on the Forum;
and of a South American town almost completely buried beneath the ash of a still active volcano - a town which will never be rebuilt despite the wishes of its evacuated inhabitants.

[Ferrard Carson]

Two things to say about this one:

1) Dear god, how does someone write that in an hour? I mean, sure compared with Vienna's other songs this one lacks that extra layer of polish, but there's plenty a singer-songwriter out there who would spend months slaving away to achieve something approaching this.

2) The more I listen to it, the less I see of "Lovers trying to find the old spark" (although it's still in there) and the more I see of a scattered family returning to their ruined homestead after The Dustbowl...

~ Teddy

[Digital]

Reminds me of the story she told during her show in January about starting to write Blue Caravan in her head while waiting for her blue Dodge Caravan to be retrieved from a parking garage.

As I recall from one of the first concerts where this was played, she was singing to the car in the hopes that it would make it appear quicker, as it was rather chilly out.

[Digital]

Upon first reading, this song seems to be about a family (or a couple) returning to their home after a catastrophic fire. Could be one of the California wildfires. There's loss and anguish about what's been lost, but also a sense of a new beginning.

Anyway, that's what comes to mind.

[Fred]

Reminds me of the story she told during her show in January about starting to write Blue Caravan in her head while waiting for her blue Dodge Caravan to be retrieved from a parking garage.

As I recall from one of the first concerts where this was played, she was singing to the car in the hopes that it would make it appear quicker, as it was rather chilly out.

Yep, same story.