With friends like these….

On the day I finished writing this song it seemed that these were among the best lyrics I’d ever written. They were concise, narrative driven, and autobiographical––about an ill-fated recording session and record label meeting in London.

That evening, I recorded an acoustic demo on a cassette, and threw it in the car to play for a close friend. We were going to see Philip Glass at Northrup Auditorium in Minneapolis.

He pressed play. We finished listening and he said, “It doesn’t really strike me.”

That was 1999. It took me 13 years to get that initial opinion out of my head and release it anyway.

Please watch “The Kensington Lows” lyric video above. Click here to learn more about the making of the album “True.”

Buy the mp3 direct here.

LYRICS ::

Paid to tally the hours
After offices close
The bell of St. Kate’s tower
Ring over Kensington Row

Keeping time with a pencil
Tweek up the radio
He drums at local pubs and stations
He’s in the Kensington Lows

And on stage he shines
So why’s he always someone’s minion?
Rehearsal’s at nine
Meet the Kensington Lows

Nodding off on the subway
To the circle lines drone
His pillow, it’s The Times
Read on Kensington woes

solo

And he’s been doing time
Counting other peoples’ millions
Rehearsal’s at nine
Meet the Kensington Lows

solo

Just a cog in the grind
The boss chimed in his opinions
“You’re on company time”
Not some Kensington dole

And he quits in his mind
So wracked with indecision
Just off Kensington Hyde
He’ll play the Kensington lows