All the Lyrics to my new album: The Medicine

Here are the lyrics to my new album as I've realized people are singing and posting the wrong lyrics. There may be a spelling error here or there but for the most part this is the way it ought to be.

Enjoy.

1. Reckoning Day

The Lions in the street bend their heads
For the reckoning day
Cause the interstate's giving up her dead
For the reckoning day

Would you come alive everybody
Would you come alive everyone
Get up out of bed for the sound of the song unsung

Bury all your guns in the sand
Cause the temperature's changed
and the blood shot eye of the sun
stains the bones of the slain

Would you come alive everybody
Would you come alive everyone
Get up out of bed for the sound of the song unsung

The hour's gonna take you apart
On the reckoning day
If the property lines of your heart
Are drawn in the clay

Would you come alive everybody
Would you come alive everyone
Get up out of bed for the sound of the song unsung

The tide water's taxing the shores
of the washing away
The flood stands high at your doors
of the houses you made

Would you come alive everybody
Would you come alive everyone
Get up out of bed for the sound of the song unsung

Lift up your head
Oh you gate
Lift up your eyes
All you who wait
Daughter and son
Ashes and dust
Come untied from the weight of the age


2.The Medicine

Driving by those trucker stops
The cheap motels made of concrete rocks
With a hole inside your chest
The size of a city block
And I remember the day
When you said you weren't afraid to die
I don't think your brave for it
I just think your more afraid of being alive

If I had the medicine
I'd give you the medicine
Cause I miss you son
I'd bring you back home if I was the one
But it's four and ten
In the belly of the four AM
And your staring down the weekend
To silence the pain
And I'm wide awake
And there's blood on the promenade

Here's to waking up with that stone between your ribs
And you're lying down again
You just pretend you don't know what it is
When everyone around you says that you're not the one to blame for it
But you're the only one feeling the pain for it
So you're gonna take matters into your own hands

If I had the medicine
I'd give you the medicine
Cause I miss you son
I'd bring you back home if I was the one
But it's four and ten
In the belly of the four AM
And your staring down the weekend
To silence the pain
And I'm wide awake
And there's blood on the promenade


3. Skeleton Bones

Peel back our ribs again
And stand inside of our chest
We just want to love you
We just want to love you yeah

Peel back the veil a time
Let us see you with our naked eyes
We just want to love you
We just want to love you yeah

Skeleton bones stand at the sound
Of eternity on
The lips of the found
Grave stones roll
to the rhythm of the sound of you
Skeleton bones stand at the sound
Of eternity on
The lips of the found
Yeah so separate those doors
Let the sun of resurrection in

Oh let us
Adore the son of glory
Dressed in love
Open up your gates
Before him
Crown him
Stand him up

We want your blood to flow inside our body and
We want your wind inside our lungs
We just want to love you
We just want to love you yeah
We want your blood to flow inside our body and
We want your wind inside our lungs
We just want to love you
We just want to love you yeah

Skeleton bones stand at the sound
Of eternity on
The lips of the found
Grave stones roll
To the rhythm of the sound of you
Skeleton bones stand at the sound
Of eternity on
The lips of the found
yeah so separate those doors
And let the sun of resurrection in

Oh let us
Adore the son of glory
Dressed in love
Open up your gates
Before him
Crown him
Stand him up

Everything that breaths
Everything that breaths
Everything that breaths


4. Carbon Ribs

A Thousand pairs of firey eyes
Burn like a serpent down the hwy 5
As the Long amber tail to Los Angeles unwinds
I've got resurrection down in side my skin
But for all my revealating
I just cant make sense
Of this gravity we're in

Cause I'm a dead man now
With a ghost who lives
Within the confines of
These carbon ribs
And one day when I'm free
I will sit
The cripple at your table
The cripple by your side

A thousand miles of pain I'm sure
Led you to the threshold
Of my hearts screen door
To tell me what it is I'm dying for
Gravity comes
Like a cold cold Rain
To lead me to the rope again
But someone is standing in my place

Cause I'm a dead man now
With a ghost who lives
Within the confines of
These carbon ribs
And one day when I'm free
I will sit
The cripple at your table
The cripple by your side
The cripple at your table
The cripple by your side

And I sit beside you
And I sit beside you
And I sit beside you
And I sit beside you


5. Dress Us Up

Dress us up in your righteousness
Bring us in with a ring and a kiss
When you walk into the room you know we can't resist
Every bottle of perfume always ends up on the floor in a mess

You make us sparkle and you make us shine
Like the stars who sing on your chorus line
Through space and time we'll harmonize
Where deep meets deep like the ocean meets the sky

The sun and the moon
They come out of their grave just for you
The dead man and the cynical too
They're coming out of their grave
And it's just for you

Cause the love of God is stronger
The love of God is stronger
The love of God is stronger
Than the power of death

Dress us up in the blood of a son
Who opened up his veins so that we would overcome
Hell and the grave in the power of his love
After three dark days he showed us how it's done
And he still does

You make us sparkle and you make us shine
Like the stars who sing on your chorus line
Through space and time we'll harmonize
Where deep meets deep like the ocean meets the sky
Yeah

The sun and the moon
They come out of their grave just for you
The dead man and the cynical too
They're coming out of their grave
And it's just for you
Cause the love of God is stronger
The love of God is stronger
The love of God is stronger
Than the power of death

His love is stronger, his love is stronger, his love is stronger, his love is stronger
His love is stronger, his love is stronger, his love is stronger, his love is stronger


6. Death in his grave

Though the Earth Cried out for blood
Satisfied her hunger was
Her billows calmed on raging seas
for the souls of men she craved

Sun and moon from balcony
Turned their head in disbelief
Their precious Love would taste the sting
disfigured and disdained

On Friday a thief
On Sunday a King
Laid down in grief
But awoke with keys
Of Hell on that day
The first born of the slain
The Man Jesus Christ
Laid death in his grave

So three days in darkness slept
The Morning Sun of righteousness
But rose to shame the throes of death
And over turn his rule

Now daughters and the sons of men
Would pay not their dues again
The debt of blood they owed was rent
When the day rolled a new

On Friday a thief
On Sunday a King
Laid down in grief
But awoke holding keys
To Hell on that day
The first born of the slain
The Man Jesus Christ
Laid death in his grave

On Friday a thief
On Sunday a King
Laid down in grief
But awoke with keys
Of Hell on that day
The first born of the slain
The Man Jesus Christ
Laid death in his grave

He has cheated
Hell and seated
Us above the fall
In desperate places
He paid our wages
One time once and for all


7. Belly Of The Lion

Dance the dance
We call living and dying
In the valley of the city
in the belly of the lion
Work all week long
All week long
You can lose your soul
In the concrete riverbeds
Rolling with the flow
Of the currents of the walking deads
Five comes and you're a rolling stone

Days like these
We've got nothing to sing about
Days like these
I don't know what I think about
Day like these
Who would've known
Days like these
I've got nothing to sing about
Days like these
I don't know what I think about
Day like these
Who would've known

Listen to the rhythm
Of the pawn shop shore
Got you falling off your hinges
Like that old screen porch
It's the interstate slipping in your pores again
You can ride the vein
From the corner store to Amsterdam
You can bleed the train
From the courthouse to the Vatican
But Friday she's a ghost
And gonna slip right through your hands again

Days like these
I've got nothing to sing about
Days like these
I don't know what I think about
Day like these
Who would've known
Days like these
I don't know what I think about
Days like these
I've got nothing to sing about
Days like these
Who would've known

So dance the dance
We call living and dying
In the valley of the city
in the belly of the lion
We work all week long
All week long
You can lose your soul
In the concrete riverbeds
Rolling with the flow
Of the currents of the walking deads
Five comes and you're a rolling stone

Days like these
I've got nothing to sing about
Days like these
I don't know what I think about
Day like these
Who would've known
Days like these
I don't know what I think about
Days like these
I've got nothing to sing about
Day like these
Who would've known


8. Philidelphia

You step through me
And the screen door hits the wood
And your packing all your things
You say your moving out to there to Hollywood
And I can't do a thing
You say there's nothing for you
In this cardboard town
And every bridge you cross
Your gonna burn it to the ground
You wont listen to a word that I'm telling ya

So who's running through the halls
In the houses of pain
That are staring back at me
Like the ocean from a plane
I swear I've seen your eyes
in the ghost of Philadelphia

I think about you late at night sometimes
When I can't sleep
Cause I can hear the train
It's always there
You just don't know it
Till a quarter to three
You just can't hear it in the day
When every body's got your number
In a plexy glass town
Where the birds ain't got wings
But no one makes a sound
Cause they all know how to fly
Just I wouldn't buy what they're selling ya

So who's running through the halls
In the houses of pain
That are staring back at me
Like the ocean from a plane
I swear I've seen your eyes
in the ghost of Philadelphia

I run into your old man every once and again
Mostly in the spring
Reminds me of our younger and more genuine days when
You weren't so out of reach
Still for all your running
You just can't change a mile
Of the things you carry around
In the closet of your mind
And the days keep coming man
They never fail ya

Your never gonna run away
From what your hanging round your head
Your never gonna run away
From what your hanging round your head
Your never gonna run away
From what your hanging round your head
Your never gonna run away
From what your hanging round your head
And I'm never gonna run away
From what you said

9. Out of the Ground
The lights come out
And follow you around the block
Where the freight train stopped
For you

Cause I can hear you walking in
The city till the pavement ends
With houses crumbling
For you

Cause I'm
Coming up from out of the ground
Coming up from out of the ground
Coming up from out of the ground
For you, for you, for you

Coming up from out of the ground
Coming up from out of the ground
Coming up from out of the ground
For you

We've run from it
But it sleeps like the current quits
And would've stained my lips
But not for you

We fall apart
at the seems
From day to dark
But its seeping into our sleep
For you

Cause I'm
Coming up from out of the ground
Coming up from out of the ground
Coming up from out of the ground
For you, for you, for you


One by one
Come undone
Come alive
Come alive


10. Ten Thousand

Ten thousand glimmering like coals in our chest
Ball bearings drawn to the magnetic breath
Of ten thousand weeping with wings on their tears
Amidst ten thousand voices for ten thousand years
For ten thousand graves yawning unlocked and unlatched
Now ten thousand holes with rocks on their backs
Ten thousand tombs gaping wide singing the praise
Of ten thousand bodies unlaced and unlaid

As the ten thousand highways unfold their doors
For the ten thousand standing on Nineveh's shores
Where the blood of a husband silences wars
For the girl who rises to meet him
And she sings

World, I have overcome you
World, I have overcome you
World, I have overcome
By my song and the blood of a son

Ten thousand rivers
Run red like my veins
Where the bones of men hum
Like a rattling cage
For sinew to cling to
And wind to remain
In ten thousand lungs
For ten thousand days
Breathing like a choir
Of holes in the ground
Where the cynical have lain
Where the cynical go down
Save the gravity of time
Lets go of her drowned
Like ten thousand sparrows
Unlocked and unwound

As the ten thousand highways unfold their doors
For the ten thousand standing on Nineveh's shores
Where the blood of a husband silences wars
For the girl who rises to meet him
And she sings

World, I have overcome you
World, I have overcome you
World, I have overcome
By my song and the blood of a son

Welcome to the Tool Shed

This blog is for artists, musicians, and worship leaders who are interested in the "what, why, and how" of what we do. 

People often request charts and lyrics to reproduce our songs within their own communities. Here we'll post charts, lyrics as well as little tips and tricks etc. to help you play the songs. However I will also be posting my opinions and theories on songwriting, music worship and art. 

Opinion # 1:

Whether your Bob Dylan or Lil Wayne, if your a songwriter your job is to help us SAY something. Songwriters help us say the things that we really want to say but may not be articulate enough to say or may be too polite to say. Often songwriters say things for us so that we don't feel like we have to say them. However you want to look at it a worship leader is certainly no different. Actually the concept is actually quite a bit more obvious when it comes to church music.  So all this to say that my goal is to help people say the things they need to say. 

Bottom line: I love the idea that you want to use our music in your community. I see nothing wrong with it and completely encourage it. But if you really want to do what we do, then please also write music for your own community. Few things are more powerful than when a group of people feel like they own a song. This is when people are vocalizing things they really feel inside of themselves and not just uttering the tired religious cliches they feel obligated to repeat.

So please enjoy the charts  but don't just cover our music. Find your own sound. It's just as good as anything we do.

John Mark