BAD RELIGION – NO SUBSTANCE – 1998

HEAR IT
Like a morning crow and his unwelcome song
Or a worn-out broken record that keeps skipping along,
Mountains of instructions you keep piling on me
Resound like a cacophonous symphony.
But I don’t wanna hear it anymore,
No, I don’t wanna hear it anymore.
Let’s go!

Priests and politicians pretend they’re your friend
And police speak to you like you’re a child again.
Blanket statements cover you like a rug
And they tell me maybe I’m acting a little too smug.
But I don’t wanna hear it anymore,
No, I don’t wanna hear it anymore.
No more!

Every day we hear the secrets of life
Reduced to cheap jokes, poetry and friendly advice.
They’d rather see us all pusillanimous,
Absorbent in their chorus of correctness.
But I don’t wanna hear it anymore,
No, I don’t wanna hear it anymore,
I said, I don’t wanna hear it anymore,
No, I don’t wanna hear it anymore!

SHADES OF TRUTH
Here inside this quiet room, there's direction,
Outside in the sultry noontime reflection.
A million people scurry, they are looking for advice,
None willing to lend charity just exercise their...

Shades of truth, and partisan convention,
Shades of truth between disparate lines.
Shades of truth interpret my intentions.
You don’t know I'm alright,
You don’t know I'm alright.

Who authored the blueprints and made us captains?
Someone proclaimed creation, people listened.
While children by the millions are thrown into this zoo,
The so-called gift of clarity!
Oh, what was God up to?

Shades of truth, and lenient conventions,
Shades of truth between disparate lines.
Shades of truth interpret my intentions.
You don’t know I’m alright,
You don’t know I’m alright.

So many walking parallel and pull their blinders tight,
So few offer apology and accept others' rights,
And nothing absolutely can be cherished in the end,
Can’t we all accept that it will all happen again?

Shades of Truth, just partisan convention,
Shades of Truth between disparate lines.
Shades of Truth interpret my intentions.
You don’t know I’m alright,
You don’t know I’m alright.

Shades of Truth, just partisan convention,
Shades of Truth between disparate lines.
Shades of Truth interpret my intentions.
You don’t know I’m alright,
You don’t know I’m alright.

ALL FANTASTIC IMAGES
England
Seemed like such a beautiful place from afar,
Until one day
I saw how miserable things really are.

All fantastic images,
They only are apparent,
Propagated just by hope
And desire to share it.

Beauty
Was the allure that brought me close to you.
Loneliness
Was the bond that made me stick like glue.

All fantastic images,
They only are apparent,
Promoted by desperate hope
That things are somewhere better.

I don’t have a thing against fantasy,
But to chase it down just doesn’t make sense to me.
If your only hope is simply peace and love,
You end up discarding most of what you're made of.

All fantastic Images,
They only are apparent,
Promoted by desperate hope
That things are somewhere better.

THE BIGGEST KILLER IN AMERICAN HSTORY
You have got your stranglers and prowlers in soft shoes,
Furniture makers, carpenters too,
Bombers and commandos, all with some lost cause,
Disgruntled workers, immersed in “veritás”.

But stealthily, in the land of the free, it’s lurking right there:
Most are unaware of
The biggest killer in American history,
And God shed his grace on thee.

Business institutions, universities,
Both are quite the circus where the killer wants his way.
I think of Edward Teller and his moribund reprise,
Then I look to Nevada and I can't believe my eyes.
It's time for him to die!

Most cannot remember minutia learned in school.
It’s not there on the blackboard, it’s what they don’t tell you.
We have got a problem, it starts and ends right here.
It can be defeated, but you've got to face your fear.

We’ll join and unite and steady our sight,
Then we'll put it right ‘cause it’s time to fight
The biggest killer in American history,
And God shed his grace on thee.

NO SUBSTANCE
History doesn’t make something right,
Consensus is not a fact-based exercise.
You’re tied and bound to this self-indulgent enterprise...
We call America.

A brush with a star, a token of love,
A name in the sand, enough is enough.
A diet of air, a face on the net,
A fish in your palm, your television set.

Once you convince yourself,
The universe falls into place.
You’ve got your ideas
And your posse of friends,
You all make up rules
And the fun never ends.

But still there’s a problem that leaves you gasping for air,
You look for some meaning, blank smiles are all that’s there,
And still water stales a soft summer breeze,
You cling to your hopes while you drop to your knees.
There's no substance.

Once you convince yourself,
The universe falls into place.
You've got your ideas
And your posse of friends,
You all make up rules
And the fun never ends.

But still there's a problem that leaves you gasping for air,
You look for some meaning, blank smiles are all that's there,
And still water stales a soft summer breeze,
You cling to your hopes while you drop to your knees.
There's no substance.

RAISE YOUR VOICE
Fa fa fafa fa fa fafa
Raise Your Voice!

Don’t be played like someone else’s board game.
Don’t be classed out like some desolate redoubt.
Don’t be misled, you’ve got a lot on your head
And nobody’s gonna pay attention when you are dead.
So:

Fa fa fafa fa fa fafa
Raise Your Voice!

It’s the primary rule, you gotta wanna be fooled.
It’s our daunted restraint that keeps us silent in shame.
It’s our nature to be adversarial and free,
Our evolution didn’t hinge on passivity.

Fa fa fafa fa fa fafa
Raise Your Voice! [ad infinitum]

SOWING THE SEEDS OF UTOPIA
We all know politicians only go
Just halfway there,
Just halfway there.
The innocence of youth needs protection not abuse
But no one seems to care,
Yet no one seems to care.

And you sit there and watch the world go around
From your pseudo-benevolent vantage point,
While we who’ve been left to pick up after you
Try our best to make some sense for those who
Come next.

Now what have you done to foster the truth
Besides just hide the lies?
Besides just hide the lies?
A selfish campaign never justifies the gain,
But the means are verified,
Yeah, the means are verified.

And you sit there and insist you are right
From your popular psychological podium,
While those who rely and depend on you,
They wilt because you don’t accept we need
Each other.

While sowing the seeds of Utopia,
You invoked a convenient amnesia.
You forgot how to care, you forgot how to provide,
You forgot how to work towards a meaningful life.

THE HIPPY KILLERS
Our Apocalypse 1981,
Teenage vagrants lookin’ for some fun.
A renewed promise of prosperity,
A vulgar platform for the world to see.
We were...

The hippy killers!

Busted refuse from broken homes,
Pocked flesh and malacious bones,
Creatures sustained by desire, heart and soul,
Nothing to leave and nowhere to go.
We were...

The hippy killers!

Good days during horrible times,
Overused bodies, neglected minds,
Shoulder to shoulder we formed as one,
The next miserable generation.
We were...

The hippy killers!

THE STATE OF THE END OF THE MILLENNIUM ADDRESS
Neighbors, nobody loves you like we do.
Neighbors, your government has triumphed in finally making you a public fit for the 21st century.
Never before has a governing body shown so much concern for the economic well-being of its subjects.
Today we have insulated you from countless factions who threathen your financial viability such as the poor; the idealistic foreigners still clinging to their childish notions of social welfare.
Why, you’re even kept uninformed of useless propagandist journalism that reports alleged violations of human rights (We all know they wouldn’t have been punished if they hadn’t been doing something wrong!).
And who better to dispense such blantantly evident factoids but a self-appointed authority like myself?
Acid rain is a thing of the past...
Too many possible causes, too little signifigance for our modern thinking public, besides, industrial manufacturing is at an all time low anyway, who needs those narrow minded laborers.
Too many mouths to feed, and to many burden on the pay roll!
Who needs ‘em here in the land of the free time?
Some other ass-backward country will give us what we need by exploiting its uneducated children anyway.
The Internet has expanded our ability to pacify average Americans better than ever by offering fantastical adventures to every corner of the imagination.
Your home office is the window to your world and the heart of your social life.
Such reclusive behavior helps clear the roads and public works from overburden like the lower middle-class and others who depend shamelessly on their government.
Today you are freer than ever to do what you want, provided you can pay for it!
Remember, the first word in USA is US.
We have arrived, neighbors, we are the privileged elite!

THE VORACIOUS MARCH OF GODLINESS
Since the start of the 17th century,
There’s been the scent of unseasoned wood burning in the air
And the conquest of nature meant nothing at all,
While we betray exception, we take all that’s there.

Motives are translucent in the reflection of shame,
The actions ghostly remnants of our ancestral ways
And unwittingly, you just take your place in this parade.
The voracious march of godliness makes us all the same anyway,
All the same.

Since the dawn of our human family,
There’s been concentrated sepsis blowing in the breeze
And we turned on each other with ferocity,
Desperation, forced without reprieve.

But the missions were misguided and the trammel led astray,
The air resounds with thunder as the victors seized the day
And the haunting voice of history lives ignored but not betrayed.
The voracious march of godliness will get us close to heaven one day,
Some day...

The voracious march of godliness makes us all the same anyway,
All the same...

MEDIOCRE MINDS
Look around the country, an abundance you'll find of
Mediocre minds.
Sift trough the fodder as the sane justice declines because of
Mediocre minds.
Shrouded under cover, the most flamboyant guise hides a
Mediocre mind.
You got yours, but you can never bend mine with your
Mediocre minds.

When they cry foul, you had better watch out
Because you never know which aptitude they’re griping about.
Don’t act too smart for their stenoscopic ways.
You’ll be discarded away.

Reason’s not to be what the privileged define with their
Mediocre minds.
So many sighted people act so helplessly blind from their
Mediocre minds.

If you want attention, then you will be asked to bend,
But the surest insurrection is enlightenment,
Then you can live outside inharmoniously without friends and enemies.

They wanna keep me locked away
‘Cause I’m an overactive brain.

Leaders, presidents and the nightly news guys cater to
Mediocre minds.
Reason’s not to be what the privileged define with their
Mediocre minds.
You got yours, but you can never bend mine with your
Mediocre minds.
The only natural thing that I despise are
The mediocre minds.
Mediocre minds,
Mediocre minds!

VICTIMS OF REVOLUTION
What will prove to be our big mistake?
Short-sighted arrogance all for what sake?
Our families to ashes, our ambitions to dust,
Our progeny in silence thinking “what about us?”

But don’t forget the dance of neglect,
The march for empowering prosperity,
The pain from loss and want for mere lucidity.
Just maternal residue, and I was there too,
And maybe so were you.

When something is won, it comes with sacrifice.
It's there beneath the joy, the glory and pride,
And rarely it’s acknowledged but in positive light
Consciously omitting the losers’ plight.

But don’t forget the dance of neglect,
The craving for community that never was met,
The longing for status and the overture of regret.
With no one to deter, pathetically unsure,
Forgetting who they were.

Just maternal residue, and I was there too,
And maybe so were you.

STRANGE DENIAL
A mutinous enemy
Carved a nascent country.
Sweat, blood and valor
Forms the grit of our history.

Bequeathed to everyone:
Chance and free expression,
Substance was restrained
And the spirit was broken.

I feel a strange denial,
Rhythmic as a change,
Constant as time.
Lonely insistent whispers,
Somber as a wave bye bye.

Searching for solution
Without constitution,
Black coats by our sides
Promising salvation.

Advocating dogma
As tickets to hereafter,
Mortals in their prime
With their desperate hands in the air.

Daunting, complex and burning,
Rhythmic as change,
Constant as time.
Conflicts craving approval
Weighted as a murder trial.
Oh, I feel a strange denial.

Correct is consensus,
Everything else nonsense.
Forward is the hope,
Forget recompense.

Peace and tranquility
Is only for the wealthy,
Dearth for the masses
And inequality.

I feel a strange denial,
Rhythmic as change,
Constant as time.
Lonely insistent whispers,
Dissipating in the night
Like a lone forgotten light.

And no one is helping me,
It’s a strange denial.

AT THE MERCY OF IMBECILES
What you do is what you are,
And wishing upon distant stars
Won’t improve the hole you’re in,
Won’t absolve your deepest sin.

But action is no gift from some covert and lofty God,
It’s dependant and weighty all the same.
And it is oh so easy just to keep to yourself,
But then you're at the mercy of imbeciles.

Now I didn’t make up the rules,
But clearly we are led by fools.
It is wise to know their ways,
So you know how not to behave.

But sometimes we find ourselves in desperate need
And we look to those with privilege and power.
It’s then we learn compassion sits inert on their shelves.
We’re at the mercy of imbeciles.

No actions is no gift from some masked spirit in the sky.
It’s reducible to flesh, mind and bone.
And it is oh so easy just to keep to yourself,
But then you’re at the mercy of imbeciles.
Imbeciles!

THE SAME PERSON
You want prosperity
For yourself, but not for me.
Somehow you just can't see
We’re in this collectively.

You think that freedom is
A drastic severance
From your past relations
Just a quest for new bargains.

We’re not the same person,
We’re not the same person.
Don’t even wanna know.

Don’t need no good advice
Nor shoddy merchandise,
I’m the suspect device
Beaten down, unable to strike.

We’re not the same person,
We’re not the same person.
Don’t even wanna know.

And the sun comes over us again,
We lament, we pine, and we rescind
And we ask for understanding,
But aren’t we the stingy ones indeed
When it’s needed from us in the end?

We watch the days go by,
Compete and then we die.
So few ever ask why,
But so many just abuse the design.

We’re not the same person,
We’re not the same person.
Don’t even wanna know.

IN SO MANY WAYS
I can see the shadows on the wall
Drifting as the leaves start to fall.
Unfazed by rugosity, the objects yield to gravity
And depict the destiny of us all.

No one really knows why we die.
No one gets a break so we try.
Ignoring mortality, we worship mediocrity
And wait to see what happens up on high.

In so many ways we live to follow the sun,
In so many ways we exalt and fail as one.
In so many ways we want so bad to be done,
In so many ways we show our pain in unison.

Something in you is busy counting the days,
Catapulting you through the haze.
Blind to virtuosity, ignorant of your sanctity,
Revealing you, in so many ways.

In so many ways we live to follow the sun,
In so many ways we tend to rise and fall as one.
In so many ways we want so bad to be done,
In so many ways we show our pain in unison.

DREAM OF UNITY
[bonustrack of Japanese version]
I had a dream of unity
Where we could work side by side
But today I see that it's only me
Just trying to get by

Sometimes we strive undeterred
To walk as one toward our goal
But as people stray towards more selfish ways
We see we have no control

I had a dream of unity
Where we would work side by side
But today I see that it's only me
Just tryin’ to get by just tryin’ to get by