SUBTERRANEAN ROADSICK BLUES
A grey sky and late December hang on this cattle town like shed skin (Another year ends). 'This life can't drag on forever,' so they say, one more month under dead weight and I may fucking prove it.
So I've been hiding out in bathroom stalls tracing my farewell letter from their cold, steel walls. This one is for home--another empty, aimless, vulgar attempt at, 'Goodbye'
and these words won't read at all like a prayer, I'm fucking sick to death of telling you what you want to hear,
of hanging on by a thread of hope that my generation is just as restless as these past twenty years have been; that we can force a spike in the static, throw our wrenches in the gears of this cycle of debt.
Work for pay. Pay to eat. Eat to live. Live to work. What am I if my work is fucking meaningless? (And it never ends)
My time drips like water and this city is a drain.
The streets outside are littered with puddles and everyone I know sleeps when it rains.
I lay in bed and I can feel the rails rusting. My ceiling creaks like it's caving in
and the Texas sky is leaking like a wound, like an old scar that's been torn back open.

CIGARETTE BURNS

We both knew that we were through long before admitting to it. Past feelings twitch like phantom limbs, so we spent our nights together trying to scratch the itch. I didn't watch it all unravel, I just got tangled in the strings and fell head first into an over-rehearsed ceremony of flesh between bed sheets but I'm not going to lie, that's not what keeps me up at night. Poets dwell on broken hearts but I let that fucker bleed dry. Dry like the empty bottles that followed the empty nights, shattering into pieces as sharp as fucking knives.Letting a cigarette burn to my finger tips cause It's not the first curse that I've placed to my lips. And we both knew the bitter truth would have to do us in, I couldn't turn my head forever and you're not as good as you think you are at faking it. 4AM to 1PM: Lay rest suspicious minds. I've never wrote a love song that I still meant after the day light shined. A touch a spark a flame. (Long burnt out.) It always ends the same. (Dead black hearts.) You waited two years long. (No love lost.) Well, now you've finally got your song.

HELL IN A HALF ACRE

'We should be men first and subjects afterward.'-Thoreau

I've been tracing the lines cut by swarms of red, tail lights that flow like blood in veins, Bleeding into the heart of this black hole city. From the street corner, a voice spilling out of a megaphone seeps words, like gas, into the night to make the sky glow just like purple halo on the head of the Industry, so the hungry, the tired and the poor came in search of redemption on their work worn knees. Hands clasp,eyes close. Noble lies, like dice, roll.
And I line up at every street light change, watching brief yellow impatience turn to blood, red hatred--watching faces start to melt. My faith was hung from the bible belt and I'm trying hard not to remember that we're all the same dust in the end. 
So, I park by a curb and step out onto the sidewalk, my eyes feel for a grip between the tower lights and dark empty lots, but I'm lost in it all...
On a night like this neither could seem too different to me.
The shrills sounds of public school bells start to diffuse into the buildings on these gridlocked streets. Silent sounds the alarm for every fucked up, wasted youth who live not as man, so have settled with myth or machine, and who can do anything? This ain't '77, you can't just dye your hair green or pierce your cheek with a safety pin. They've turned the outsiders back in. So, what does it take to burn a flag in this place?
This isn't an answer. This isn't poetry.
It's only the sound of a dying faith in humanity.   

SHELTER FROM THE SWARM
The clock says its 5am and we’re just now pulling in, I stumbled into the kitchen for the fridge but it looks like the night lasted longer than the beer did. My bed is a high school crush that’s still leading me on, all the sheets are twisted and turned but I ain’t been home for a fucking month. And don’t worry, Ma. I know that I missed your calls and though we haven’t
broken many laws they’d lock me up if they only knew what I do this
for. Another show. Another day. Another mile. Another song for the
highway. These interstates feel like my last stretch of hope. No, she ain't no Columbia but I’d follow her anywhere she’d go. We are the wanderers, we built our homes in flesh and bone, we warm our hands by the fire of a microphone. And we’re the outsiders of a new American dream come true. Red hands, white skin and the work-weak
blues.

You can stream Numbered here:
http://music.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=music.Discography&artistid=14703472

Those of you who own the EP may have realized that the songs "Principles" and "One Twenty Two" are flip-flopped on the artwork and  that has translated over onto this.
The lyrics I posted are in the correct order.


Caravel/Mediastinum
"Whichever way the winds blow."
Through the storm, through the stale, dead breeze.
I've been staring hard out of windows to lose myself in the scenery.
One wave will break and quickly fade into blue so I carved
you like "x" onto a map under a burning moon.
We'll learn to swim against the current. To the death I've fought the undertow.
I'll hold your head above the surface, though I may be swept below.
I've filtered waters of past-tense but you weren't even a drop in that sea.
You're more like the ocean so I'm letting tides wash over me.
If I am the sand of time consolidated on this eastern shore, I long to be at your side, you are what I thirst for and the eternal connection of where we are and where we've come from... I know that land and sea intertwine beyond even the shorelines.
If we're divided only by the air that fills our lungs then we'll bridge the gap one breath at a time.

Late Night, no. 708
I've spent so many nights struggling to fall asleep through the gears grinding in my head, just to retreat to the cold concrete to empathize with burning cigarettes.
I throw empty stares through frozen breath and smoke and watch the war wage between night and dawn. Yeah, we all know how it goes but I'm never quite sure of where it's gone.
So, try not to be too shocked if it seems that these thoughts are familiar. It's all just numbers between a fire and a flame. Mankind divides on culture, class and skin but in the end we know we're all same shit different name.
I remember some days behind me but I've lived in them long enough. Feels like the only things that haven't changed are the things I so desperately wished would but I don't want a drug or a drink to sedate me through the pain of living. I don't need another miserable song to sit and compare scars with.
I just want to see through the shadow in the mist of a society that's turned schizophrenic.
I've watched friends come and I've watched them go. I've spent countless hours in this apartment alone but I'm like a word that's been redefined. I've abandoned the thoughts that closed my mind. I used to believe we had all the time in the world but now I know we have all the world for a time.
Forget tomorrow. Forget yesterday.
Looks like another late night at 708.

Looking out, Looking In
I'm spreading myself thin over a torn out page. Spending days with a sorrow that works for an hourly rate. We press our luck at minimum wage but these things take time to accumulate.
Looking out, looking in: open mouth, closed eyes, bleeding heart, tongue tied.
I just can't seem to shake my commercial vice. And it's a full-time job articulating struggle and cashing in on the hopes that you're all as miserable and self-loathing as me. Don't take it personal, no don't take it personal… it's only psychographic marketing.
I lie awake. I shop for pain. I long for heartache. I sell complaints.
Flooding markets with angst filled words to worn out beats in a tired verse.
A bitter anthem out of syncopation in an endless surplus of misplaced aggression and now we're selling more than songs: torn up jeans, tattered shoes, pissed off stares, new tattoos and you can sing along until finally you embrace our socio-political views. Yeah, no one knows the trouble I've seen, till they're ten bucks out
for our new CD.
We empty our hearts to fill our stomachs.

Principles (of Scientific Management)
We raise hell in generations like time bombs. Our fuse is burning shorter but our days are growing long. The streets and bars fill, every weekday at 5 o'clock with faces full of lines and the sunk in eyes of men who've lost the ambition they once had of being anything more than coal for machinery. Of being anything more than combustible energy.
They're counting the days and wasting their lives tangled up in chains each endless hour of empty. Punching in and out of clocks. Every second of your life's only worth (it will never be enough). Keystrokes and symbols to author binary poetry. Our technological advances turned technological dependencies.
We are the well oiled eyesores. We are the pieces made to fit. We are the interchangeable parts. We are the broken spirits.
A virus plagues a computer. A human mind is reprogramming. Juxtaposition in the mechanical heart of our new American dream. A post-modern world. A calibrated, standardized society. We are the coal that keeps this engine burning. We are combustible energy
Counting restless nights of hiding my head under these pale white sheets and I know I'm not the only ghost still tracing sidewalk on these dead end streets. I'm not the only man hiding in the populous of this overcrowded city. I'm not the only man scared to death of being a lone with my humanity.

One Twenty Two
(Written For Matthew William Miller and Preston Ryan Gillespie.)
I was thrown into this nightmare. Rewinding days that lead to this morning. This is not reality it's just a bad dream that I'll relive daily.
Something is in the way... and I'll never make sense of the way that life just kept pressing on without you, each day with it's endless fucking nights of searching for something to hold onto. Hours spent fighting with the truth and still only questions, like if death has taken your body what the fuck did it do to our friendship?
And still, I can't sleep this off. This day was a curse from the start. The 22nd of January tore me apart, when it broke the spell of your hearts steady beat and cast its shadow onto these same old streets. The same old streets we frequently toured hot summer afternoons on beat up skateboards and now, looking back, all I can truly say is, "buried with you are our better days." Days before we got so disconnected. Days when school and jobs weren't first to friendship. Sometimes I think of our last conversation. I didn't say, "goodbye." I just walked away. And I watched them close your casket in that sanctuary and I opened two blood shot eyes to all the life that I'd been wasting.
Now you, you're just a ghost story. And me, I'm living on a handful of cherished memories. You know I never thought I'd run out of time to make it back. I told you that I was busy but now I'll never remember what the fuck with.
I'm so sorry that it took this for me to see what was truly important and I'd give anything to be back to the 21st again.
I can't sleep this off. Restless nights are all I've got...ceaseless thoughts are all I've got.
Why did it ever come to this? The end is never what you want it to be.
I can't change our last years and for that I'll never be more fucking sorry.

Cold Sweat
"And the wild regrets, and the bloody sweats,None knew so well as I:
For he who lives more lives than one, More deaths than one must die." -Oscar Wilde


Nineteen years old and already tracing back to see a life pushed past the line,We, once so young and hopeful, are now more bitter than angry from sorting through the crowded years of empty words—those stolen days—reading  the palms of liar's hands,while eyes and mouth converge to memorize each verse... so heartlessly.Am I a product of my environment? Am I paying for my father's sins? Was I cursed from birth? Meant to live a life of constant questioning and doubt? I've heard so many holy words in the sales pitches dripping from their filthy mouths. Yesterday when my phone rang I passed the conversation off to the dial tone.I don't care about what they've got to sell. My time is all I've ever owned.I may improvise the rhythm or blues but I carefully pick each word I use.If this is Armageddon I'll admit I've played my part,but don't tell me this is heaven on earth when I know there's only hell in your heart. We used to dream big and every breath came with a silver lining,but there comes a point in life when you realize that every time you wake up you're just a day closer to dying. My heart is harder than a diamond, to anything that can be bought or sold. I know there's nothing I could take past the grave that my trembling hands could hold. Yeah, I know I've wasted so much life on nothing. And the days aren't adding up. They're counting down. And we're not getting any younger are we?

Punknews.org
Rating: 3.5/5
"Decades' debut EP, Numbered is a 21-minute, slow-churning pot of modern hardcore in the recent scope of bands like Dead Hearts, This Is Hell and Modern Life Is War, but with a coating of sincere emotion and desperation to help them rise above the glut of mediocre acts overcrowding the room lately.

Sure, this sound's been done and it's been done a bit better, but to deny Decades' talent in their ploy here would just be dishonest. With a vocalist who's semi-raspy and rather comprehensible, akin to the singer of Election Day (a reference I'm sure helps, oh, three of you reading this), the usual density applied to a style like this is much less overwhelming. "Principles (Of Scientific Management)" bears a surprising amount of room to breathe and guitar chugging seemingly marked by plenty of frustration and tenseness over its 4:25 course.

If they were to constantly operate at that one tempo, I could envision Numbered being a bit tedious to listen to, but the band know that an occasional fast pace doesn't hurt. See "Late Night, No. 708," where the strongest case is made for the aforementioned This Is Hell comparison; the guitar lead sticks its neck out and there's a nice rugged bounding about things. "Looking Out / Looking In" has some nice catchy refrains, as well as a somehow well-integrated quote from "High Fidelity."

Numbered's tracks average at well over three minutes apiece, so rest assured that Decades' hardcore is not for the "1-2 fuck you" set. But those who appreciate the methodical, thoughtful burn of a heavy song should definitely find something to like in Decades." -Brian @ http://www.punknews.org/review/7704

NoiseBlog
Rating: n/a
"Decades is a young hardcore band from the Dallas, Texas area on State of Mind Recordings, a label with a reputation for helping bands reach that next level of success (This Is Hell, Dead Hearts). They have recently released this EP, 'Numbered' and I have had the chance to listen to it quite thoroughly, and I really like it.

Decades' sound is something right up my alley, there's a slew of bands that I hear in this music, Modern Life Is War, The Carrier, Hollywood, even some older early 2000's metalcore stylings, and I really like it. It's a melodic sound that maintains a heavy edge and a lot of emotion in the vocals and composition keep it really engaging.

There is a lot of experimentation within the norms of hardcore that really accent the music that they've put together. They're not afraid to slow the songs way down with cleaner parts, and there are some really great parts where the vocals do an awesome, standout job of completely taking an otherwise normal piece of music and giving it an extra push.

It's a pretty meaty EP, the 5 songs here come in around 20 minutes, which is pretty long for a hardcore EP, but it's not too long. The songs are wrote well enough where they don't fall flat, they don't get repetitive, and they flow together very well. I think that the variety that they've put in this EP surely helps too. It's not a very predictable sound, and it's a sound in the ballpark of other bands, but it has it's own distinctness.

Decades is a great looking band, and this first EP they have released is very strong. I strongly recommend checking them out. I think they have a really bright future as a band, and I'm eager to see that future.'
-Scott @ http://noiseblogx.blogspot.com/2008/11/decades-numbered.html

Scenepointblank.com
Rating: 7.5/10
"Ah yes, Texas hardcore. In spite of the recent loss of many of its key bands, the various scenes within Texas continue to strike back with more young and promising hardcore bands. Decades, from the greater Dallas region, is amongst this new crop of bands bringing new life.

Numbered is the band's debut effort, a six-song EP. "Caravel / Mediastinum" starts things off with three minutes of mid-tempo riffing and drum work that is occasionally accented with the occasional meandering guitar melody. It's a building piece that shows definitely influence from the Boston rock-meets-hardcore sound of the first half of this decade.

"Late Night, No. 708" picks things up with a much faster approach, think This is Hell or The Backup Plan. The faster pace suits the tone of scratchy, coarse vocals a bit more than the previous track. "Looking Out / Looking In" follows and continues with the faster pace, but taking a bit more of a melodic take - think the more poppy material from Comeback Kid.

Decades continues to move back and forth between the faster hardcore tunes and the most mid-tempo cuts. The fact that they're mixed up helps keep the songs from sounding as one, which is good. Though I do prefer the faster-paced songs to the slower-moving ones.

Lyrically, the subject matter tends to focus on self-analysis of life choices - mistakes made, friendships/love lost, placement in society, and the choice to be drug free, among others. The personal nature and substance of the lyrics is much better than standard fair scene politics lyrics and definitely adds to the songs.

Numbered is a solid debut from this young Texas outfit. They've got the knack of writing some catchy hardcore. Occasionally the songs can become a tad predictable, but for the most part the album is fresh and fun."- Micheal @ http://www.scenepointblank.com/reviews/2193

Delusions of Adequacy
Rating: n/a
"Decades play traditional American hardcore with melodic tendencies. This Dallas-area band's debut EP, Numbered, paces through 6 tracks of mediocrity. The music is loud and the band is tight enough, but on this disc, Decades execute songs like each part is compulsory. The effect is uninspiring.

Every new indie band must compete with a million other new indie bands for an audience, and modern hardcore fans are perhaps the most critical audience of all. A band like Decades better sound like they live their music. If they can't convince listeners of this, then they're done.

Decades might be great live, but Numbered fails to get the blood pumping.

Opening track "Caravel/Mediastinum" is a slow, lumbering song hampered by a weak guitar lead. The EP's best song is track 2, "Late Night, No 708". This stomper aggressively recreates early 1990's style hardcore with the vocal, "I don't want a drug or drink to sedate me through the pain of living / I don't need another miserable song to sit and compare scars with".

But then the disc gets dull. Monotony kicks in, group shouts sound like yelping dogs, and guitar leads struggle for relevance. The cracking, emotional vocal delivery on "Principles (of Scientific Management)" helps the cause, but simply can't redeem the Xeroxed music around it. The lyrics on "Looking Out/Looking In" sum it up best: "I sell complaints / Flooding markets with angst filled words to worn out beats in a tired verse". Sad but true.

Numbered was written on auto pilot. But Decades may show us yet. They tour with good company - something hard to do for a band from an impoverished music scene."- Damon @ http://www.adequacy.net/review.php?reviewID=9139