I Should Stop Being Such a Fool

Kingdom of Fools

3 newly recorded songs dedicated to The Fool…

I told my self
Life has no meaning
I told myself
I should stop dreaming
I told myself
I should stop being such a fool

Three songs about three different kinds of fools… [and let me hasten to point out that while All Fool’s day caught me off guard today with the startling news that Apple was leaving the home computer market, I must still have been subconsciously thinking ahead: yesterday’s song — which went up quite late last night — and is kind of interesting if I do say so myself — had the line: “…in the Idiot’s Guide to Love I must be listed in the back under ‘Fool’…”

Kingdom of Fools

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previous versions
Sunday, September 25, 2005
Tuesday, February 28, 2006

lyrics
Kingdom of Fools
Ain’t no such thing
as too high to fall
aint no place so low
you can’t get there
if you crawl

Ain’t no bro’
so close you can’t play him down
’cause in the kingdom of Fools
only one can wear the crown

Ain’t no truth so pure
you can’t turn it to a lie
ain’t no love so deep
you can’t drain it ’til it’s dry

ain’t no flower so pretty
you can’t crush it to the ground
in the Kingdom of Fools
only one can wear the crown

Ain’t no lie
that can ever make you see the truth
and your whole life ’til now
is just so much living proof

Ain’t no one but you
can keep you from where you’re bound
‘Cause in the Kingdom of Fools
Only one can wear the crown
(C)2007, TK Major

__________

No Fool

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previous versions
Wednesday, November 09, 2005
Friday, February 24, 2006
Friday, January 26, 2007

lyrics
No Fool

Sitting all alone
by my telephone
Waited all day
but that’s okay
I could wait all night
and that would be all right
for a woman like you
I would wait all my life

Sometimes I pull myself together
and I go downtown
I’m all dressed up
and I wander around
and I feel like a fool
I can’t stop thinking of you
When you’re all alone
this city’s so cruel

I walk along the river
until the stars come out
I sit by myself alone in the dark
and I wonder
Oh yes I wonder
I’m just like a child
but I am no fool
I know it’s over

(C)1980, TK Major
(C)2007, TK Major

__________

I Should Stop Being Such a Fool

more stream & DL options

previous versions
Friday, October 13, 2006
Friday, January 26, 2007

lyrics
I Should Stop Being Such a Fool

I told my self
Life has no meaning
I told myself
I should stop dreaming
I told myself
I should stop being such a fool

I told myself
love’s just a lie
I told myself
I should get wise
I told myself
being kind is just being cruel

Lookin in my heart
was like lookin’ in a well
and if there was a bottom
you couldn’t really tell
as dark as midnight
all the way down to hell
one day I looked in
and then I just fell

Then I looked in my soul
and I saw that it was empty
and I said to myself
just like the rest of them
and i said out loud
from here on
it’s all ’bout number one

But I added that up
and I factored in forever
I subtracted my dreams then
divided that by never
When I saw the bottom line
I sat down — I knew that
I was done

Lookin in my heart…

Back then I told my self
Life has no meaning
And I told myself
I should stop dreaming
Then I told myself
I should stop being such a fool

But then I thought to myself
what’s it all for?
and I thought to myself
must be something more
and I realized all at once
there’s more than one kind of fool

Two Fools

Fool.

Terminator menu system-like, I see a short list of possible angles and ledes…

1) Since the beginning of time, the fool has symbolized man’s ambivalence about the relationship between knowledge, wisdom, and grace…

2) The idiot. The savant. Are they not two sides of the same illusory coin of enlightenment…?

3) In the medieval courts, who better than the sovereign’s own chosen fool to plumb the inner machinations of that court or even to orchestrate those intrigues…

I dunno.

Here are two songs that both have the word fool in the title.

The first is something of an oldie, going back to the early 80s but here rearranged somewhat, different chords, a slightly darker feel.

The second is, even by the rough standards of AYoS, pretty sloppy. Intentionally sloppy — but that’s like intentionally ugly in a painting: you have to be an artist to make it work. Here, we just have sloppiness. Still, there’s a cheery, who gives a good goshdarn exuberance to it that matches the relatively optimistic lyrics.

Relatively optimistic, that is, for this writer. I still manage to get in a line about falling down the well of one’s own soul, bottomless, hell, yadda yadda. So, anyhow…

4) None of the above.

No Fool

Internet Archive page for this recording
previous versions
9 November 2005
19 February 2006

No Fool

Sitting all alone
by my telephone
Waited all day
but that’s okay
I could wait all night
and that would be all right
for a woman like you
I would wait all my life

Sometimes I pull myself together
and I go downtown
I’m all dressed up
and I wander around
and I feel like a fool
I can’t stop thinking of you
When you’re all alone
this city’s so cruel

I walk along the river
until the stars come out
I sit by myself alone in the dark
and I wonder
Oh yes I wonder
I’m just like a child
but I am no fool
I know it’s over

(C)1980, TK Major

I Should Stop Being Such a Fool

Internet Archive page for this recording
previous AYoS version
Friday, October 13, 2006

I Should Stop Being Such a Fool

I told my self
Life has no meaning
I told myself
I should stop dreaming
I told myself
I should stop being such a fool

I told myself
love’s just a lie
I told myself
I should get wise
I told myself
being kind is just being cruel

Lookin in my heart
was like lookin’ in a well
and if there was a bottom
you couldn’t really tell
as dark as midnight
all the way down to hell
one day I looked in
and then I just fell

Then I looked in my soul
and I saw that it was empty
and I said to myself
just like the rest of them
and i said out loud
from here on
it’s all ’bout number one

But I added that up
and I factored in forever
I subtracted my dreams then
divided that by never
When I saw the bottom line
I sat down — I knew that
I was done

Lookin in my heart…

Back then I told my self
Life has no meaning
And I told myself
I should stop dreaming
Then I told myself
I should stop being such a fool

But then I thought to myself
what’s it all for?
and I thought to myself
must be something more
and I realized all at once
there’s more than one kind of fool