The Motor Oil, Snot, and Honey LP
Why the strange name? Well, the song lyrics tend to fall into three categories: political, snotty, and honey-sweet (awww). All three liquids are viscous. Motor oil represents the political songs (like 'American Gothic' and 'Military-Industrial Complex'), which like oil tend to get on the floor of your garage and never go away. The snotty songs ('You're Wrong', 'Jackass', 'Punk in Disguise') are just that. I originally intended to call this the 'Snot LP', but snot doesn't describe all the tunes. The final category, 'Honey', is the love songs ('I Wanna Tell You', 'The Right to Lose', and 'Miles Away').

This record came together over a month's worth of weekends at my house. Overall, it is at the same time more punk sounding than Perspective, yet I used more acoustic guitar, piano and strings. Oh, well.

Lyrics © 2002 Dave Short.

You're Wrong [Rough Mix MP3]
Why can't you just admit defeat?
The evidence proves that you've been beat
Get a clue or get a grip
Now you're going down with your ship

You're wrong!
All through the night
And all day long
You're wrong

Just get this thought through your head
Gossamer to penetrate your lead
Shut the hell up and sit your ass down
Because you've finally been shot down

American Gothic
Mommy's waiting by the phone
3 am and Daddy ain't home
Daddy's looking for another prospect
His secretary's the cheif suspect
Divorce #3 wasn't the end
So she'll find another boyfriend
She'll prove what she's really made of
And this time it'll really be love

The American Dream, Pulitzer scheme
Smarmy, trite and overwrought
It ain't too funny when you run outta money
And don't get the future you bought
So remember, it defies all logic
American gothic

Brother's stuck in a fast-food job
Another working-class white collar slob
Eight hours a day spent on his feet
Barely able to make ends meet
Life stuck in a paralyzed condition
Can't afford the college tuition
Serving fries until middle age
Getting my on his minimum wage

Impolitically Correct [Rough Mix MP3]
I have a problem with euphemisms
It's like dumbing language down
So it makes people feel better
But it takes meaning from the noun
I don't want peopel telling me
What it is I can and can't say
Do they think a better name
Will make everything okay?

I'm impolitically correct
Let me use my own intellect
I'd rather be direct
Let me be what I wanna be
And I promise I won't be PC

So dream up your nice little words
Words for others to follow
They may make people political
But they make people hollow
If we step around our problems
Then lives'll be built on lies
And everyone will walk around
Hidden in a verbal disguise

Same Old Story
You tell me how the world's gonna end
Consumed in hate, a nuclear war
But I'm afraid I've heard that one before
You've written the same song again
Pull that stick from your ass once in a while
Would it really hurt to try to smile?

It's the same old story
Again and again and again
It's the same old story
And I don't want to hear it again

You tell me about your new girlfriend
How you're stop and go like a streetlight:
Make up, break up, then another fight
You've got more stories than Dr. Frank
You won't fall in love, and I know why
You aren't will to even try

For some people it's always the same
Duck-duck goose is their favorite game
Run in a circle and then fall down
They're only happy running around
And around, and around

I Wanna Tell You
Girl I can't really describe how I feel
When you're arond the world seems unreal
You're always able to knock me off my feet
And when you're gone I am incomplete
I wanna tell you in a million ways
That I wanna hold you for a million days

I want you to know that I love you so
You're all that I think of when I'm awake
If we're together I'll love you forever
Our hearts united will never break

Take away everything that I hold dear
I'll be just fine as long as you're near
Yeah I'm happy just to gaze on your face
To see you smile and feel my heart race
Yeah I know now what dreams are made of
I'm in paradise knowing your love

And when I see your eyes shine
I know that everything will be just fine

Military-Industrial Complex
Take a step outside and what do I see?
Broken homes, sightless allegory
Hidden from site, yet plainly in view
Your precious banners, red white and blue

Military-industrial complex
pervading my thoughts, stuck in my head
Double misdirecttion meant to perplex
Military-industrial complex

I try to escape but there's nowhere to hide
It's seiged my psyche and now it's gone inside
Where you see a tree I see a tank
Single file schoolkids now walk only in rank

Now I think I'm losing my mind
Wherever I will look is where I will find
Evidence of a conspiracy that lurks all around
To breed us like cattle, then mow us down

Punk in Disguise
You admonish everyone who doesn't come to see your band
But you don't go to shows yourself - something I can't understand
When you do go to a show you act as if you've sprouted roots
No local band in town will get you to move your combat boots

No wonder the scene is almost dead
Yo come to the door but smoke outside instead
When I look at you I can believe my eyes
You're nothing more than a punk in disguise

You're ever so quick to write about the system's flaws
But when was the last time you helped with a worthy cause?
You say you're out to change the world and clean up the mess
But the truth of the matter is you couldn't care less

Your mohawk may be two feet tall
But the truth is you don't care at all
So ignore charities in favor of hair dyes
You're nothing more than a punk in disguise

PMRC
Your efforts are in vain and oh-so-transparent
Recording-buying decisions should be left to the parent
Buying naughty records ain't like buying alcohol
No you shouldn't limit music at all

Jackass
How does it feel to know you're a jackass?
To go through life known to be crude and crass
Nobody likes the way you like to act
You're the fire to my gasoline - I'm gonna react
When you come around people blow their tops
How many folks have you managed to piss off?
You've turned idiocy into a fine art
The only time I'm happy is when we're far apart

You're a jackass
Please don't stay
You're a jackass
Just go away

People are getting sick of everything you do
It's only a matter of time before someone decks you
Can't you learn how real people behave?
It just might save you from an early grave

You're a jackass
You're a thorn in my side
You're a jackass
You'd better run and hide

Miles Away
Skyscrapers take me to the top of the world
But even up there I can't see that girl
My eyes open wide but I'm in the dark
It seems like I'm blind whenever we're apart

No matter what I do and no matter what I say
It won't change the fact that she's miles away
The last thing I think at the wrong end of dawn
Is why am I here while she has moved on?

Dreams bring me down to the depths of my mind
But she isn't there, and all I will find
Are memories of the past, things I can't see
I'm wearied by the search and the despair inside me.

Landmines no More
A pusillanimous man planted poison seeds
He's gone now but his evil lives on in his deeds
For the seed sprouted into a worldwide threat
The innocent pay their lives to his hate-debt

Landmines no more
They rarely reach the targets they're intended for
Watch where you tread
For you may be the next one to wind up dead
Landmines no more

Civilians play a deadly game beyond the farms
Losing the match and losing legs and arms
For how are they supposed to suspect
What's under the earth that they can't detect?

The man didn't care how many died
And the court system just lets it all slide
His family still does what it thinks it needs
To plant even more of his deadly seeds

The Whole World is Burning
They know they can shout louder than their foes
What perterbed them is a mystery nobody knows
We do know that they like to shout in a crowd
Compared to their enemy they seem impossibly loud

And the whole world is burning
The flames lick to their full height
They think they're winning and no one is learning
As the firelight darkens the night

People are burning, ideas are too
Stories, lives and images we all once knew
They're dying, yet their screams can't be heard
There's no defense for the iconoclastic word

Still the whole world is burning
A funeral pyre, a gruesome sight
And there they stand, angry and yearning
Eager to show that we're wrong and they're right

When it was all over, all I found
Was part of page thirteen, amid ashes on the ground
Opinions and ideas died in the conflagrations
Because of some obstinate misinterpretations

And the whole word is burning
Houses, friendships, heroes and books
Their targets in their graves would be turning
If they could see the gleeful, hateful looks

Vote [Rough Mix MP3]
It's a free country so you have the right to abstain
But if you do then you'd better not complain
If you're dissastisfied with the political regime
Then you'd better register when you turn 18
So armchair revolutionists, and punk rockers take note
If you wanna change the world then you're gonna have to vote

The Right to Lose
Your path of late, it seems so wrong
Your head's above the water, but it won't be for long
Where you turn and what you learn, there's nothign I can od
Except turn my head and admonish you

Let you go, well I don't know
How selfish is that?
I wish you would realize
The crossroads you're at
So I come undone, it's not so fun
You've had the right to choose
But you've gotta understand that includes
The right to lose

A friend is a friend or so it seems
A fixer of promises and a mender of shattered dreams
Where you turn and what you learn, there's nothign I can do
I can't find a way to show my disapproval to you

I don't know what knocked down your defences
Did some tragedy split you open and spill out your senses?
I must've absorbed them all because you're drying out
Somehow you lost your self-doubt