Nick Drake
Forgotten while you're here
Remembered for a while...
Fruit Tree
Nicholas Rodney Drake (19 June 1948 – 25 November 1974) was an English folk singer-songwriter and musician.
Song lyrics
- I'm growing old and I wanna go home.
I'm growing old and I don't wanna know.- Black Eyed Dog, first appeared on Fruit Tree (1979)
- The world hums on at its breakneck pace;
People fly in their lifelong race.
For them there's a future to find,
But I think they're leaving me behind.- Leaving Me Behind, appeared on Family Tree (2007)
Five Leaves Left (1969)
- Time has told me
You're a rare, rare find,
A troubled cure for a troubled mind.- Time Has Told Me
- So I'll leave the ways that are making me be
What I really don't want to be.
Leave the ways that are making me love
What I really don't want to love.- Time Has Told Me
- Going to see the river man,
Going to tell him all I can
About the plan
For lilac time.
If he tells me all he knows
'Bout the way his river flows,
And all night shows
In summertime.
- Going to see the river man.
Going to tell him all I can
About the ban
On feeling free.If he tells me all he knows
About the way his river flows,
I don't suppose
It's meant for me.
- Have you seen the land living by the breeze?
Can you understand the lights upon the trees?
Tell me all that you may know
Show me what you have to show
Tell us all today if you know the way to blue...- Way To Blue
- When the day is done,
Down to earth then sinks the sun,
Along with everything that was lost and won,
When the day is done.
- Fame is but a fruit tree:
So very unsound.
It can never flourish
Till its stalk is in the ground.
So men of fame
Can never find a way
Till time has flown
Far from their dying day.
Forgotten while you're here,
Remembered for a while.
A much updated ruin
From a much outdated style.- Fruit Tree
- Life is but a memory,
Happened long ago.
Theatre full of sadness
For a long forgotten show.
Seems so easy
Just to let it go on by
Till you stop and wonder
Why you never wondered why.- Fruit Tree
- Safe in the womb of an everlasting night,
You find the darkness can give the brightest light.
Safe in your place deep in the earth,
That's when they'll know what you were really worth.- Fruit Tree
Bryter Later (1970)
- And what will happen in the morning when the world it gets
So crowded that you can't look out the window in the morning?- Hazey Jane II
- And at the chime of the city clock
Put up your road block.
Hang on to your crown.
For a stone in a tin can
Is wealth to the city man
Who leaves his armour down.- At the Chime of a City Clock
- I could have been a sailor, could have been a cook,
A real live lover, could have been a book,
I could have been a signpost, could have been a clock,
As simple as a kettle, steady as a rock.
I could be here and now,
I would be, I should be, but how?
I could have been one of these things first.- One of These Things First
- Do you curse where you come from?
Do you swear in the night?
Will it mean much to you
If I treat you right?
Do you like what you're doing?
Would you do it some more?
Or will you stop once and wonder
What you're doing it for?
Hey slow Jane, make sense.
Slow, slow, Jane, cross the fence.- Hazey Jane I
- Please give me a second grace.
Please give me a second face.
I've fallen far down
The first time around.
Now I just sit on the ground in your way.- Fly
- Please tell me your second name.
Please play me your second game.
I've fallen so far
For the people you are.
I just need your star for a day.- Fly
- I never felt magic crazy as this,
Never saw moons, knew the meaning of the sea,
I never held emotion in the palm of my hand,
Or felt sweet breezes in the top of a tree,
But now you're here.
Brighten my northern sky.- Northern Sky
- Would you love me for my money?
Would you love me for my head?
Would you love me through the winter?
Would you love me 'til I'm dead?
Oh, if you would and you could,
Come blow your horn on high.- Northern Sky
Pink Moon (1972)
And we are everywhere...
From The Morning
- Saw it written and I saw it say
Pink moon is on its way
And none of you stand so tall
Pink moon's gonna get ye all.
- And I was strong, strong in the sun
I thought I'd see when day is done.
Now I'm weaker than the palest blue
Oh, so weak in the need for you.- Place to Be
- Don't be shy you learn to fly.
And see the sun when day is done.
If only you see
Just what you are beneath a star
That came to stay one rainy day
In autumn for free.
Yes, be what you'll be.- Things Behind the Sun
- And now we rise
And we are everywhere.- From The Morning
Quotes about Nick Drake
- Since Nick Drake's death, his eerie, jazz-tinged folk music has had an ever-growing cult following.
- The Rolling Stone Encyclopedia of Rock & Roll, (Third Edition), p. 280
