I know I promised Halloween-related material, and I'll get to that later in the month. Right now, I'm going to post a song called "In The Dark". The music was written and recorded by my friend Rob, who is an excellent self-taught guitarist (and who you may have heard on my song "Learning To Let Go", which I posted here last month). Back towards the end of 1992, he and I discussed the idea of working on a musical project together, even though we had fairly different musical inspirations (his: Jimmy Page, Yngwie Malmsteen, Steve Vai; mine: Duran Duran, Pet Shop Boys, Kraftwerk). He gave me a cassette that contained several instrumentals in varying stages of completion. The one that caught my ear right away was an ambitious power ballad with some interesting changes. I set out to write some lyrics for it, but it wasn't easy. I'd never tried to write lyrics to someone else's music before, and I had trouble coming up with words that fit well in the places where the time signature changed. Eventually though, I came up with a set of lyrics that I was happy with, and it turned out that Rob liked them as well. Rob and I settled on the name 'Two-Man Clan' for our music project, because we've always felt like we were brothers in all but blood.

The lyrics turned out to be sadly prophetic. They tell the tale of a man with a broken heart (gee, one of my songs? Really? lol), and when I wrote them in January of 1993, they were a work of fiction. However, by the end of the month, the relationship I was in had fallen apart, and they had become a true story. Life imitates art. For those of you keeping score at home, "In The Dark" becomes the fifth song I've posted to FA that is at least partly inspired by this same girl (the other four being "If I Could", "There Are Times...", "Crawl", and "Learning To Let Go". She almost deserves thanks here more than anyone else lol... so thanks, Meg, for being my 'accidental muse'.

Fun fact: The mid-section, beginning with the line "And I'm lying here in the dark", did not appear in the original draft of the song. It was added at the last minute when Rob and I felt like the song needed another change in the middle. It ended up being our favorite part of the song (even though I do rhyme the words "name" and "same" for the second time in the same song lol).

This song is just a couple of seconds over the seven-minute mark, but I hope you'll listen to the whole thing. As always, thank you if you bothered to read this entry. I really like to share the back stories of the songs I post here. ^_^


"In The Dark" (7:01)
Music written by Rob T., date unknown
Lyrics written by me, January - February 1993
Recorded February 1993
me - lead & harmony vocals
Rob T. - all guitars, drum programming


The clock strikes four and I still haven't shut my eyes
How am I supposed to sleep without you by my side?
Since you left me all alone, I haven't been myself
I just can't bear the thought of you being with someone else
I don't know what I did to make you want to leave
But you should know I'd never hurt you willingly
I could prove it to you if you'd give me another try
But you won't even talk to me, and I still don't know why

I still feel uneasy at the mention of your name
And it makes me sad to know you'll never feel the same

And if I knew then what I don't know now, I could've changed history
And maybe if I could read your mind, I could change my destiny
I would say I'm sorry again, but it wouldn't do any good
But baby if I could, I'd hold you in my arms and never let you go again

Everything I see somehow brings you to my mind
All my friends keep telling me to leave the past behind
But I can't shake your memory no matter what I do
No one I could ever find could take the place of you
Trying to live without you is like trying to swim upstream
I wake up each morning hoping that it's all a dream
Every day's a little longer than the day before
Every night that passes by, I need you more and more

Everybody tells me that life will go on
But it seems that everything that I was living for is gone

And if you could see what you've done to me, then maybe you'd change your mind
And if you knew what I was going through, you wouldn't be so unkind
I could spend forever just dreaming of yesterday
But if there was a way, I'd hold you in my arms and never let you go again

-guitar solo-

And I'm lying here in the dark, and I'm calling out your name
And I'm so afraid that my heart will never be the same
I could show you happiness, if you'd just come back to me
If you'd only tell me "yes", I'm sure that you would see

I've been trying to plan out every word that I would say
But every time I try, it never quite comes out that way
But if you could read what is written in my heart
Then you'd understand that we should never be apart

But my prayers go unanswered, day after day
And I know that it's no use, there's nothing I can say

But I still can't believe that you went away, after all that we've been through
And if I live a million years, I'll still be in love with you
Maybe you'll be happier, leaving me behind
But if you ever change your mind, I'll hold you in my arms and never let you go again