back to
Papercup Records
We’ve updated our Terms of Use to reflect our new entity name and address. You can review the changes here.
We’ve updated our Terms of Use. You can review the changes here.

At Home Again, Singing

by Marek Johnson

/
  • Record/Vinyl + Digital Album

    Beautiful strictly limited 2-colour vinyl edition of "At Home Again, Singing"

    Includes unlimited streaming of At Home Again, Singing via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    ships out within 2 days

      €23 EUR or more 

     

  • Record/Vinyl + Digital Album

    Includes unlimited streaming of At Home Again, Singing via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    ships out within 3 days

      €20 EUR or more 

     

  • Streaming + Download

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    Purchasable with gift card

      €8 EUR  or more

     

1.
Owls 03:21 video
Take another pill to swallow my fears Vanishing in warm vanilla clouds Take me out into the world Show me all the wonders worth Looking at and being stunned This is how far we have got Sitting at your back for miles Riding through the pouring rain Riding till I fall asleep Take me out into the world Take me out into the world Looking back now I feel the end seemed closer When nothing really mattered Owls were being planted One took love for granted No dreams to be shattered Sitting at your back for miles Riding through the pouring rain Riding till I fall asleep Take me out into the world Take me out into the world Take me back into this world Where nothing really mattered Owls were being planted One took love for granted No dreams to be shattered
2.
Hommage 03:34
Hommage When the cow cries in the dark The lord, she won’t help you To fall asleep When we lie awake at night The charms of the day Turn into childish fears Listen to the whisper That comes from the trees The pink moon is glowing We’re walking the cow On the other grassy side It sure is hard to be a green-eyed soul So while we walk under the sun I won’t forget the peace of the night Listen to the whisper That comes from the trees The pink moon is glowing We’re walking the cow
3.
These days I wonder Are you aware of my love? Knowing myself it can’t be easy to know From paralyzed silence From taking love for granted You’ll make it anyway I could have seen you by now Sometimes i wonder Am I aware of your love?
4.
I stare at paper and out the window While another year goes by And friends turn into mothers and fathers People of the sunrise The unspoken rule gives us a purpose A right to love in flesh and blood Riding on beautiful horses And I’m waiting for the sun to burst Looking at the golden sky Where you can see her pass again Giving us a glimpse of eternal joy Every day till we know What’s the use of leaving cracks behind When we’re not even sure about our own faith?
5.
Eddy 03:48
Once there was a simple man With a simple family It’s so easy to forget About perfect harmony So he raised his glass And made harmony stay Cover up the darkness waiting in the day Leaving home lead by his brother Only fourteen years of age Just away from war and slaughter On the rail roads towards the south From the last time I saw him in his backyard Remains a picture of a laughing bloke Searching for the light As he drowns himself There were stories of him fighting There were stories of him dancing There were stories that created All those shadows from the past So he danced and fought and raised his glass For perfect harmony As his path slowly narrowed down Searching for the light As he drowns himself Searching for the light As he drowns himself
6.
Nothing 02:58
All this time we fall Back to the womb of dirt You don’t have to be scared Bind a rock to your feet Stone and flesh go down In history as dust anyway Don’t rush back to the womb This might be the only time To see the sun go down To feel rain on your face To hear the wind play with the trees What do you see in nothing? What do you see in nothing? What do you see in nothing? What do you see in nothing? What do you see in nothing? What do you see in nothing? What do you see in nothing? What do you see in nothing?
7.
Birds 06:31
You seem ok but is that the truth? Who knows Feeding the birds like you always do Alone Three children living their own lives Divided You don’t seem to care much for your own Existence You taught me time will make us stronger I wish I could do the same for you today Remember the days We were living by the station He was driving strangers All over town And I felt safe in his room Full of smoke We lost our way Somewhere along the lines You take your ashes Wherever you may go I see you carrying his with poise before us That day I learned what it means To love someone
8.
Sleep 04:13
At the start of the day We get up and find the world It's beautifiul Only the mind can't take it When I get up In the town that we believe in Believe in Believe in me I want you to see me I'm afraid you won't see me Is what I learned What I learned after getting up The sleep
9.
Taking Stock 02:07
Once more you realise Things could be worse Your loved ones are still breathing Sleeping just like stones In time you’ll see them laughing again As memories of this darkness fade At home again, singing The songs of the travellers And sharing tales of valour Or the times that we walked 'til we lost our way Under the bluest southern sky Fear not the future Treasure the past And all the little detours All the ebbs and flows Here’s to the sunrise Lift your cup We’re drinking to another day
10.
Knowing 02:00
She cries at the dinner table Love has failed her once more I’m watching the scene in silence Knowing it’s just us again She has no choice But to be strong And carry on Has that ever been different? From the moment she brought me into this world While a man was being sorry for himself Again So I too made her cry a thousand times While she was there for me While she gave all she had While she is there for me While she gave all she had

about

At Home Again, Singing

Out of nowhere David Helm's voice resounds, as if it were a ghost from a lamp, finding its way into the ear together with the guitar. The voice engraves the words "Take another pill to swallow my fears/ Vanishing in warm vanilla clouds" into history - that is, into the present of a world without reliability which is full of false certainties. An absurd life produces the most insane moments, the most passionate entanglements and the most painful realizations. So crazy, passionate and painful that sometimes only pills help - or just this music. Or both. The nocturnal, psychedelic song "Owls" conveys an atmosphere of time travel, during which the unconscious evaporates in Helm's voice, but the world around it continues to appear as an impregnable fortress; leading into the past and the future at the same time. With "Owls" and its vanilla clouds, David Helm creates a musical space in which time is suspended. That is the 'home' of which the title of the album references and about which his songs are sung. 

It is necessary to briefly digress in order to explain how Marek Johnson got into this space. It has something to do with Mark Hollis. Hollis landed synth-pop hits like "Such a Shame" with his band Talk Talk in the 1980s. But gradually Hollis and co turned to organic instrumentation, improvising more, deliberately letting go of fixed song structures at times, shaking up well-rehearsed automatisms in pop, when ultimately it's more common for unconventional acts to move in the opposite direction and become more accessible. Then they suddenly capture the zeitgeist, which Hollis in fact didn't care about at all after a certain point in his creative work. After that they burn out again because timeless beauty is rare in the fast-moving chart business.

David Helm got to know the later Talk Talk and Hollis albums at some point and gave time and space to the process of getting to know them. Helm comes from a jazz background and is active in various formations. The first EP under the name Marek Johnson, "Stay Low,"  released a good two years ago, marked a step in a completely new direction for him. More pop than ever, and yet much freer than before. That only sounds like a contradiction if you deny pop music's emancipatory power instead of rediscovering it time and time again.

David Helm is one of those pop music explorers who also feel like opening up to other microcosms and contexts, such as the environment of the Papercup Records label, which offers him new possibilities of expression. With "At home again, singing" he ventures even further forward artistically and back a bit in time. Paradox? The multi-instrumentalist, who sang in a boys' choir in his youth and openly describes the phase of his voice breaking as a traumatic experience, had already rediscovered his own voice and his role as a singer on "Stay Low";translating thoughts and feelings into his own lyrics for the first time. Helm's voice revealed in the essence of its development so much potential that one was already looking forward to the next step. Like a time machine, the EP allowed us to listen into the future of today and the present form of Marek Johnson. All that was missing was the space where Helm could retreat to summon the spirit.

"At home again, singing" describes this space - and at the same time is the space. The world that David Helm deconstructs in the pieces of the album is at the same time carried by the songs, because the songs are about his own life, that is, about his history, including his family, his everyday life and his relation to others. A cathartic approach with many self-critical undertones. The aforementioned time travel effect also results from the preoccupation with parents and the clash between family and history. Fear. Love. There are fragments that Helm connects with the fine thread of his voice, some shards that he puts together with compositional heart; dreamlike images that are saved from oblivion by bittersweet melodies and choruses that cut into the flesh.  The radical intimacy of the album is the result of a kind of detachment. Helm not only wrote all the songs and almost all the lyrics (for one song they were contributed by his partner, musician Shannon Barnett), he also played all the instruments this time, with only producer Jan Philipp at his side. Helm is closer to himself and yet ventures more outside of himself, giving Marek Johnson a firmer character than on "Stay Low". And when there are passages that immediately remind one of the Beatles? It's all the more beautiful.

The haunting "Leaving Cracks" hints at a certain longing for disappearance with the lines "What's the use of leaving cracks behind/ When we're not even sure about our own faith?", and gets to the heart of the album's central paradox. Time is suspended twice, in that Marek Johnson's virtuoso singer-songwriter pop does not submit to trends, exudes timeless elegance and raises existential questions for eternity that anyone could actually ask themselves right now, should he or she be able to muster the strength. And also in that the songs lift up the past in the sense that they preserve it. The song "Eddy" is dedicated to David Helm's grandfather, who took his own life. A moment becomes a whole story.
You feel it when you enter a room you call home after an extended time away. The outer time seems to stand still as soon as one closes the door behind oneself; the inner time is stirred up more and more by having stayed away for so long. In that instance, if one heard one's own voice, so tender and fragile, from another world and yet caught in this world, as if it were a ghost of days gone by singing, "What do you see in nothing?", then it would either be time to swallow the next pill - or to listen to this album again. 

- Wolfgang Froemberg

credits

released October 28, 2022

All songs and lyrics by David Helm
(‘Taking Stock’ lyrics by Shannon Barnett)
Produced and performed by David Helm and Jan Philipp
Processed saxophone on‘Leaving Cracks’ by Leonhard Huhn
Engineered and mixed by Jan Philipp in Cologne
Mastered by Alex Kloss
Coverphoto by Jennifer Rumbach
Graphic design by Elisa Metz

© ℗ Papercup Records 2022

license

all rights reserved

tags

about

Marek Johnson Cologne, Germany

Time is suspended twice, in that Marek Johnson's virtuoso singer-songwriter pop does not submit to trends, exudes timeless elegance and raises existential questions for eternity that anyone could actually ask themselves right now, should he or she be able to muster the strength. And also in that the songs lift up the past in the sense that they preserve it. ... more

contact / help

Contact Marek Johnson

Streaming and
Download help

Redeem code

Report this album or account

If you like Marek Johnson, you may also like: