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Mortal Like Me

from Shapeshifter by Violet Bell

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about

This song careens off the rails. It’s a confession; a rowdy reflection from the fisherman in the wake of the selkie’s escape. We find him thinking about why he ever kidnapped her in the first place, and the folly of trying to compel love or contain a wild force. I imagine him waking to the empty bed, finding her gone, and playing it all back in his mind over a bottle of whisky. You get the sense that he knew this outcome was inevitable.

This one feels like Neil Young’s “Love is a Rose,” with teeth.

Joe Troop showed up in the studio for one day, and this was the first track we cut with him on the banjo.

lyrics

I was out on the water
Too late one night
That’s when I saw her dancing
Naked in the moonlight

Wet stones, wet curves, wet skin
Not of this earth
But born of the sea
Never meant for a mortal like me

In a dream, I climbed up on the stones
and snatched her skin
She could not swim
so I took her home

wet hands, wet curves, wet woman
not of this earth
but torn from the sea
seven years and I’ll set you free

I tied it to a stone
I cast it from a cliff
into the waves below
I watched it sink

It calls our daughter’s name
It wakes me in my sleep
Her love was never mine to keep
Her love was never mine

Window’s open,
a chill is blowing in
I turn to her,
Woken by the wind

One room, one bed
Two pillows, only one head
Full moon, black sky
Deep waters opening wide
Can’t hold the tide
We all know, and yet we all try
To steal from the sea –
Never meant for a mortal like me.

credits

from Shapeshifter, track released October 7, 2022
Lizzy Ross - lead vocals, vocal harmonies
Omar Ruiz-Lopez - cello
Joe Troop - banjo
Tatiana Hargreaves - 5-string fiddle
Joseph Terrell - acoustic guitar, vocal harmonies
Libby Rodenbough - vocal harmonies
SOUND ENGINEER: Jason Richmond
MIXING ENGINEER: Jason Richmond
MASTERING ENGINEER: Jason Richmond
PRODUCER: Jason Richmond, Lizzy Ross, Omar Ruiz-Lopez

license

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about

Violet Bell image

Violet Bell Chapel Hill, North Carolina

✨harmony + folklore + queer + de-homogenizing the americana roots music narrative ✨ Our new album Shapeshifter is out 10/7/22. It tells the ancient story of the selkie, a seal who can take off her skin to become human, as medicine for social norms that would keep us small. ... more

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