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House of the Departed

from Lost in the Woods by Lewis Mullen

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Written and recorded in 2009

From the same period as Through the Floor, House of the Departed sees me exploring similar themes of lovelorn sadness tempered with sardonic humour. I say I explored them; I’ll leave it to you the listener how well you think I incorporated them into song

Added to the mixture is a fascination with the gothic and sensational; the interplay between haunting, dreaming and heartbreak is opaque when held up to the light

The adoration of the ghost’s (apparent) youth is a bit creepy in the wrong way listening to it now, especially now that I’m further from twenty-one than I was when I wrote this song (to put it mildly). I stand by the “sockets of my eyes” line though: that’s creepy in the right way. And I’m still proud of that whole first verse

lyrics

I wait by the front gate

But Esme doesn’t show

She’s always late

But that’s cause she’s a ghost



I’ve spent three months in this haunted house

Where nothing is as it seems

I’ve slept so restlessly

With a head so full of dreams



Won’t you stay a while

In the House of the Departed

Stay a while

I’m this home for the broken hearted



The White Lady and Headless Pete

And the man who walks in chains

They ain’t got nothing

On Esmeralda Cain



She died when she was twenty-one

And now she’ll never age

A ruby caught in amber

A picture on the page



Won’t you stay a while

In the House of the Departed

Stay a while

I’m this home for the broken hearted



No man should be single

No ghost should walk alone

I promised my dear Esme

I’d be her flesh and bone



She’ll live inside my body

In the sockets of my eyes

A life that’s symbiotic

A love that never dies



Won’t you stay a while

In the House of the Departed

Stay a while

I’m this home for the broken hearted

credits

from Lost in the Woods, released November 3, 2023

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Lewis Mullen Glasgow, UK

I write the kind of music I'd like to listen to, and I hope you enjoy listening to it to. It's a window into a slightly different world that's a more honest mirror of our own

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