Cuatro
Cuatro (meaning “four” in Spanish) is the fourth studio album by Flotsam and Jetsam, released on October 13th, 1992 via MCA Records. The album was re-released on May 13th, 2008 by Metal Mind Productions, remastered with five bonus tracks and limited to 2000 copies. The re-release also contains new packaging and liner notes from band members Eric A.K., Jason Ward and Ed Carlson. Chris Cornell (Soundgarden) co-wrote “The Message” and is credited as Christopher Cornell.
In a time when the thrash metal community laid broken and battered at the hands of the music industry executives, with bands such as Metallica and Megadeth making safer sounding albums in both “The Black Album” and “Countdown to Extinction”, Flotsam and Jetsam battled the grunge flavor of the week by delivering “Cuatro”, an album with near perfect production by Neil Kernon, balancing straight forward thrash metal anthems like “Natural Enemies” and “Swatting At Flies” with more progressive tunes like “Double Zero” and “Wading Through The Darkness”.
TRACK LIST:
- Natural Enemies (3:35)
- Swatting at Flies (4:03)
- The Message (4:32)
- Cradle me Now (4:04)
- Wading Through the Darkness (6:06)
- Double Zero (3:43)
- Never to Reveal (4:16)
- Forget About Heaven (4:47)
- Secret Square (5:21)
- Hypodermic Midnight Snack (3:46)
- Are you Willing (4:00)
- (Ain’t Nothing Gonna) Save This World (3:45)
EDWARD CARLSON – GUITARS | JASON WARD – BASS | MICHAEL GILBERT – GUITARS | ERIC A.K. – VOCALS | KELLY-DAVID SMITH – DRUMS
Lyrics
NATURAL ENEMIES
Damned right out of paradise
It’s all right between the eyes
We are all the same at birth
And at the end of a knife
To the grave had it made
Ignorant but mighty brave
No matter how tight the choke
They’ll misbehave
Natural enemies
The trouble with you is the trouble with me
Natural enemies
You’ll never hear heaven and nature sing
See no evil or the good
The whole world one neighborhood
A backwards in reverse
Modern day Robin hood
Everyday lived in suspense
Introductions so intense
Making deals without ever making sense
Natural enemies
The trouble with you is the trouble with me
Natural enemies
You’ll never hear heaven and nature sing
For what you know you had to spy
Help to commit suicide
The prize head hanging on the wall
And glorified
The only way to win the game
Is to leave it all the same
Your introduction into
History’s hall of shame
Natural Enemies
The trouble with you is the trouble with me
Natural enemies
You’ll never hear heaven and nature sing
SWATTING AT FLIES
The only thing I ever made in my life was a fist
The only thing that ever proved that I exist
Broken glass looks best when the sun’s goin down
Take it from me, I’m broken too
And there’s lots of us around
Like swatting at flies till they cover the floor
Like pulling teeth, tie the string, and slam the door
Like the time I fell in love into someone else
Like the time I complained about the cards I’ve been dealt
Like they say when it rains you know it always pours
Like hearing no again and slamming of doors
I’ve been alone, I’ve been together, I’d been lost
Making my decisions, with the coins that I toss
The slower they walk, you know the harder it gets
Shoulda, woulda, coulda, sketches all our regrets
Like swatting at flies till they cover the floor
Like pulling teeth, tie the string, and slam the door
Like the time I fell in love into someone else
Like the time I complained about the cards I’ve been dealt
Like they say when it rains you know it always pours
Like hearing no again and slamming of doors
Enjoying myself has just been an afterthought
I never doubted the teachers, just the lessons they taught
If I couldn’t fill my stomach, I’d fill my head
But I never could fill the word that I said
Like swatting at flies till they cover the floor
Like pulling teeth, tie the string, and slam the door
Like the time I fell in love into someone else
Like the time I complained about the cards I’ve been dealt
Like they say when it rains you know it always pours
Like hearing no again and slamming of doors
Slamming of doors, doors, doors
THE MESSAGE
Wolves devour
The full moon heart
Screams bloodless howls
And starves for the dawn
As teeth and Jaw
Sink in like needles
There’s no love lost
For a helpless pawn
Taking care of business
Selling rock candy and suicide
The message
In the battle of the colors
Eyes for eyes, brothers for brothers
Taking care of business
Selling rock candy and suicide
Buying low and selling high
Business booms when cold lead flies
The message
Delivered every day
The message
Tribal, primal, criminal
Old men backing out of heart attacks
Send the young ones back to do a man’s job
To the fire and water
The best man’s daughter weds the wings of the dragonfly
Taking care of business
Selling rock candy and suicide
Buying low and selling high
Business booms when cold lead flies
The message
Delivered every day
The message
Tribal, primal, criminal
The message
Delivered every day
The message
Tribal, primal, criminal
CRADLE ME NOW
Passage through time
Leave this place time to erase
My link to myself
Leads me astray
The whole world in my way
Out of my body, out of my mind
Out of luck and out of time
Sift through the remains
Enter this cage-disengage
Once it was easy
My best foot forward
As I trip through the same daily non-existing life I call hell
Bloodless, pale
Another empty shell
Captured mind details
As I loath myself
Can’t you see, can’t you tell
Safely assumed, I’m not well
Cradle me now, teach me how
Teach me how, cradle me now
Make life not your victim
Resume your identity but don’t overload
Seek the riches
Hungry for change, I’ve got to explore
Hidden recesses, lost in my mind
Trapped forever doing time
Bloodless, pale
Another empty shell
Captured mind details
As I loath myself
Can’t you see, can’t you tell
Safely assumed, I’m not well
Cradle me now, teach me how
Teach me how, cradle me now
Bloodless, pale
Another empty shell
Captured mind details
As I loath myself
Can’t you see, can’t you tell
Safely assumed, I’m not well
Cradle me now, teach me how
Teach me how, cradle me now
Bloodless, pale
Another empty shell
Captured mind details
As I loath myself
Can’t you see, can’t you tell
Safely assumed, I’m not well
Cradle me now, teach me how
Teach me how, cradle me now
WADING THROUGH THE DARKNESS
The storm’s too deep outlook dead
Handing down that anger
Nothing good ever lasts
Moody violence
Now a fool in my eyes
What’s the answer, I’ll search till I die
Try a little harder I hear myself say
Make it last before it’s taken away
Wading through the darkness
My head held in my hands
Wading through the darkness
Forced to forget this anguish
I’m half of what I used to be
Erase my memory
Now gone forever goodbye
But I know my memories won’t die
Wading through the darkness
My head held in my hands
Wading through the darkness
Dead inside with a heart that bleeds
Relax my tension needs
Tightness suffocates
Too dense to focus
I’ll see it through the day
No longer churning inside
Rotted memories inhabit my mind
My rage destroys the calm
Destroys the calm
Wading through the darkness
My head held in my hands
Wading through the darkness
DOUBLE ZERO
Here comes the message from the antennae
Who knows how transmissions came
I’ve got the license a bag of passports
Even I don’t know who I am
Howling bullets fly by so often
I can hear them buzz
I’ve lived in deserts, I’ve warred on cities
I don’t even know where I was
Remember Israel and Korea
Kuwait’s the best time I ever had
Had an accomplice who knew of nothing
I killed the best friend I had
Can’t be too careful, can’t use computers
They’re gonna catch my disease
I work alone don’t trust my own mother
Scratched out like ticks and fleas
Dial double zero
Call me whenever you have got a war
Home’s where the guns are
My bed’s the ammo and no one comes to my door
Dial double zero
Wherever you start a war
More of me going than I’ve got coming
They’ll squeeze my blood through the skin
I shouldn’t have wasted my education
The fucking trouble I’m in
I’ve got your had on, I’ve got your suitcase
I’m you when you’re gone
Out here thinking like
I’m never me too long
Dial double zero
Call me whenever you have got a war
Home’s where the guns are
My bed’s the ammo and no one comes to my door
Dial double zero
Wherever you start a war
NEVER TO REVEAL
Turning to the right, feel it getting tight
Demand of the heart, my hands rip apart
I’m so afraid, my welcome overstayed
Never find a way to make all this O.K.
Sleepless nights, I am forever awake
Just one taste–won’t let it go to waste
The way I feel–Never to reveal
Just one taste-of my own space
Fucking sick of this, hope my tongue don’t slip
Familiar trips, loosen up its grip
Instinct never worked anyway, what I’ve seen I just can’t say
My sight’s been taken, my eyes betray
Just one taste–won’t let it go to waste
The way I feel–Never to reveal
Just one taste-of my own space
My hands at my back, pushing violent acts
The truth an artifact
The rabbit in the hat
Kicking out this make believe
Dedicate a new belief
The risk runs high, but I’ve gotta try
Hold it all inside, until the day I die
FORGET ABOUT HEAVEN
When the sun’s gone
Then they cry, laughing as they die
They can’t look into your eyes
Moonlight makes it all so clear
Pierces the skin without tears
The writing on the wall’s been smeared
Tragedy, comedy
Bite the hand that set ’em free
Same old song with a different beat
Comedy, tragedy
Forget about heaven
And the book of fear
Forget about heaven
We’re staying here
Getting so high but staying so low
Stumbling, look out below
Halfway’s too far to go
Forget about heaven
And the book of fear
Forget about heaven
We’re staying here
Beliefs, disaster
Domination by persuasion
Nightmare is after
Your ruined faith beckons grace
Hold their heads down
When kneeling to pray
Heaven lies the other way
Cheated angels turned away
Forget about heaven
And the book of fear
Forget about heaven
We’re staying here
Forget about heaven
Forget about heaven
Forget about heaven
SECRET SQUARE
Slip into the realms of the eight hour grip
She notioned to tangle she mentioned a trip
A place far, far away, like the sky on a cloudy day
Slipping through that secret maze
It creeps with time
She’ll be mine
To fantasize
Through her eyes
LAUGH thru my tears, let go all the fears
That consume you in her universe
LAUGHTER splits my mind, nothing in the way
Run with your knotted situation
Through the door an endless playground
Intensity the hum in your head
LAUGH thru my tears, let go all the fears
That consume you in her universe
LAUGHTER splits my mind, nothing in the way
Go with your knotted situation
Through the door an endless playground
Intensity hums in your head
Sands go ticking by, It’s almost over
Your sunken thought, time to dry the spill in your brain
Absorbed in conscience
Released thru sweat
As the last taste of her
As the last trace of her
Spins away
LAUGH thru my tears, let go all the fears
That consume you in her universe
LAUGHTER splits my mind, nothing in the way
Tense with your knotted situation
LAUGH thru my tears, let go all the fears
That consume you in her universe
LAUGHTER splits my mind, nothing in the way
Stress with your knotted situation
HYPODERMIC MIDNIGHT SNACK
Energy, reality, combined with creativity
Engulfed in popularity with everyone he knows
Dripping in humanity, exactly what a friend should be
At least that’s how it used to be before he hit the stone
Shooting up shooting down
Stealing hurting just to pay for what he needs to live his day
Injecting all his cares away and nodding off the time
Banging up what used to be a life of high prosperity
Complete enraged insanity for a nauseating high
Shooting up shooting down
Shooting up shooting down
(The claw hangs just above your head
Hypodermics gathered make your bed)
Spending all of present time begging outside in the grime
Colour turning slightly lime from hypodermic midnight snack
Dignity is tossed aside as he finds a place to hide
Detox without losing pride, he simply can’t do that
Shooting up shooting down
Shooting up shooting down
The claw hangs just above your head
Hypodermics gathered make your bed)
Shooting up shooting down
Shooting up shooting down
ARE YOU WILLING
If you had a cure for the epidemic of today
Would you hold it ransom or give it all away
Will you be willing to do what’s right when proven wrong
Will you be swept away or will you come along
Are you willing
The trend is now searching for the mighty midas touch
Walking on a broken leg and you can’t find a crutch
If you find the missing piece the answers of a lasting peace
You have found nothing’s ever changed
Are you willing
Are you willing
Yell out to the world echo never comes
I look into myself to see how colour runs
If you knew what I know do you think we all should share
Everybody’s got a cross to bear
Ask and ask the same old riddle
My finger’s in my ears touch in the middle
The trick’s been played, life’s slight of hand
Answers come so slowly, no matter the demand
Are you willing – to let logic go
Are you willing – to forget what you don’t know
Go ahead and fantasize a calm in your own mind
You’ve got to let go to get a piece that really binds
Scratch the itch scratching at the heart
Use the soul’s glue to keep from coming all apart
Out of your head when emotions start to think
Let feelings flow hard bring yourself to the brink
Filled your bags with what we don’t talk about
The questions the answers drown yourself in doubt
Are you willing – to let logic go
Are you willing – to forget what you don’t know
Are you willing – to let logic go
Are you willing to forget what you don’t know
(AIN’T NOTHING GONNA) SAVE THIS WORLD
Is this real or just a test
Attitude learned from the best
Showed the cross but never blessed
Been sleeping long without rest