Billy Talent - Surrender Lyrics
She reads a book from across the street,
Waiting for someone that she'll never meet.
Talk over coffee for an hour or two,
She wonders why I'm always in a good mood.
Killin' time before she struts her stuff,
She needs support and I've become the crutch.
She'll never know how much she means to me.
I'd play the game but I'm the referee.
Surrender every word, every thought every sound.
Surrender every touch, every smile, every frown.
Surrender all the pain we've endured until now.
Surrender all the hope that I lost you have found.
Surrender yourself to me.
Even though I know what I'm lookin' for,
She's got a brick wall behind her door.
I'd travel time and confess to her,
But I'm afraid she'd shoot the messenger.
Surrender every word, every thought every sound.
Surrender every touch, every smile, every frown.
Surrender all the pain we've endured until now.
Surrender all the hope that I lost you have found.
Surrender yourself to me.
I think I found a flower in a field of weeds,
I think I found a flower in a field of weeds.
Searching until my hands bleed,
This flower don't belong to me.
I think I found a flower in a field of weeds,
I think I found a flower in a field of weeds.
Searching until my hands bleed,
This flower don't belong to me.
This flower don't belong to me.
Why could she belong to me?
Every word, every thought every sound.
Every touch, every smile, every frown.
All the pain we've endured until now.
All the hope that I lost you have found.
Surrender every word, every thought every sound.
Surrender every touch, every smile, every frown.
Surrender all the pain we've endured until now.
Surrender all the hope that I lost you have found.
(Surrender) I never had the nerve to ask,
(Surrender) Has my moment come and passed?
(Surrender) I never had the nerve to ask,
(Surrender) Has my moment come and passed?
(Surrender) I never had the nerve to ask,
(Surrender) Has my moment come and passed?
(Surrender) I never had the nerve to ask.
Waiting for someone that she'll never meet.
Talk over coffee for an hour or two,
She wonders why I'm always in a good mood.
Killin' time before she struts her stuff,
She needs support and I've become the crutch.
She'll never know how much she means to me.
I'd play the game but I'm the referee.
Surrender every word, every thought every sound.
Surrender every touch, every smile, every frown.
Surrender all the pain we've endured until now.
Surrender all the hope that I lost you have found.
Surrender yourself to me.
Even though I know what I'm lookin' for,
She's got a brick wall behind her door.
I'd travel time and confess to her,
But I'm afraid she'd shoot the messenger.
Surrender every word, every thought every sound.
Surrender every touch, every smile, every frown.
Surrender all the pain we've endured until now.
Surrender all the hope that I lost you have found.
Surrender yourself to me.
I think I found a flower in a field of weeds,
I think I found a flower in a field of weeds.
Searching until my hands bleed,
This flower don't belong to me.
I think I found a flower in a field of weeds,
I think I found a flower in a field of weeds.
Searching until my hands bleed,
This flower don't belong to me.
This flower don't belong to me.
Why could she belong to me?
Every word, every thought every sound.
Every touch, every smile, every frown.
All the pain we've endured until now.
All the hope that I lost you have found.
Surrender every word, every thought every sound.
Surrender every touch, every smile, every frown.
Surrender all the pain we've endured until now.
Surrender all the hope that I lost you have found.
(Surrender) I never had the nerve to ask,
(Surrender) Has my moment come and passed?
(Surrender) I never had the nerve to ask,
(Surrender) Has my moment come and passed?
(Surrender) I never had the nerve to ask,
(Surrender) Has my moment come and passed?
(Surrender) I never had the nerve to ask.
Billy Talent Discography
- Devil In A Midnight Mass
- Red Flag
- This Suffering
- Worker Bees
- Pins And Needles
- Fallen Leaves
- Where Is The Line?
- Covered In Cowardice
- Surrender
- The Navy Song
- Perfect World
- Sympathy
- Burn The Evidence
- This Is How It Goes
- Living In The Shadows
- Try Honesty
- Line & Sinker
- Lies
- Ex, The
- River Below
- Standing In The Rain
- Cut The Curtains
- Prisoners Of Today
- Nothing To Lose
- Voices Of Violence
Billy Talent for now
Appearances can be deceiving. By all accounts, Billy Talent is a young band just releasing their second album. Hell, it’s even called II. But like most stories worth hearing, the best part often lies beneath the surface
While II is the Toronto-based quartet’s sophomore record, the number hardly seems appropriate for this group of friends that first began this journey 13 years ago. And it’s those years of grounded experience that kept them from sacrificing II to the dreaded second album curse.
“There can be a bit of a curse but it’s a curse that’s explainable,” says guitarist Ian D’Sa. “You have your whole life to write your first record but sometimes you only have a few months to write the second one. The most important thing is to not get bogged down in other people’s timelines and just do it when you feel comfortable with the work.”
The band finished touring for their award-winning self-titled debut in late December 2004 and were scheduled to hit the studio the following February. But going from the road right to the recording studio isn’t how Billy Talent rolls.
“We took some time off, spent time with our friends, family and all the different people that need to be connected with,” says singer Ben Kowalewicz. “You need to have things to write about, you need real life to give you things to write about. I’m not going to write about touring up and down the highway.”
“We definitely wanted some time to slip back into normal society and let the songs come out naturally,” says D’Sa. “I think it was important to take our time with it like that. We were very confident with the material we had early on so we didn’t want to rush it and end up with three good songs and seven others that were filler.”
The band will be the first to admit that the last three years has been like living a rock n’ roll dream. Whether jamming backstage with their musical idols or showing up to awards ceremonies in a full-on military tank, Billy Talent has taken advantage and fully appreciate where they are and how far they’ve come. But it was working day jobs and playing everything from rented suburban halls to downtown Toronto dives for more than a decade that set the stage for their explosive debut, so it’s no wonder the band wanted a return to regular life in order to refuel for the follow-up.
Billy Talent’s version of regular life started when Kowalewicz, D’Sa, Jon Gallant (bass) and Aaron Solowoniuk (drums) began playing together in high school forging their own creative vision through a common love of punk rock. Bands like The Clash, Rage Against the Machine and Jane’s Addiction provided the foundation for what would become the foursome’s own unique sound. The band, then called Pezz, put out a few independently released cassettes and recorded a full-length indie CD called Watoosh. By 1999, Pezz was traded in for a new moniker, lifted from a character in the film Hard Core Logo based on the book by Michael Turner.
With all four guys working full-time jobs – autoworker, financial planner, radio producer, animator – they released their 2001 EP Try Honesty. It was then Billy Talent planted the seeds that would take them from Toronto-rock club obscurity to a North American major label record deal, sharing stages with heroes the Buzzcocks and Jane’s Addiction, touring with Lollapalooza, the Warped Tour and a gaggle of European showcase stops including the U.K.’s infamous Reading and Leeds festivals.
Their self-titled major label debut came out swinging, establishing the band as a melodic tsunami of fist-in-the-air rock n’ roll that garnered the guys accolades from Best New Group, Group of the Year and Album of the Year Junos trophies to Best Video and Best Rock Video MuchMusic awards, as well as a passionate following of fans at home and abroad.
For the follow-up, Billy Talent maintains the elements that makes them who they are – hard-hitting, hook-filled, tight arrangements with an edge – but with a more refined sense of purpose.
“The first record was very angst-fueled,” says D’Sa. “We had spent 11 years as a band together and hadn’t really gotten anywhere so the result was an angst-filled album. This record is a lot about trust and trust issues, and a little more of a personal and emotional record. That said, it’s still Billy Talent. There’s a good balance of simple hard songs and more complex songs, but no 10-minute prog jams.”
While it’s definitely clear the months of constant touring have sharpened their musical chops, one of the stand-out differences is the way Kowalewicz has tempered his screeching lungs of steel to reveal his inner punk rock crooner.
“I sing a lot more than I did on the first album,” he says. “I don’t want to be known as the Scream Guy, so I’ve worked on that. When you’re telling a story you need commas and periods. I think I was more angry on the last record, all around. And on this one, I’m a bit more focused and pick my moments.”
One thing Kowalewicz and the band haven’t changed is their deft lyrical depiction of personal experiences and keen observations. The blistering opener “Devil in a Midnight Mass” shows how Kowalewicz can take an issue and talk about it in a personal way.
“It’s from a story I read about a priest in Boston who had been arrested for child abuse and the church kept moving him from parish to parish,” says Kowalewicz. “The Supreme Court tried and convicted him of molesting 150 kids over a 30 year span and while he was serving his sentence another inmate broke into his cell and murdered him. I stumble upon these stories, they don’t necessarily have to be directly personal but it’s things like this that move me. I’m a big advocate for children’s rights and this song looks at sexual abuse. It’s not against the church or anything, it’s more about that individual betrayal between adult and child. I don’t have the answers but hopefully if I sing about a certain issue it will get people talking about it.”
The album seamlessly weaves such the issue-based songs with more personal tales, from friends falling victim to drug addiction in “Fallen Leaves,” to hipster snobbery in “Where is the Line?” to dealing with people who don’t stand by their convictions in “Covered in Cowardice” – the music sets the scene while the words tell the vivid stories.
“I think this record is more focused for us as writers and people telling stories that are a bit more personal and revealing the side of us that we were more hesitant to reveal on the first record,” says D’Sa.
Musically, the song “This Suffering” melds all the sounds and styles that fans were first introduced to on their first record. “I think it’s a good representation of the band and all the little things we do in our music,” says Gallant.
But while individual songs can be picked out and highlighted, II is not a collection of singles but a single work put together with purpose – which explains the spartan title.
“A lot of times you look at certain songs to get the name of the record, but the problem with that is then you’re saying that is the song – fast-forward to this song,” says Kowalewicz. “For us, the record is an entire album not just a few songs and some filler.”
Like getting to know a good friend better over time, their lyrics and sound are familiar but delve deeper into who Billy Talent is and where they stand. The first 13 years of their career established them as an authentic, honest and direct force of energy and these next 13 songs add to that legacy. Welcome to part II.
While II is the Toronto-based quartet’s sophomore record, the number hardly seems appropriate for this group of friends that first began this journey 13 years ago. And it’s those years of grounded experience that kept them from sacrificing II to the dreaded second album curse.
“There can be a bit of a curse but it’s a curse that’s explainable,” says guitarist Ian D’Sa. “You have your whole life to write your first record but sometimes you only have a few months to write the second one. The most important thing is to not get bogged down in other people’s timelines and just do it when you feel comfortable with the work.”
The band finished touring for their award-winning self-titled debut in late December 2004 and were scheduled to hit the studio the following February. But going from the road right to the recording studio isn’t how Billy Talent rolls.
“We took some time off, spent time with our friends, family and all the different people that need to be connected with,” says singer Ben Kowalewicz. “You need to have things to write about, you need real life to give you things to write about. I’m not going to write about touring up and down the highway.”
“We definitely wanted some time to slip back into normal society and let the songs come out naturally,” says D’Sa. “I think it was important to take our time with it like that. We were very confident with the material we had early on so we didn’t want to rush it and end up with three good songs and seven others that were filler.”
The band will be the first to admit that the last three years has been like living a rock n’ roll dream. Whether jamming backstage with their musical idols or showing up to awards ceremonies in a full-on military tank, Billy Talent has taken advantage and fully appreciate where they are and how far they’ve come. But it was working day jobs and playing everything from rented suburban halls to downtown Toronto dives for more than a decade that set the stage for their explosive debut, so it’s no wonder the band wanted a return to regular life in order to refuel for the follow-up.
Billy Talent’s version of regular life started when Kowalewicz, D’Sa, Jon Gallant (bass) and Aaron Solowoniuk (drums) began playing together in high school forging their own creative vision through a common love of punk rock. Bands like The Clash, Rage Against the Machine and Jane’s Addiction provided the foundation for what would become the foursome’s own unique sound. The band, then called Pezz, put out a few independently released cassettes and recorded a full-length indie CD called Watoosh. By 1999, Pezz was traded in for a new moniker, lifted from a character in the film Hard Core Logo based on the book by Michael Turner.
With all four guys working full-time jobs – autoworker, financial planner, radio producer, animator – they released their 2001 EP Try Honesty. It was then Billy Talent planted the seeds that would take them from Toronto-rock club obscurity to a North American major label record deal, sharing stages with heroes the Buzzcocks and Jane’s Addiction, touring with Lollapalooza, the Warped Tour and a gaggle of European showcase stops including the U.K.’s infamous Reading and Leeds festivals.
Their self-titled major label debut came out swinging, establishing the band as a melodic tsunami of fist-in-the-air rock n’ roll that garnered the guys accolades from Best New Group, Group of the Year and Album of the Year Junos trophies to Best Video and Best Rock Video MuchMusic awards, as well as a passionate following of fans at home and abroad.
For the follow-up, Billy Talent maintains the elements that makes them who they are – hard-hitting, hook-filled, tight arrangements with an edge – but with a more refined sense of purpose.
“The first record was very angst-fueled,” says D’Sa. “We had spent 11 years as a band together and hadn’t really gotten anywhere so the result was an angst-filled album. This record is a lot about trust and trust issues, and a little more of a personal and emotional record. That said, it’s still Billy Talent. There’s a good balance of simple hard songs and more complex songs, but no 10-minute prog jams.”
While it’s definitely clear the months of constant touring have sharpened their musical chops, one of the stand-out differences is the way Kowalewicz has tempered his screeching lungs of steel to reveal his inner punk rock crooner.
“I sing a lot more than I did on the first album,” he says. “I don’t want to be known as the Scream Guy, so I’ve worked on that. When you’re telling a story you need commas and periods. I think I was more angry on the last record, all around. And on this one, I’m a bit more focused and pick my moments.”
One thing Kowalewicz and the band haven’t changed is their deft lyrical depiction of personal experiences and keen observations. The blistering opener “Devil in a Midnight Mass” shows how Kowalewicz can take an issue and talk about it in a personal way.
“It’s from a story I read about a priest in Boston who had been arrested for child abuse and the church kept moving him from parish to parish,” says Kowalewicz. “The Supreme Court tried and convicted him of molesting 150 kids over a 30 year span and while he was serving his sentence another inmate broke into his cell and murdered him. I stumble upon these stories, they don’t necessarily have to be directly personal but it’s things like this that move me. I’m a big advocate for children’s rights and this song looks at sexual abuse. It’s not against the church or anything, it’s more about that individual betrayal between adult and child. I don’t have the answers but hopefully if I sing about a certain issue it will get people talking about it.”
The album seamlessly weaves such the issue-based songs with more personal tales, from friends falling victim to drug addiction in “Fallen Leaves,” to hipster snobbery in “Where is the Line?” to dealing with people who don’t stand by their convictions in “Covered in Cowardice” – the music sets the scene while the words tell the vivid stories.
“I think this record is more focused for us as writers and people telling stories that are a bit more personal and revealing the side of us that we were more hesitant to reveal on the first record,” says D’Sa.
Musically, the song “This Suffering” melds all the sounds and styles that fans were first introduced to on their first record. “I think it’s a good representation of the band and all the little things we do in our music,” says Gallant.
But while individual songs can be picked out and highlighted, II is not a collection of singles but a single work put together with purpose – which explains the spartan title.
“A lot of times you look at certain songs to get the name of the record, but the problem with that is then you’re saying that is the song – fast-forward to this song,” says Kowalewicz. “For us, the record is an entire album not just a few songs and some filler.”
Like getting to know a good friend better over time, their lyrics and sound are familiar but delve deeper into who Billy Talent is and where they stand. The first 13 years of their career established them as an authentic, honest and direct force of energy and these next 13 songs add to that legacy. Welcome to part II.
BILLY TALENT II
The band's second album was mostly recorded at The Warehouse Studio in Vancouver B.C., again working closely with good friends Gavin Brown and Chris Lord-Alge. This time however Ian D'Sa got a chance to try his hand at producing. The band also recorded cover songs of John Lennon's "Cold Turkey" and the Buzzcocks "Ever Fallen in Love?" during these sessions.
Beginning in the fall of 2005, songs from the new album were purposely leaked by the band to gain publicity. A demo of "Red Flag" circulated across the internet, even though it had already appeared on the soundtracks to Burnout Revenge, Burnout Legends, SSX On Tour and EA Sports' NHL 06, and on the Atlantic Records compilation Black by Popular Demand. "Devil In A Midnight Mass" and "Surrender" were available for download on the official website exclusively on Christmas Day, 2005 and Valentine's Day, 2006, respectively.
"Devil In A Midnight Mass" was the first single for the album, officially released on April 20, 2006. The final version of "Devil In A Midnight Mass" was made available online through the band's Myspace, as part of it's official single release. "Red Flag" was the second single. A video for it was shot on July 21, 2006, in Los Angeles, California.
On June 23, 2006, all of the tracks were officially released onto the band's MySpace as a listing preview for the fans, and four days after the album being leaked onto BitTorrent. The next day, ten of the songs were removed, leaving "This Suffering", "Devil In A Midnight Mass", "Red Flag" and one of the songs from their self-titled album.
The album hit the shelves on June 27, 2006. It fared very well in Canada in its debut week, landing in at number 1 on the Canadian charts with 48,000 copies sold the first week. However the success didn't duplicate itself in the U.S., where the disk came in at #134, selling only 7,231 units in week 1.
The day after it's debut, the band performed a Intimate & Interactive outdoor concert on MuchMusic in the CHUM-City Building parking lot in Toronto, Ontario. They were also interviewed by Much VJ Devon Soltendieck, and asked questions from viewers via telephone, e-mail, and videophone.
The music video for their third single, "Fallen Leaves", was shot on the first two days of November 2006, in Los Angeles, CA. It was first played in Canada on Much on Demand on November 27th, 2006, and worldwide the following week.
The band performed a live session for Mike Davies on BBC Radio 1's The Lockup on September 12th, playing the tracks "Red Flag", "Devil In A Midnight Mass" and "This Suffering".
During the band's most recent UK tour, Ben was forced to return to Canada for family related reasons. The band had to miss their Southampton show in Ben's absence. The whole band returned the following month to play the show. Halfway through the performance, Ben apologised to the crowd for his absence the previous month, which was followed by a heart warming round of applause from the crowd.
On November 22nd, the band made its American premiere on the Late Night with Conan O'Brien show, performing "Red Flag."
On the 12th January 2007 the music video for Fallen Leaves was made available to watch in the UK on the Rock channels Kerrang TV, Scuzz and MTV 2.
On Jaunary 18th, the band started their first Canadian arena tour with the bands Rise Against, Anti-Flag, and Moneen in Victoria, which will go through the provinces of British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Quebec City and ending off Febuary 8 in London,Ontario.
"Devil In A Midnight Mass" was the first single for the album, officially released on April 20, 2006. The final version of "Devil In A Midnight Mass" was made available online through the band's Myspace, as part of it's official single release. "Red Flag" was the second single. A video for it was shot on July 21, 2006, in Los Angeles, California.
On June 23, 2006, all of the tracks were officially released onto the band's MySpace as a listing preview for the fans, and four days after the album being leaked onto BitTorrent. The next day, ten of the songs were removed, leaving "This Suffering", "Devil In A Midnight Mass", "Red Flag" and one of the songs from their self-titled album.
The album hit the shelves on June 27, 2006. It fared very well in Canada in its debut week, landing in at number 1 on the Canadian charts with 48,000 copies sold the first week. However the success didn't duplicate itself in the U.S., where the disk came in at #134, selling only 7,231 units in week 1.
The day after it's debut, the band performed a Intimate & Interactive outdoor concert on MuchMusic in the CHUM-City Building parking lot in Toronto, Ontario. They were also interviewed by Much VJ Devon Soltendieck, and asked questions from viewers via telephone, e-mail, and videophone.
The music video for their third single, "Fallen Leaves", was shot on the first two days of November 2006, in Los Angeles, CA. It was first played in Canada on Much on Demand on November 27th, 2006, and worldwide the following week.
The band performed a live session for Mike Davies on BBC Radio 1's The Lockup on September 12th, playing the tracks "Red Flag", "Devil In A Midnight Mass" and "This Suffering".
During the band's most recent UK tour, Ben was forced to return to Canada for family related reasons. The band had to miss their Southampton show in Ben's absence. The whole band returned the following month to play the show. Halfway through the performance, Ben apologised to the crowd for his absence the previous month, which was followed by a heart warming round of applause from the crowd.
On November 22nd, the band made its American premiere on the Late Night with Conan O'Brien show, performing "Red Flag."
On the 12th January 2007 the music video for Fallen Leaves was made available to watch in the UK on the Rock channels Kerrang TV, Scuzz and MTV 2.
On Jaunary 18th, the band started their first Canadian arena tour with the bands Rise Against, Anti-Flag, and Moneen in Victoria, which will go through the provinces of British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Quebec City and ending off Febuary 8 in London,Ontario.
MAINSTREAM SUCCESS
In 1999, Pezz ran into some legal trouble over their name. A punk band from Memphis, Tennessee used the same name, and indeed had released their first record under that name in 1990 (however, their first full-length was not released until 1995).
At first, the Canadian Pezz's management threatened a lawsuit and demanded $5,000 from BYO Records, the Los Angeles-based record company, at the time, for the American Pezz. In time, the band relented, and soon renamed themselves Billy Talent in 2001. The name was inspired by "Billy Tallent", the name of a guitarist in Hard Core Logo, the novel by Michael Turner and its film adaptation by Bruce McDonald.
As Billy Talent, their sound began to move in a more aggressive, punk rock direction. Their four song EP, Try Honesty, was released in September 2001, and the band became increasingly well-known, and their live shows, noted for their high energy, more frequent.
In 2002, the band quickly attracted considerable interest from major record companies. In the end, the band signed with Atlantic Records and Warner Music Canada. In the fall of 2003, the band released their full-length self-titled album, Billy Talent. The album found considerable mainstream airplay and sales success. "Try Honesty" was a successful first single, and was followed by other singles into late 2003 and 2004.
The band played sold-out shows in Canada and the United States and had success in Europe as well. The band received Juno and MuchMusic Video Award nominations and awards, and spent late 2004 and most of 2005 touring. As of June 2006, Billy Talent the album, has gone 3x Platinum in Canada and will likely achieve mainstream success in the United States as well after playing shows at almost every Warped Tour 2006 festival.
At first, the Canadian Pezz's management threatened a lawsuit and demanded $5,000 from BYO Records, the Los Angeles-based record company, at the time, for the American Pezz. In time, the band relented, and soon renamed themselves Billy Talent in 2001. The name was inspired by "Billy Tallent", the name of a guitarist in Hard Core Logo, the novel by Michael Turner and its film adaptation by Bruce McDonald.
As Billy Talent, their sound began to move in a more aggressive, punk rock direction. Their four song EP, Try Honesty, was released in September 2001, and the band became increasingly well-known, and their live shows, noted for their high energy, more frequent.
In 2002, the band quickly attracted considerable interest from major record companies. In the end, the band signed with Atlantic Records and Warner Music Canada. In the fall of 2003, the band released their full-length self-titled album, Billy Talent. The album found considerable mainstream airplay and sales success. "Try Honesty" was a successful first single, and was followed by other singles into late 2003 and 2004.
The band played sold-out shows in Canada and the United States and had success in Europe as well. The band received Juno and MuchMusic Video Award nominations and awards, and spent late 2004 and most of 2005 touring. As of June 2006, Billy Talent the album, has gone 3x Platinum in Canada and will likely achieve mainstream success in the United States as well after playing shows at almost every Warped Tour 2006 festival.
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