1. THE CURTAIN PULLS BACK

(Instrumental)


2. THE CRIMSON RIDER (GALLOWS FRONTIER, ACT I)

Death! And no escape.
See, the Crimson Rider - alone in the silver screen expanse.
A teeming bedlam of dust and thunder follows in his wake.
With all the resolve of hell burning in his eyes, the bastard hero traverses the plains.
Saddled with avarice and cruelty he rides - the key to a nation fixed to his belt.

A hero? A man. A mouthful of blood.
Perennial, a loaded gun.

A law of the land cares not for lawless men.
A skyline of gravestones stands tall come the dawn

The frontier eternal, beholden to none.
The rider who would deal death, has drafted his own.

The sun drawing nearer, The rider pushed on.
In a fervor of gold, the outlaw becomes a God.

See our hero, realize too late:
He was blind to the gallows, yet tied his own rope.
As the platform falls from his feet, His last breath proclaims:
I am iron, I am death. I am the setting sun. I am the West.

They’ll sing his song - of an era gone

Hero hero, to which sunset will you ride?
When the bleeding clouds leave no horizon?
The gallows, no road back?


3. THE IRON HORSE (GALLOWS FRONTIER, ACT II)

Lo, and behold...
The reaper doth approach.

The iron-clad stallion - its pallid complexion concealed.
Forward on, steel legs run.
A new lord lays claim to the land.

From bastard god, to steam powered daemon.
The apostles follow in the cavalcade.
Reavers and raiders, hunters and harbingers
A path is struck - extinction begins

The iron-born hellion - its burning eyes survey the killing fields.
Permanence, and negation.
The veins of the Republic expand.

The company revels in their champion
On his back, the west will be won
An inferno, fed of enslavement and starvation
There is always more coal for the flames.

Silence becomes the nations that stood in the path.
The gallows engulf the settlements that follow its wrath.

The forgotten hands that struck down the ties are swallowed by the frontier.
Joining the peoples, pushed deep below
The new nation will learn the fear.

Violence begets fear and tragedy.
As the Iron horse sow, so shall it’s riders reap.

As iron goes
So pile the skulls
the Gallow frontier,
Will never forget


4. FIRE AND GOLD

The engine grinds its song,
One lonesome drone
The arrow of slumber drawn -
He’ll sink below

One man alone
Is it a dream?
Dreams bought and sold

Now he’s out there, on his own
A man on fortune’s road
The plains are his alone
The hills erupt with gold

There is a flame,
It’s whispering his name.

One land below
Is it a dream?
Fire and gold.

He finds himself in a dance
A burning romance.
As the blaze swallows his hopes,
He’ll sink below.


5. MASUERADE OF THE GUNSLINGERS

Decadent, nearly divine.
Their shadows dance like velvet moonlight.

In the mezzanine above they applaud
Transfixed by the dancers, silently awed
The sterling attraction - the ballet of the gun
Murder in cold blood, as art in motion

Masquerade! they rise and they fall.
A pirouette, in the cadence of song

One mask falls down, another appears.

It's not what they see.
It is what they believe
It is there, at the crux of their judgement,
That the fantasy becomes the desire

The tragic poem ends as it begun.
And the men in the masks in death will live on

Awash in gold and velvet, with wandering eyes
You feel it burning within you, you're paralyzed
Please take my hand, and step into the night

The great dionysian facade
Is held upon our backs

The callous belief in blood elegant
Perpetuating from fathers to sons.
Spiraling down the grand halls of the dream.


6. INTERMISSION

(Instrumental)


7. VAUDEVILLE

I’ve seen me that traveling band, for that love they bled
I’ve seen me that rider, of crimson and lead

I’ve seen that iron horse, rolling the plains
Seen a man cross in it’s way, and never again.

Behold the great picture show, the immortal dance
Our heroes are all killers - and it’s gold they romance

I’ll be that masked man a glory to see.
I’ll kill me a hundred men, so you’ll remember me

All parts have been played on the stage,
The raucous, faux-elegant wake
The gunfighters dancing in circles
Seduced by the fear they create

Chaos in black and white!
Cheers erupt as another man falls
In each young man’s eye, a fire is lit
He too could be the most savage of all

I wait for the show to come back
Holding out, to see that magic once again
I wait, while the water comes down
Will I ever see the end?

I see them, nights - in my dreams.
The riders of crimson and lead.
They turn their rifles on me -
Please sing my song when I’m dead.

Where is the dream?
Where is the world that was promised?
Where is romance?
When did it give way to rape?

Who wears the masks?
Who do the gunslingers ride for?
Where is the dream?
Bleeding, discarded, thrown from the tracks.

Where is the dream??