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It Don't Pay Now (To Bet On Us)

from I Fell Into The Fire – Limited Edition Handprinted by Jeni Hankins

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  • Limited Edition Compact Disc Handmade by Jeni Hankins
    Compact Disc (CD) + Digital Album

    Each disc is individually stamped and packaged by Jeni Hankins. Includes a booklet designed by Jeni with all the lyrics from the album plus original artwork and photographs.

    This album includes songs which Jeni Hankins and Alfred John Hickling mainly wrote via correspondence between March 2020 and August 2021 when collaboration in person was impossible due to coronavirus lockdowns in Britain. Jeni lives in Carnforth, Lancashire, and Crystal Palace in Southeast London. Alfred lives in York. They've been writing songs together since 2015 and collaborating on performances since their bands met in 2010.

    Jeni and Alfred recorded most of these songs in the course of 72 hours around a single microphone in Jeni's studio in Carnforth. A few of them were recorded by correspondence where they sent each other ideas and then subsequently recorded their musical responses over each other's initial musical idea. The final song on the album is a special recording from their February 2021 appearance at Bromborough Folk Club on The Wirral. This was their last live show before lockdown and they weren't to perform again for 540 days.

    This album also includes Jeni and Alfred's single mic, single take recording of songs from the Jeni & Billy catalog including Miner's Reward, Tazewell Beauty Queen, and Reckoning Day.

    This album will not be available on streaming or other digital platforms such as Spotify or Alexa until Jeni has sold 100 copies of the album through Bandcamp. This is to protect her right as creator to make an income from her writing and recording. If Jeni sells 110 albums through Bandcamp, she makes $1000 which is what she considers a minimum wage for the time she spent on this work. In order to make $1000 on Spotify, for example, Jeni would need 243,932 streams (single songs played all the way through). At Jeni's average of 463 streams per month, it would take her 43 years to earn the same money on Spotify that she could earn by selling 110 copies of this record. Please consider buying a digital or physical copy (all physical copies come with a digital copy of this record) of this record, so that Jeni can earn a living wage for her work. Once Jeni reaches $1000 in sales or tips (bandcamp gives fans the option of paying more for a record than the retail price), she will offer this record on streaming and other digital services.

    Includes unlimited streaming of I Fell Into The Fire – Limited Edition Handprinted via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
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  • Full Digital Discography

    Get all 26 Jeni Hankins releases available on Bandcamp and save 20%.

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of String Unraveller Demo May 2021, The American Dream (Harlis and Freda), Voice Memo Demo, I'm Letting Go of You – Kitchen Single, The Wondarium: Songs For Kids, A Body is a Delicate House, I Fell Into the Fire, The Loneliest Snowman, I Fell Into The Fire – Limited Edition Handprinted, and 18 more. , and , .

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lyrics

It Don’t Pay Now
(To Bet On Us)

If there’s a mountain,
we’d have to climb it.
If I was sorry
would you take me back?
If there’s a wrong way,
we’re bound to find it –
no moral compass,
no emotional map.

Well I know that’s it’s hard
and I don’t want to say it.
It’s my very last card,
so I gotta to play it

I used to gamble –
a bad example
when every day
would be boom or bust.
I’m outa patience
with speculation,
‘cause it don’t pay now
to bet on us.

If there’s a lake,
we’d have to swim it –
too far out
and in too deep.
We think our hand
will finally win it,
but the dealer’s got
our ace to keep.

Every roller I met thinks
he knows what he’s doing.
Not a single one yet
hasn’t ended in ruin.

If there’s horse,
we’d have to run it
even though it won’t
leave the gate.
If there’s wheel
we’d have to turn it,
spinning right
into our mistake.

Lady luck will call,
but we shouldn’t listen
when we know all along
her hand is well hidden.

credits

from I Fell Into The Fire – Limited Edition Handprinted, released October 15, 2021
Jeni Hankins – Vocals and Rhythm Guitar
Alfred Hickling – Harmony Vocals and Electric Guitar

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Jeni Hankins London, UK

Jeni Hankins grew up in the coalfields of Appalachian in Southwest Virginia among a family of miners, moonshiners, and journalists. Her writing pulls the grit, gumption, and keen sense of observation out of that heritage like drawing water from her grandmother’s well.

In every song, Jeni’s “true sense of place shines through – old as the hills, but brand new at the same time.”
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