1. |
Truant
04:41
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Steal the moment when it’s aching on the bough
Don’t hesitate: it’s time for taking right now
Peel the skin; savour of the flesh within
Why let it go by?
Band of angels marching right across your view
Don’t tremble: they’re coming for to carry you
Home once more; they’ll lay you down beneath the door
Why let it go by?
Call the fathers: say you’re leaving them behind
Don’t worry: they cannot get you this time
Don’t think twice: it’s never gonna be this right
Why let it go by?
See your dharma, see it floating on the lake
I’ve got a fast boat: we could be there before they wake
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2. |
Golden Stairs
03:52
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Let me tie your shoes to stop you falling down
Let me wipe your face of all that chocolate brown
Tonight we climb the golden stairs
It’s alright if you want it
It’s alright ‘cos it’s been there all the time
Too long in the orchestra, you’re Orpheus with a tin ear
Tonight we meet the mountain, not the mountaineer
Tonight we climb the golden stairs
It’s alright if you want it
It’s alright ‘cos it’s been there all the time
Sugar, sugar pie, we gonna go to the shore
Kneel down and suck and swallow
This time the whales in the belly of the boy
And all of the fishes follow
All the little fishes follow
Let me tie your shoes to stop you falling down
Let me wipe your face of all that chocolate brown
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3. |
1979
09:52
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Don’t drink the Kool Aid just because your lips are dry
Don’t send your whole town to sleep just because you’re tired of being tired
Don’t shoot your congessman dead in the head like it’s 1979
Don’t try to borrow against your tommorrows,‘cos what if the debt’s still not paid?
Don’t drink the Kool Aid
Don’t go to Jonestown, even if the rents are low
Don’t let your good buddies down (’cos you know that they know that you know)
Don’t leave your mind behind, don’t resign, it’s not yet 1979
Don’t leave your disco in San Francisco: don’t drop your tambourine on the ground
Don’t go to Jonestown
I will await your news: you will be coming home on your Carribean cruise
Paper ribbons in your hair, you will be there, selling buttons at the Castro Street fair
Don’t talk to Jimmy: he’s a mad cunt and everybody knows
I want to see you shimmy again once more before the whole scene blows
Let’s be pagans, vote for Reagan; things could be fine in 1979
Don’t be frightened: I’ll make you enlightened (just have a couple of cones)
Don’t talk to Jim Jones
I will await your news: you will be coming home on your Carribean cruise
Paper ribbons in your hair, you will be there, selling buttons at the Castro Street fair
Don’t drink the Kool Aid just because your lips are dry
Don’t try to swallow all your tomorrows: you’re wasting your yesterdays
Don’t drink the Kool Aid
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4. |
Fitzrovia
12:22
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I make it back to Fitzroy with an inch worn off of my shoes
And got one joint left shoved there in my Winfield Blues
I keep me love letters in the lining of my suit
(Hoping to find me a stooge, so I can put them to use)
Nobody bothers me for a light or even a “beg your pardon”
I guess I’ll walk that lonely mile down to the Garden
The Napier, the Rainbow, the Labour In Vain
The long last rattle of the Collingwood train
Last drinks with Johnny Cash at the Rob Roy where he smashes my glasses
I cross six lanes to Lover’s Lane, full of toothaches aching for Charles Foster Kane
And lumberjacks wanting to carve their names in all of our arses
Scenemakers dressed in their Saturday best, with their lowriders round their ankles
With a smile, some popper queen reaches round for his silver bangles
But it’s funny how easily passion dissolves in a 3am bucket of rain
All the damp fringes and the sticky fingers go fluttering back to whence they came
I’m stuck between a hard-on and a headache in the mists by the oramental lake
When my Hiawatha calls from the opposite shore
The buckskin dazzles me as I reach for the door
I wake up at Cherry Bar with a feather between my front teeth
I crawl into the bass bin for some sonic relief
The boss comes later, with his chief roogalator, his popgun upside of my head
He says: “Didn’t I see your name. boy, in The West Preston Book Of The Dead?”
Nobody notices as I steal my way down to Pony
But I slip, and I bust my lip on the doors of Baba O’Reilly’s
The stagnight bores come crashing through the doors of Bridie’s, and into the arms
Of the Thin White Dukes in their miniature suits
When the little horse has lost its charms
I’m stuck between a fistfight and a handshake
And a groom shoved facedown in next week’s wedding cake
When some Cockney clown knoxks me to the ground,
And the blood flows down on my bridal gown
I wake up in my backpacker’s arms in the dunny of the All Nation’s Hotel
Someone’s banging both doors: I guess they’re just trying to wish us well
When the honeymoon’s finished, I pinch his Guiness
And steal my way out to the bar
Stepping over West End girls who’ve gone one Champagne and Soda too far
Out on King Street, in stockinged feet, with their high heeled shoes in their hands
The hen’s night ladies stomp to the Casino
After footy stars, in their tight polyester pants
I will not follow, ‘cos there’s nothing there to be found
Five queens may line up in a row and give me their gold, but never their crowns
I’m caught between Flinders and Franklin; I’m trapped between Spencer and Spring
When the man in the news stand opens his shutters
And stutters the news of the death of the king
I wake up in the pastures of Parkville, bedded down on The Saturday Age
All around, I hear the sound of TVs shutting down ‘cos there’s nothing left on Rage
A ruck-rover from Newman Hall bends over my body (he’s all of seven feet tall)
He says: “Piss off, cunt, or we’ve got nowhere left to bounce the fuckin’ ball!”
Thirty-six cheers sting my ears as I make my way out of the Garden
Yea, though I walk through the valley of death, it’s only the streets of North Carlton
Give me, this Sunday, my daily bread
Or, at least, some chums and a bottle of red
Won’t someone in this city offer me pity
And show me the way to go back to my bed?
I’m trapped between a funeral and a fun run
Somewhere just south of somewhere else
When the Dan appears, with my breakfast of beers
And I sing to the ringing of the St Mark’s bells
I make it back to Fitzroy with another inch worn off of my shoes
I can’t find my joint and I can’t find my Winfield Blues
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5. |
Shame
02:11
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You left your records in the rain: how could you do that? Shame!
You plant your crops; you pray for rain, but see what you did when it came? Shame!
Please don’t drag me back into your plan
You blew the fuses in my mind and then you tried sneaking behind. Shame!
You blew your money on a horse when I knew the course. Shame!
You keep your geisha in a bar, so he won’t stray far. Shame!
Please don’t ak me why I just can’t cry
You make your bed, you lay in mine. Well, sugar, not this time. Shame!
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6. |
The Prince Of My Tribe
09:15
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I hear that you’ve got a dump out on the highway
Someone said something about ‘growing you own’
Jill saw you at a show, but you slipped out sideways
She could tell, by the beard, that you wre living alone
I know that I lost you when I had to get on with my life
Now, I’m not so sure that it was worth all the tears
I’m still trying to break my own heart
Trying to slice it right out with my knife
But each cut releases a ghost from the back of my years
Do you remember that house we had, down in St Kilda
Where the boys used to blow in just like the breeze?
You had Tom the piper’s son, and I had Bob the builder
(How we laughed at the way that he’d dance without bending his knees!)
That was the time when I should not have had the next drink
(I’m still choking on that last sip of my wine)
You said: “ Get rid of Bob, and I’ll get rid of Tom
And we’ll run right down to the sea”
But I was too wasted to bother untangling the line
When the afternoon’s ageing, as afternoons are itching to do
I grab my Washburn, my drugs and my bottle of wine
I sit down and wait for the magic hour
When the ghosts come marching through
(Maybe some of them faces will come close to mine)
I pick out the chords of After The Gold Rush
And the (C, F, G, A minor) Sweet Jane
And if you can hear me and forget about that old, old stuff
We can dance that time back over again
Jimmy is still kept hostage by his voices
And Billy’s found his castle right down in the sand
No prizes for guessing that Annie’s still making bad choices
And John’s still trapped in the backline of that shit seventies band
And what about you? Do you ever think of the times?
Do you ever ache to be back by my side?
I will keep sending out these indiscriminate rhymes
I’ll put on my ghost shirt, and dance up the prince of ny tribe
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7. |
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I chased you like you stole something, on Rucker’s Hill, tonight
On the left, the sunset over the city, and the pretty mountains on the right
When you hit the top, you stopped, and dropped my heart right on the ground
I said: “I don’t want it back! I cannot stand to hear it pound!”
You drag me into Eastment Street, where the Pink Palace used to stand
You back me up against a wall, for to teach me how to dance
One step, two step, turn around, and then you drop your pants
(Man, I don’t think that’s dancing the way Arthur Murray understands!)
You, you own my heart tonight
Me, I only dream my dream that we, we own the streets tonight
But only the way that the kitten owns the cream
From Darling Street to Separation, it’s only a quarter mile
But it takes you half an hour if you’re doing it in style
(If you’re roaming in the gloaming, combing the bindies right out of your hair
From Plimsoll Park flirtations, where the neighbours come to stare)
I take you down the Boulevard to where the bellbirds make their chimes
Throwing rocks into the river, like I’ve done a hundred times
With every splash on your eyelashes, like dew upon the vine
I’m doubling up my dreams, turning my nickels into dimes
You, you own my heart tonight
Me, I only dream my dream that we, we own the streets tonight
But only the way that the kitten owns the cream
In Kew, we’re burning hedges, just to make a little light
The red blast on our faces makes a Shepherd’s Delight
Please, Mr Policeman, don’t tie anvils to our kite!
We promise we’ll be gone before the morning light
It’s a long, long way to Balwyn, but it’s calling me to come
All those guitars, unstolen, are just waiting for my strum
The songs I sang to make a bang back in 1981:
I’ll change the names to your name if you promise me you’ll come
You, you own my heart tonight
Me, I only dream my dream that we, we own the streets tonight
But only the way that the kitten owns the cream
A thousand years from now, what will they find?
Two names scratched in concrete
And an empty bottle of wine!
I dreamed I saw St Augustine (he was nibbling on your ear)
If I could have you summer, he’s got the whole rest of the year
But if it’s half past December, and I still find that fucker here
I guess I’ll just wake up, and I will draw you near
You, you own my heart tonight
Me, I only dream my dream that we, we own the streets tonight
From where I’m sitting, it seems oddly fitting
That it’s only the way that the kitten owns the cream
It’s only the way that the kitten owns the cream
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