Flat Chat

The rich get richer, the poor get the picture
The bombs never hit you when you're down so low
Some got pollution, some revolution
There must be some solution but I just don't know
The bosses want decisions, the workers need ambitions
There won't be no collisions when they move so slow
Nothing ever happens, nothing really matters
No one ever tells me so what am I to know

You wouldn't read about it, read about it
Just another incredible scene, there's no doubt about it

Hammer and the sickle, the news is at a trickle
The commissars are fickle but the stockpile grows
Bombers keep acoming, engines softly humming
The stars and stripes are running for their own big show
Another little flare up, storm brewed in a tea cup
Imagine any mix up and the lot would go
Nothing ever happens

You wouldn't read about it, read about it
One unjust ridiculous steal, ain't no doubt about it
You wouldn't read about it, read about it
Just another particular deal, there's no doubt about it

Oh get down, getting down, so much money in the ground
For the people who don't deserve it now
It's a circus we're the clowns as the giant ones disown
Every bit of something we call home

Said it's a pity 'bout the middle class Holden mass
We get a bit to play around with doesn't really matter
They kid us with their dole, kid us with the dope
But generally speaking, nobody's got a hope

We're playing the music of the middle-aged queens
Getting fatter and fatter and splitting their jeans
It's all the same, we're out in the cold
The good ones died, the others just got old
Everything's set, everything's fine
You just got to stand in line
Oh everything's set, everything's fine
You just got to stand in line

Getting down, getting down, we have to make it now
Everybody's beaten, everybody's down, oh everybody's down
So goodbye to the creeps who are making it
Goodbye to the let it happen stand
I'm moving out got no doubt they've forgettn twist 'n' shout
They never ever listen to the man

(Moginie/Hirst/Rotsey/Garrett)

You say times are tough
We've got the best of both worlds here
Things are rough
We've got the best of both worlds here
Times are tough
We've got the best of both worlds

The real world is not as calm as it appears to be from here
The old world is not as safe with the new world closing in
The great south land can be as great as the one it could have been
The one it could have been

The real world is not as calm as it appears to be from here
The small world is not as strong and the testing ground is near
The old world is not as strong as the one we could have seen
The great south land can be as great as the one it could have been
The one it could have been

We've got the best of both worlds

The raising of children, the rearing of young
Used to be simple but look what it's become
The choice of career, the proper vocation
Out of your hands, all for the needs of the nation

No inhibitions with the modern child
Wasted lessons or pleasure or pain
Easy to follow your natural instinct
Easy to follow, much too hard to learn

Useless expressions and sporting aggression
Don't waste my time, I can't wait for the end of the session
What opportunity, the modern child?
Waste passion and wasted mind

Some kids got no time for playtime
Some kids got no time for games
Some kids got no time for playtime
Some kids got no time for games

Don't want to live in a prison cell
Don't want to live in a smoking room
Independence just won't come to you
In the brief of a diplomat

Say your prayers for the future
Say your prayers for the past
It might be round the corner
It might be all we have
Say your prayers

Don't want to live with a compromise
Don't want to live with hypocrisy
Bureaucracy doesn't have to win
Breaks the cage of the beast within

Say your prayers in the boardroom
Say your prayers on the stairs
It might be catastrophic
It might be too damn bad
Say your prayers

I got the cure for compassion fatigue
Spend a week with the Timorese
Running scared from the military
You can share you can share your disease

Now we don't live with an absent master
We don't live on an island divided
Don't want my kids to grow up in shame
In a country with a different name
Had to throw them out, had to break the chains

I got the cure for compassion fatigue
Spend a week with the Timorese
Running scared from the military
I come to you with a plaintive plea

I believe we're crossing the great ravine
Still yearning half way a stranger
I believe in our multiplicty
Still part-blind no reason for anger
I believe we pull up our roots and retreat
A new crop of aerials in Dacca and Canberra

Why don't you tell me the truth about you

Vaseline, you smeared it across every scene
Anchor-man drowns in a sea of sensation
Tyranny, crushing the young bird's seed
Hallowe'en's mate, short fuse of the banker

We're all spores but we're never eunuchs
Love's on the loose deflect the short tunic
And the cameras ruse
There's no judgement in ignorance I say

Some people tell me stories, wasting all my time
Some trying not receiving someone else's lies
It's my time, yes it's my time

(Moginie/Garrett)

The God forsaken rifleman stands rigid at the bar
The kids discover victims in the rubble and the tar
They're married to ambition to the slogans of the war
Slogans that used to be scrawled on the wall
Are written in the heart

A woman bows to Mecca and she struggles to her feet
It's better since the president took shooting off the street
She pictures all the poverty the cursed Holy War
The pictures that used to be scrawled on the wall
Are written in the heart

The elders make a promise and they forge it in the fire
The general's car is sabotaged, four bullets in the tire
With the burning of the words there goes the scorching of the earth
The words that used to be scrawled on the wall
Are written in the heart

When they march
When they march over fields of green
When they march
When they march over fields of green
When they march
When they march over fields of green

walking in the wilderness
No future to the question
You might get a simple answer
Get a simple answer

walking in the wilderness
You're naked now just skin and sand
You'll get a smile answer
Get a smile answer

see the king see the king of happiness
See the king
See the king of happiness in the light
In the light you can see him crawl
See the king
See the king of happiness

walking in the wilderness
No future to the question
You might get a simple answer
Get a simple answer

walking in the wilderness the endless distance
You don't need to get a smile answer
Get a smile answer

past the point of no return
Your like a dog without a bone
So get a simple answer
Get a simple answer