Blood & Chocolate

The landlady's husband came up to town today
Since he left them both ten years ago to serve the ministry
The dark down road of his approach in constant rain was drenched
The tenant's boy said "how d'ya do" then swore in french
Did you teach this little child these curses on my soul
You should both be shut down in the coal-hole
That's the way to treat a child who cries out in the night
And a woman who teaches wrong from right

Chorus: he's a battered old bird
And he's living up there
There's a place where time stands still
If you keep taking those little pink pills

"hush your mouth you hypocrite"
His humour cut her deep
The tight lipped leer of judgement
That had seen her love desert her just like sleep
"filthy words on children's lips are better, my dear spouse
Then if i were to speak my mind about this house"

Chorus

On the first floor there are two old maids
Each one wishing that the other was afraid
And next door to them is a man so mild
'til he chopped off the head of a visitor's child
He danced upon the bonfire
Swallowed sleeping pills like dreams
With a bottle of sweet sherry that everything redeems

Chorus

And on the second floor is the macintosh man
He's in his overcoats more than out of them
And the typewriter's rattling all through the night
He's burgundy for breakfast tight
He says "one day i'll throw away all of my cares
And it is always christmas in a cupboard at the top of the stairs"

Chorus

"well here's a boy if ever there was
Who's going to do big things
That's what they all say and that's how the trouble begins
I've seen them rise and fall
Been through their big deals and smalls
He'd better have a dream that goes beyond four walls"
You think he should be sent outside playing with the traffic
When pieces of him are already scattered in the attic

Now it's just you and me, my blue friend
And you say that it's you that she's thinking of
And our affair must end
But if it's you that she's thinking of
I think my broken heart might mend

Chorus: now it's my turn to talk and your turn to think
Your turn to buy and my turn to drink
Your turn to cry and my turn to sink down in the blue chair
Down in the blue chair

Now i've made up my mind i've made my mistake
And i know that she cries for you
When she's barely awake
Well she's going to bend your mind
Well i hope it don't break

Chorus

Down in the blue chair
We can watch our troubles rise
Like smoke into the air
And drift up to the ceiling
Down in the blue chair
You can feel just like a boy or a man
And next minute you can find yourself kneeling
Down in the blue chair
They're boasting of loving the daylights right out of her in the small hours
Down in the blue chair
You say that your love lasts forever when you know the night just hours

And still i want her right now
Not any minute, hour or day
And wherever she is tonight
I want her anyway
I suppose she never said to you,
You were just in the way

Chorus

Down in the blue chair
Down in the blue
Blue becomes you
Down in the blue chair

Big nothing.

He stood in the road outside of town with a broken clockwork toy in
His hand: a graveyard for childish dreams in his palm; a broken lifeline.

Big nothing.

The mechanical amusement sputtered in his fist. as he clenched, it
Whirred and died again. it was a cowboy who drew his gun, but the
Pistol was welded to the holster by age and careless children, so it
Struggled and strained and it unwound his own spring.

Big nothing.

He didn't need tattoos to show where he had been and who he had loved. it
Was the same thing that men had cried for; that women had dyed their hair
For. the cellophane illusion of a starry sky stretched over an open sore.

Big nothing.

He thought about his lost daughter: the way her eyes would alight at the
Greedy circus barker's blackmail song; how he wanted to smash her skull
When she parroted back, 'tell mommy; tell poppy; you need this little
Dolly.'

Big nothing. (x2)

The smoky voice of the petaled girl woke him long enough. there was too
Much light in the room, so he unscrewed the bulb. she took him to bed like
An adopted dog.

Big nothing.

She lit sickly incense, as he tried to tell if the resemblance was pure
And coincidental. he unleashed his grip on the toy, all it meant to him,
And it wound down forever.

Big nothing.

He woke up in a sweat. the next day, with her smile still painted on his
Mouth, he walked out of a town called big nothing.

Big nothing. (repeat until fade)

I can't lie on this bed anymore it burns my skin
You can take the truthful things you've said to me
And put them on the head of a pin

Poor napoleon

You always look so disappointed when i take my stockings off
Don't you know the facts of life, boy
Don't you know what these things cost
She was selling stolen kisses to travelling salesmen and minstrel singers
You put a penny in the slot
She called you her magic fingers

Poor napoleon

I bet she isn't all that's advertised
I bet that isn't all she fakes
Just like that place where they take your spine
And turn it into soapflakes

So good night little school boy, you'd better learn some self control
Did you mess up your hairstyle, pour scorn in your begging bowl

Bare wires from the socket to the bed where you embraced that girl
Did you ever think there's far too many people in the world?
One day they'll probably make a movie out of all of this
There won't even have to be a murder just a slow dissolving kiss

(written by elvis costello, transcribed by craig ciccone w/ bolan's corrections)

Oh, a tv went off like three day old milk
That shook this town down better than most
And it always was less of idea and more of a boast
Oh, you're burning in the bloom of life
'til you're powder in the grave
Or you're pounding in the counter beggin' for more
'til you evaporate


You'd forgive her anything
If you look like you, my pretty miss
I wonder where you are tonight
And this place becomes pityless


Oh, i couldn't sleep, but i can't complain
Oh, this won't hurt a bit, oh, this won't hurt again
When the roof comes down and the walls move in
Oh, he didn't know it could feel like that
And your face turned away and the day turned black
And the rain fell like a curtain
Oh, it's my turn to begin
To forgive her anything


You'd forgive her anything
If you knew what i know
You'd forgive her anything
So where did all my pride go?


Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh
Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh


Oh, oh, oh, oh, you'd forgive her anything
If you knew what i know
You'd forgive her anything
So where did all my pride go?

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven.
Monday's calling you too early when you're sound asleep
Bells are ringing by your bedside and out in the street
Usually monday's long enough, but this is just the start
Tuesday's just the same as monday without the surprising part

Wednesday's point of no return
When you've squandered all you've earned
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, seven day weekend. (x2)

This is all i'm thinking about as the days go by
Spend your life on holiday and even when i die
There could be but one inscription: "this was not his day"
If it isn't thursday anymore, it must be friday

I can't wait until i maybe
Get off work and see my baby
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, seven day weekend. (x2)
I can't wait until i maybe
Get off work and see my baby
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, seven day weekend. (x8)

December 1965 in caracas
When arnie laflem took a piece of the pie
When he packed up the casino chips, the iou and the abacus
And switched off the jukebox in a "a fool such as i"

He was a leg man who was open to offers
But he couldn't get her off his mind as he passed the tourist office
And as he entertained himself singing just like sammy davis junior
He toyed with her trip to miami

For money like that
He could have sweet talk in her ear
Now they don't speak any english
Just american without tears

It was an idea that he dangled on his knee
And nursed it like his coffee cup
When he couldn't find any other way
It always seemed to come to him
While the day was dipping down
And sun was like a lightbulb
Being swallowed by a clown

He took her for everything
He took her for his only one
He took her out of coventry and over to idaho
But the war wound that he carried home
Wasn't really visable
When bullets were forgotton
She lived dowdry, down, and miserable

And she seemed to be crying for year after year
And says, "you don't speak any english
Just american between tears."

"honey" she said to me "will you turn down the radio.
You haven't slept a wink since we came to havana
When you're gonna get the strength to go over to florida
All you ever listen to is 'the voice of america'."

It was the story of a young english puppet
Who took up with a soldier boy
And thought she would profit.
Just like me she found out what true love is about
Anyway she's in new orleans it would never work out

Oh she seemed to be crying for year after year
Now you don't speak any english
Just american between tears.
Just american without tears.

For you seem to be crying year after year
Now you don't speak any english
Just american without tears.
Just american without tears.

The sky fell over cheap korean monster-movie scenery
And spilled into the reservoir of the crushed capsule hotel
Between the disney abattoir and the chemical refinery
And i knew i was in trouble but i thought i was in hell

So you look around the tiny room and you wonder where the hell you are
While the k.k.k. convention are all stranded in the bar
They wear hoods and carry shotguns in the main streets of montgomery
But they're helpless here as babies 'cause they're only here on holiday

Chorus: what do we care if the world is a joke
(tokyo storm warning)
We'll give it a big kiss
We'll give it a poke
(tokyo storm warning)
Death wears a big hat 'cause he's a big bloke
(tokyo storm warning)
We're only living this instant

The black sand stuck beneath her feet in a warm sorrento sunrise
A barefoot girl from naples or was it a barcelona hi-rise
Whistles out the tuneless theme song on a hundred cheap suggestions
And a million false seductions and all those eternal questions

Chorus

So they flew the super-constellation all the way from rimini
And feasted them on fish and chips from a newspaper facsimile
Now dead italian tourists bodies litter up the broadway
Some people can't be told you know they have to learn the hard way

Holidays are dirt-cheap in the costa del malvinas
In the hotel argentina they can hardly tell between us
For teresa is a waitress though she's now known as juanita
In a tango bar in stanley or in puerto margarita
She's the sweetest and the sauciest
The loveliest and the naughtiest
She's miss buenos aires in a world of lacy lingerie

Chorus

Japanese god-jesus robots telling teenage fortunes
For all we know and all we care they might as well be martians
They say gold paint on the palace gates comes from the teeth of pensioners
They're so tired of shooting protest singers
That they hardly mention us
While fountains fill with second-hand perfume
And sodden trading stamps
They'll hang the bullies and the louts that dampen down the day

Chorus

We braved the cold november air and the undertaker's curses
Saying "take me to the folies bergere and please don't spare the hearses"
For he always had a dream of that revolver in your purse
How you loved him 'til you hated him and made him cry for mercy
He said "don't ever mention my name there or talk of all the nights you cried
We've always been like worlds apart now you're seeing two nightmares collide"

Chorus