unknown

My baby left me, my mule got lame,
Lost all my money in a poker game.
Wind storm came one summer's day,
Carried the house and lift it away.

Having so much trouble
Having so much trouble.

I'm having so much trouble.
It's finally driving me insane.

Carry me to jail my pyjamas on,
I even hate that i was born.
Let me out of jail, come through town.
Couldn't find my wife, she had put me down.

Having so much trouble,
Having so much trouble.

I'm having so much trouble:
It's finally driving me insane.
I pawned my watch and i pawned my chain,
I would have pawned myself but i was ashamed.
Got me a job on the city pay
Early one morning layed me off that day.

I'm having so much trouble,
I'm having so much trouble,
I'm having so much trouble,
Bought to drive me insane.
I'm having so much trouble:
It's finally driving me insane.
Trouble!

There were three men, came out of the west,
Their fortunes for to try
And these three men made a solemn vow:
John barleycorn must die!
Well, they've ploughed, they've sown, the've harrowed him in.
Threw clouds upon his head.
Till these three men were satisfied.
John barleycorn was dead.
They've let him lie for a long long time,
Till the rains from heaven did fall.

And little sir john sprang up his head
And so amazed them all.
They let him fly till the midsummer's day,
Till he looked both pale and wan, oh,
Then little sir john has grown a long long beard
And so became a man.

They have hired men with the scythes so sharp.
To cut him off at the knee,
They rolled and they tied him around the waist,
Serving him most him barbarously.
They hired men with the sharp pitchforks
To prick him to the heart.
And the loader he has served him worse than that,
For he's bound him to the cart.

Well, they've wheeled him 'round and 'round the field,
Till they came onto a barn.
And there they made their solemn oath,
Concerning a barleycorn.
They hired men with the crab tree sticks
To split him skin from bone, yeah,
But the miller he has served him worst and bad
For he ground him between two stones.

Well there's beer all in the barrel
And brandy in the glass,
But little old sir john with his nut-brown bowl
Proved the strongest man at last.
John barleycorn, throw him up, throw him up!

Now the huntsman, he can't hunt the fox,
Nor loudly blow his horn
And the tinker he can't mend his pots
Without john barleycorn,
John barleycorn, john barleycorn,
Barleycorn, barleycorn
John barleycorn, john barleycorn.

I work in dark factories --- a cog in the big wheel
Driving grey satanic mills and weaving sad stories.
And faceless masters --- oh, they pay me plenty ---
Crumbs from their luncheon packs, harsh wine from
Bottles halk empty.

A stitch in time saves nine.
Said cock robin from the wall.
It's an early bird catches the worm.
Show a little pride before you fall.
So i flew to the south sun with birds of a feather
To drink in the warm nights and tell of fine weather.
A stitch in time saves nine.

Listen all you young folk --- your lives on a timetable
Clocking on twenty-one --- fly while you're able.
A stitch in time saves nine.

What would you like for christmas ---
A new polarity?
You're binary, and desperate to deal
In high figures
That lick us with their hotter flame ---
Lick each and everyone the same.
And march, the mad scientist,
Rings a new change
In ever-dancing colours.

He rings it here and he rings it...
But no one stops to see
The change of fate and the fate of change
That slips into his pocket ---
So he locks it all away from view
And shares not what he thought you knew.
And april is summer-bound,
And february's blue.
And no one stops to see the colours.

Through long december nights we talk in words of rain or snow
While you, through chattering teeth, reply and curse us as you go.
Why not spare a thought this day for those who have no flame
To warm their bones at christmas time?
Say jack frost and the hooded crow.

Now as the last broad oak leaf falls, we beg: consider this ---
There's some who have no coin to save for turkey, wine or gifts.
No children's laughter round the fire, no family left to know.
So lend a warm and a helping hand ---
Say jack frost and the hooded crow.

As holly pricks and ivy clings,
Your fate is none too clear.
The lord may find you wanting, let your good fortune disappear.
All homely comforts blown away and all that's left to show
Is to share your joy at christmas time
With jack frost and the hooded crow.

Cold aeroplanes, slow boats, warm trains
Remind me of jack-a-lynn.
Lush hotels and pretty girls
Won't cheer the misty mood i'm in.
Silly, sad --- i've never had to write this before ---
Oh, jack-a-lynn.

Funny how long nights allow
Thoughts of jack-a-lynn.
When phantoms tread around my bed
To offer restless dreams they bring.
And it's just the time and place to find
A sad song to play
For jack-a-lynn.

Magpies that shriek, old boots that leak
Call me to jack-a-lynn.
Coal-black cats in policeman's hats
Nosing where the mice have been.
And the long miaow's beginning now
And i'm far, far from home ---
And jack-a-lynn.

Walking on air, shoulder and head above you.
Down in the street, black canyons walking through.
Hooded sad eyes, fixed on your shuffle shoes.
Life is a clue in your crossword.

Typewriter turk. telephone terror takes time to wind down.
Push-button finger shakes.
City of dreams. back to your quiet nightmare.
Your life is a clue in the crossword.

Working to rule in your own time.
Drag yourself home to your star sign page.
Staying awake on cold yesterday's steak and warm beer.

Ladder of string --- climbing to sweet success.
Homework aside. your brain on the train to test.
Pick up the news (you left on the seat beside you).
Your life is a clue in the crossword.

Have you ever stood in the april wood
And called the new year in?
While the phantoms of three thousand years fly
As the dead leaves spin?
There's a snap in the grass behind your feet
And a tap upon your shoulder.
And the thin wind crawls along your neck ---
It's just the old gods getting older.
And the kestral drops like a fall of shot and
The red cloud hanging high ---
Come --- a beltane.

Have you ever loved a lover of the old elastic truth?
And doted on the daughter in the ministry of youth?
Thrust your head between the breasts of the fertile innocent.
And taken up the cause of love, for the sake of argument.
Or while the kisses drop like a fall of shot
From soft lips in the rain ---
Come --- a beltane.

Happy old new year to you and yours.
The sun's up for one more day, to be sure.
Play it out gladly, for your card's marked again.

Have you walked around your parks and towns so knife-edged orderly?
While the fires are burned on the hills upturned
In far-off wild country.
And felt the chill on your window sill
As the green man comes around.
With his walking cane of sweet hazel --- brings it crashing down.
Sends your knuckles white as the thin stick bites.
Well, it's just your groaning pains.
Come --- a beltane.

I once met a girl with the life in her hands
And we lay together on the summerday sands.
I gave her my raincoat and told her, ``lady, be good!''
And we made truth together, where no one else would.

I smiled through her fingers and ran the dust through her hands ---
The hour-glass of reason on the summerday sands.

We sat as the sea caught fire.
Waited as the flames grew higher
In her eyes.
We watched the eagle born ---
Wings clipped, tail feathers shorn
But we saw him rise ---
Over summerday sands.

Came the ten o'clock curfew.
She said, ``i must start my car.
I'm staying with someone i met last night in a bar.''
I called from my wave top ---
``at least tell me your name!''
She smiled from her wheelspin
And said, ``it's all the same.''
I thought for a minute, jumped back on dry land ---
Left one set of footprints on the summerday sands.

I once met a girl with the life in her hands
And we lied together on the summerday sands.

There was a warm wind with the high tide
On the south of the hill.
When a young girl went a-walking
And i followed with a will.
``good day to you, my fine young lady
With your lips so sweetly full.
May i help you comb your long hair ---
Sweep it from that brow so cool?''

Up, ride with the kelpie.
I'll steal your soul to the deep.
If you don't ride with me while the devil's free
I'll ride with somebody else.

Well i'm a man when i'm feeling
The urge to step ashore.
So i may charm you --- not alarm you.
Tell you all fine things, and more.
Up, ride with the kelpie.
I'll steal your soul to the deep.
If you don't ride with me while the devil's free
I'll ride with somebody else.

Say goodbye to all your dear kin ---
For they hate to see you go
In your young prime, to this place of mine
In the still loch far below.
Up, ride with the kelpie.
I'll steal your soul to the deep.
If you don't ride with me while the devil's free
I'll ride with somebody else.

Too many drivers in too many cars.
Too many lost souls drinking in too many bars.
Too many heroes stepping on too many toes.
Too many yes-men nodding when they really mean no.
Too many lives each cat can lose ---
We've got too many too.
Too many too.

Too much sunshine. too many drops of rain.
Too many equal and average children who will all grow up the same.
Too many fireside politicians holding too many views.
Too many questions --- but there are answers too few.
Too many lives each cat can lose ---
We've got too many too.

If i were a liar --- yes, and you were a cheat ---
There would be too many places where we all could meet.
Too many temples where we could worship the beast.
Where he who thinks he had the most in fact has the least.
Too many lives each cat can lose --
I've got too many too.
I've got too many too.

They left me, leaving my house on fire, me running round ---
Got out through the window.
While clinging to the skirts of fate
Was not my idea of fun
I'll jump to it gladly.
The town was filled with smoke and hate.
Came to my senses just too late
To realize that all i ever owned
Was borrowed. i thanked them for having shown
Me that nothing ever really belongs to anyone.

They burned my books and they broke my car,
And gave the dog to a man who used him for breeding.
They felled my trees and they tramped flowers and threw
The kitten into my new pool.
The same things done to other men had made them run away from the city.
This being the case, i joined them there and breathing air spent
The night with these new friends.

Blew my smoke on a sunny day
When the first black powder came my way.
Hot lead ball from a muzzle cold ---
To win fair lady and take your gold.
I know it hardly seems the time ---
(i am your gun)
To talk of blue steel so sublime.
I can understand your point of view.
To tell the truth i'd scare me too.

Match, wheel and flintlock, they all caught your eye.
Pearl-handled ladies' models, scaled down to size.
I am the peacemaker, so the theory goes.
But i don't choose the company i keep ---
And it shows.

I am your gun.
Love me, i'm your gun.

Maxim and browning, they helped me along.
Stoner, kalashnikov --- thrilled to my song.
Now one of me exists, for each one of you,
So how can you blame me for the things that i do?

Now i take second place to the motor car
In the score of killing kept thus far.
And just remember, if you don't mind ---
It's not the gun that kills
But the man behind.

I am your gun.

[instrumental]

Fish and chips, sandpaper lips and a rainy pavement.
Soho lights, another night --- thinking of you.
Black cat, sat on a wall, winks at me darkly.
Suggesting ways and means that i might win a smile ---

As you leave the place where you work until 12.30
And the policemen nods as you pass along his beat.
Sweaty feet, troubled brow -- we're all in the same game, lady.
Life's no bowl of cherries --- it's a black and white strip cartoon.

I've been warned that you and your friends are crazy
As from your hearts you bare your parts to the gentlemen,
Who, while they drool, trying to keep cool,
Spill their scotch and water.
But i'm not that way, i must say --- i'd much prefer to see
You in your texturised rubber rainwear around 12.30.
Come and play shades of grey in my black and white strip cartoon.
Strip cartoon is all i'm after.
Strip cartoon is all i crave ---
So come to my place around 12.30
`cos i'm a leading politician
At a dangerous age.

[instrumental]

[instrumental]

[instrumental]

A) scenario

In long years of ancient time, stood alone a friend of mine.
Reflected by the ever-burning sigh of a god who happened by.
And in the dawn, there came the song of some sweet lady singing in his ear.
Your god has gone, and from now on, you'll have to learn to hate
The things you fear.

We want to know, are we inside the womb
Of passion plays, and by righteousness consumed?
Or just in lush contentment of our souls?

And so began the age of man.
They left his body in the sand.
Their glasses raised to a god on high
Who smiled upon them from the sky.
So take the stage. spin down the ages. loose the passion.
Spill the rage upon your son who holds the gun up to your head ---
The play's begun.

B) audition

Then god, the director, smells a rat.
Pulls another rabbit from his hat.
Sniffs the air and he says, ``well, that's that --- i'm going.''
The actors milling helplessly --- the script is blowing out to sea.
But what the hell, we didn't even pass an audition.
The lines you'll have to improvise. the words are written in
The eyes of politicians who despise their fathers.
And so the play necessitates that all you boys participate
In fierce competition to eliminate each other.

And groupies, on their way to war,
Get to write the next film score.
But the rock and roll star knows his glory is really nothing.
Men of religion, on the make,
Pledge an oath they undertake to
Make you white for god's own sake, and none other.

While ladies get their bedding done
To win themselves a bouncing son ---
But bad girls do it for the fun of just being.
And me, i'm here to sing along,
And i'm not concerned with the righting wrongs,
Just asking questions that belong without an answer.
The god is laughing up his sleeve
As he pours himself another cup of tea,
And he waves goodbye to you and me,
At least for now.

C) no rehearsal

Did you learn your lines today? well, there is no rehearsal.
The tickets have all been sold for tomorrow's matinee.
There's a telegram from the writer,
But there is no rehearsal.
The electrician has been told to make the spotlights brighter.
There's one seat in the circle --- five hundred million in the stalls.
Simply everyone will be there, but the safety curtain falls when
The bomb that's in the dressing room
Blows the windows from their frames.
And the prompter in his corner is sorry that he came.

Did you learn your lines today? well there is no rehearsal.
The interval will last until the ice-cream lady melts away.
The twelve piece orchestra are here, but there is no rehearsal.
The first violinist's hands are chilled --- he's gone deaf in both ears.
Well, the scenery is colourful, but the paint is so damn thin.
You see the wall behind is crumbling,
And the stage door is bricked-in.
But the audience keep arriving
`till they're standing in the wings.
And we take the final curtain call, and the ceiling crashes in.