A Burlesque of Schubertian Beauty

I’ve seen the women left to die
I’ve seen their men with blood in their eyes
I’ve seen their children slaughtered
Let us in
And I’ve seen them bow their heads like nobody knows
Broken feet walk broken roads
The rich just sending prayers
Let us in

Another bullet shot light up the world
Begging for life but your body’s been sold
Does anyone hear them in silence
Let us in
Mother crying for the body she found
Young woman screams torn to the ground
Keep your satellite
Oh let us in

Circumcising women benefits who
Does the threat of beauty mutilate you
Defacing love in darkness
Let us in
Does anyone come when you turn out the light
Are you praying to God that he might
Protect you from what’s coming
Let us in

And I see em holding on til their dying breath
The stoning and the bombing and they’ll beat you to death
How dare you look away
Oh let us in
Starving and broken into prisons you go
If you see what they feel do you fear what they know
Schubert in my head
Oh let us in

*Additional vocals by Sophie Vaughan

Somebody Touch My Soul

Concentration camp beds are burning
As I stamp out the fire of men
Somebody touch my soul....
Somebody touch my soul....
Woman blow out another candle
As I trade in my God for love
Somebody touch my soul....
Somebody touch my soul....

It doesn’t get any better
These shelter lines they run on forever
Somebody touch my soul....
Have you given up your right for expression
To swallow what they’re shovelling
Somebody touch my soul....

Have we no influence over our own lives
Whose gonna save from ourselves
Somebody touch my soul....
We’re a million years of evolution
To sit in front of the television
Somebody touch my soul....

Bad connections of parents
Have stopped driving us forward
Somebody touch my soul....
Somebody touch my soul....
In a world grown so fat and hungry
Our dreams are worthless and frightened
Somebody touch my soul....
Somebody touch my soul....

Is there anyone left to say something
Are we the generation that feels nothing
Somebody touch my soul....
Somebody touch my soul....
The new wars they taste like the old ones
And the old ones have lost all their meaning
Somebody touch my soul....
Somebody touch my soul....

You wanna fight for your right
To be another fucked up example
Somebody touch my soul....
Somebody touch my soul....
The only thing left to love is the silence
And I traded in my family for lust
Somebody touch my soul....
Somebody touch my soul....

Yesterday we prayed for the dead
Today we pray for the living
Somebody touch my soul....
Somebody touch my soul....
The truth is not a matter of opinion
Not even God lasts forever
Somebody touch my soul....
Somebody touch my soul....

Sound of the Earth Spinning

In conversation with a Swiss Astro particle physicist he said that in our galaxy alone there are approximately 200 million stars. The universe is, in his humble estimation a collection of several hundred billion galaxies both high and wide. The idea that we are alone is little more than the furthest reach of human arrogance.

Do you hear it?

We have evolved too fast; our purpose cannot keep up with our greed. Our devastation, our non-compliance to nature, our failure to be what we represent. And we cannot find our own evolution; we are defined only by history. And we will be remembered in tears.

Do you hear it?

When our children die in the war it’s a tragedy, when their children die in the war it’s a victory. Violence is a human characteristic. The pro-lifers are killing the abortionists.

Tell me is the earth unpopular. Chinese whispers of love.

At the end of another street the corporate supermarket puts out of business the local butcher, baker, greengrocer. Its inferior products are cheap and flown in from exploited under developed countries leaving behind a massive carbon footprint and an imbalance in the ecology of life. Its customers say it’s so convenient.

There are too many people poor and in need. Can you hear it?

Mankind’s greatest marketing achievement is convincing us that it’s all right, we’re in safe hands. Life will be sustained. We are the masters of our destiny. Money is our number one objective and the sole heir to our moment of dominance. Money succeeds us as the number one priority over life.

In another corner of the world, lawyers sue governments on behalf of clients who have tripped over a tree root lifting the pavement. In response to the many lawsuits the local government has cut down all the trees on a leafy boulevard a meter above the ground. Lawyers.

Do you hear it

As a race we are unable to accept change as a rational concept. Extinction waits for those without the ability to adapt. And for the smallest moment in time extinction happens only to other animals.

Society is becoming more and more suspicious of those of us who value silence.

I am not a great man because Beethoven wrote the ninth symphony, or because of Shakespeare, Da Vinci, Einstein. We are not them. Although we wear the same skin.

Statistics delivers us fact from fiction.

Life is constructed of miscellaneous things, I grant you my presumption.

In an AIDS clinic the businessman said he was foolish to have unprotected sex with a Nigerian prostitute. He hoped his wife wouldn’t find out the hard way.

We dwell in the womb of our mothers when the world can no longer be bared.

Love, enables you to experience loss in detail.

We spent the day together; it was the last day before we were to become parents. We let out all our lifeboats. Her eyes were loaded

This is the sound of the Earth spinning

So Much for Prayer

Please I’m all alone
Please the streets are so cold
Sorry
I’ve been a bad man
Please anybody there
Please is there room for one more
Please sir
So much for prayer

*Additional vocals by Sophie Vaughan

Stroking a Rose

Digging you a hole
And I don’t know where it goes
I’m sharing your love
In a room full of ghosts
I’m reading your diary
All pregnant with crows
25 years stroking a rose

And when I get hungry
I can smell you aroused
And I go through your dreams
And I’m in them and proud
You were the witch
Who made a king from a man
And I come to you now
With a thorn in my hand

I swim in the dark
And kiss where you lay
And I lick your womb
Where I was God for a day
I’m feeding on your grace
And it ain’t made of man
I gave you a rose
You took a thorn from my hand

We stand and make love
And you droppin’ your page
And I smell your mouth
All breath and rage
I can feel you in utero
Ravished in pose
Sentenced to love
For stroking a rose

You breathing in the word love
You climaxing the word fuck
I’ve been shown the art of love

Passive

Lethargy - Take your turn
Eloquence - Atom bomb
Superficial - Dress to kill
Happiness - Hold her still
Dinosaur - Bible school
Take my hand - Pay the girl
Sometimes I wanna live
And sometimes I’m at the bottom of the world

Prima donna - Taste the air
Low ride - Oh I’ve been there
Jump shot - Offend her
Magnitude - Cadenza
Give it away - Take control
Find yourself - Pay the girl
Sometimes I wanna live
And sometimes I’m at the bottom of the world

Cuckold - Manuscript
Erudite - Between her lips
Hug me - Tempted
Go home - Self-centred
I’m knocking - On your soul
Please me - Pay the girl
Sometimes I wanna live
And sometimes I’m at the bottom of the world

Whose in charge - Where’s the dream
Cried all night - Make a scene
And drive - Poor
Hungry - Law
Who got the most
Jelly roll - Ancient brain
Pay the girl
Sometimes I wanna live
And sometimes I’m at the bottom of the world

Passion - In retreat
Apologise - Time to eat
Evidence - Teach me
I don’t know - Love is free
Hungry toilet - Empty bowl
Put it right - Pay the girl
Sometimes I wanna live
And sometimes I’m at the bottom of the world

Punishment - Cohort
Swear words - Room for thought
Grey area - Bottle of wine
Been alive - Summertime
Clean your room - I don’t know
Sex and breath - Pay the girl
Sometimes I wanna live
And sometimes I’m at the bottom of the world

What am I - Hide your grin
Free your love - Bow to him
Bottleneck - Lucky guess
Cigarettes are cool - Death by stress
Email - Find a pearl
Do you know the way
Pay the girl
Sometimes I wanna live
And sometimes I’m at the bottom of the world

In silence - What was said
Dignity - Share your bed
Sunglasses - Busted heads
Speak to god - Take your meds
Hostile - Life’s a whirl
Sunset - Pay the girl
Sometimes I wanna live
And sometimes I’m at the bottom of the world

After The Pain Shall Come the Song

Came on like a rosary in silence
You were the gift encore
You had a smile to light up mankind
You tied a ribbon around the war

You showed me another view of the world
You wore the rags of summers long
Don’t cry for me I’m just the artist
After the pain shall come the song

Is this the road to Ecuador
Is this the road to Ecuador
Don’t cry for me I’m just the artist
You tied a ribbon around the war

Is this the road to Ecuador
Is this the road to Ecuador
And I’m gonna cry myself an island
You tied a ribbon around the war

Who knew this road would be so long
Who knew this road would be so long
Don’t cry for me I’m just the artist
After the pain shall come the song

And Famous

And I’m dead and famous
Kiss my attitude
Turn up the candles
Guns God and booze

But we’re ordinary and famous
Lonelier than you

Another 27 years old
Immortal gorgeous as peers
Another rock and roll epitaph
Can’t save us in tears

All jacked up and famous
Lonelier than you

Once I killed a whale
Dripped with blood and love
Looked into her dying eye
Swear I heard God

Fame is gonna kill ya
Lonelier than you

Laud me like the Blues
Earned my hedonism for free
I don’t know what I’m doing
Felt someone pray for me

And I’m all jacked up and famous
Lonelier than you

I invented a cure for death
Critics say it’s just a song
You wanna be like me
Make you forever young

But we’re ordinary and famous
Lonelier than you

Media in dept to us all
Setting traps for youth
Reading into rubbish
Believing it’s the truth

Fame is gonna kill ya
Lonelier than you

Once I banged a drum
Now they tattoo what I said
And we all need something to look up to
Even if they’re dead

Wasted and famous
Lonelier than you

She's a God

She’s a poem
She’s a bum
She’s everybody you need when you got no one
Got no one

She’s an activist
See her at birth
She knows the gorilla wont survive mankind’s earth
Mankind’s earth

Nude on your wall
It’s all about you
If you pull the wings off her flower she’ll make you feel it too
Feel it too

She smells like sex
Cunt for a girl
Don’t care for persuasion
She’s a God
Make her king of the world
Make her king of the world

She’s not a fighter
She makes men free
She’s not an artist
But she don’t need to be
She’s a woman

Fragile

And I’m fragile and thin
Why does a caged bird sing
She knows what it is to be free but you’re not listening

And why do we fight
Flowers grow into the light
And so many people scared in the dark tonight

And when I grow old
My mind be filled with gold
And it took me a life to learn I can’t save the world

Wait here comes the pain
Sorrow will bring on the rain
And sometimes you gotta fall from the sky
To get up again

And where have all the heroes gone
Palestine or Jerusalem
Throw your pomegranates at the wall
Oh where have they gone

And I’m scared of the dark
And I can’t find my guitar
And you wouldn’t want my liver
And you sure wouldn’t want my heart

And why was I born
I thirst on pages torn
And I’m hurt and I’m as fragile as a swan

And whose gonna turn you on
The truth is almost gone
And I’m tender and I’m fragile
And I’m nobody’s son
And I’m done

*Additional vocals by Sophie Vaughan

List of My Demands

Here’s the list of my demands
Let the hostages go
Let little boys be free
Just say you don’t know
Make love to life
Soak my pillow in her
Lay down your holy book
For hate find a cure
Learn ignorance will make you cold
Fools wait in line to be king
Let the beauty of mankind shine
Let these people sing

Here’s the list of my demands
If you want me to fight
Stop talking about yourself
Make children feel safe at night
Let us all get what we deserve
Let your prejudice go
When your dreams are all you got
Get off your knees and grow
First love this big old world
And all we ask is that you try
Over-rule the weakness of war
Take a day off and cry

Here’s a list of my demands
For a worlds forgotten voice
Promote dignity
Serve no man without a choice
Don’t take what you don’t need
To the family of earth take it slow
Address the worlds forgotten pride
Petty things let em go
Hold hands across the market
Pick the truth out of lies
Find peace just for mama
Turn it up close your eyes