/// A character piece about a guy blinking and becoming middle aged and unremarkable /// Life begins at 40 and it ends at 45 That's a lot of drugs and rock n' roll and not a lot of time You save the days for decades incomplete Watch the shakedown of a banking man When concave concrete meets family sedan Idle hands, hard shoulders, seated Trying not to think on your feet And watching from the wings the journey seems rehearsed How every little limo's looking like a hearse You curse yourself for taking on the roads And fantasize of open skies and hurricanes But your parachute was open when you left the plane Don't land and start demanding what you're owed Another go but sans the load What will we tell the investors? What will you become? What will I write in the ledgers? The greatest story ever told You're far too young to be so old You couldn't see the beaches for the eyes of sand The dreams seemed like the dreaming of a different man The man who said goodbye to her with a kiss Not the listless bucket kicker in a corner booth With pictures on the pinboard of a sort of youth To someday teach you the names of all your kids Each mr man and little miss Still life portraits on the hallway walls The vase that rattles when your mother calls These wedding photos came with the frames A notebook full of empty spaces caked in dust A yearbook full of strangers saying "keep in touch" The novels never lasted past the name Kindling waiting for a flame What did you carve in the mountain? What's been fossilized? What's there to say when they've found it? The saddest story ever told You're far too young to be this old What did you hear through the window? What's your neighbour's name? Who sang along in the valley? You walk it with no hand to hold You're far too young to be this old And far too old to think us 'old and wise' Fumbling for lessons we're too young to recognise You know what they say of fortune and bravery's link Well that makes us cowards, and cowards, we swim to sink Well the tide grows higher, let's show some composure And hide on WIZARD ISLAND til it all blows over All I am is all I came to be And when the end comes I know it's coming for me (and I'll be there to see it, be there to see it...) Some other guy On some other day You live not to die and you die anyway Your hair is a mess, so coalesce!, you coward!

/// This one's about making art and/or making money /// My friends and I are gonna change the world And spend our time creating shiny pearls Just gotta get my foot out of this bear trap, gotta get my bones on my side Gotta do this guy some favours for the right, the right not to decide And there is no trusting hand When what you must ain't what you can I bought an urn, it's tightroped on the sill I'm automatic writing my last will And if I'll be six feet deep, hey, I'll shell out for six feet wide Cause you cannot be a cheapskate on the hole, the hole in which you'll die And I find I'm 75 And my pension's dry What a price to pay! And we my darling, we don't stand a chance So fire away! Don't wanna see you sing, just hear you dance And I hear a buzz! It's not my fault, but oh how I wish it was And the heart of making ends meet is just to retire But it's hard to take a breath in a house on fire And when times are at their hardest we put a price on our hearts Cause everyone's an artist spending most of their waking life not making fucking art Cause we simply can't Not when the car won't start And I can't just sit and wait for you, but what else could I do? The spark will dissipate before you finish the unfurling of the fuse Because you never really choose How you'll make the news What a price to pay! And we my darling, we don't stand a chance So fire away! Don't wanna see you sing, just hear you dance And I hear a buzz! It's not my fault, but oh how I wish it was OH GOD What a price to pay! Patience, darling, we were born to queue All night and day! Doomed to tread the path the dead men drew And fear the bends! A job at the morgue will meet my ends

/// A ditty about being doomed and useless like a frog on a windshield /// God complained, and so we rained in fury On the windshield of the king's delivery boy A scrawled scroll says rome will fall someday So un-invest! He heads lead-footed when he puts the wheel away I guess we're headed west! And in a snare we'll share the road Frogs on the highway, take me home! The brakes are clipped, and so we slip in inches While trying not to fly behind the plates They don't slow for omens, not for you nor I Nor the locust breeze! The world is blurry in the moving eye We move hopelessly! The hope that we don't croak alone Frogs on the highway, take me home! How do I look pressed to the glass? Well perhaps I shouldn't've asked But god is on the line Cause I called ahead of time Said I'm headed for Rome Frogs on the highway, take me home!

/// A bandit goes around stealing love for unclear and potentially non existant reasons /// Stand and deliver newlyweds! I heard all those beautiful things you said My pillowcase is hungry, my aim is true You have until death, but let's hope that's not what it's coming to For all the love in the world I'm gunnin' for all the love in the world I ransacked Paris and I wrecked your home I tracked and packaged all earth's pheromones And interpol said "truth be told, our hearts aren't in it, there will be no sting" And my fingers are getting so weighed down by all these wedding rings Oh all the love in the world I have all the love in the world It's stuffed into my drawers, it's strewn across my carpet And I can hardly move in my studio apartment But there's room in the view from the kitchen throne Over what is mine and mine alone Of all the love in the world Of all the love in the world

/// A day in the life of a man learning to hate his country /// And in media res is how we all wake So we filled out a record for the children's sake The story is boring, but at its core It was 1066 and then we won the war And then yeah, we'll leave it there I sprung in spring, an April fool Still a similar thing when you consider it all The sun in my eyes was a nasty surprise My windows were repo'd, I'm shown to the sky And then left, I was not prepped I missed a train I didn't know I had tickets for Slipped on papers piled and the piss at my door And the sound of a gutless song, it persists From the mouth of an upper class Oliver Twist He's a hack (with a backing track) He sang la da da la da da... Blindfold strapped, I ran in straight lines For a kind old chap on a bench in the pines With a face full of scars and a prison tattoo A tin foil scarf and lizardskin shoes I took a seat, we shuffled our feet He asked me my name, I said "the opposite of yours" He said "listen here Sam, if I learnt one thing in the war It's that you can't live without oxygen in space But you can live without it most any other place" And then he sighed, and then he died He didn't convince me of life after death As his ghost spoke gibberish with terrible breath "I played chess with death but I did other things too! I played chess with death but I did other things too! Did things for which nobody sings!" Nobody sings la da da la da da... Pawned my ring for a signed queen headshot Sold it to a king unsatisfied in wedlock The night was young, I said "what the heck" Took a hatchet and passed it through the prince's white neck In a flood of purple blood I set fires over London town Rolled the eye through the tower and plundered the crown With every stone lion left wanting revenge But they'll never know quite what I did to stonehenge Oh, and I joined a punk band My songs were spent, so I prepared a speech For some wanderer friends getting wed on the beach I recognised my ring right away I was paralysed as they threw the bouquet Bounced off the chest of my Sunday best As they sang la da da la da da... I screamed at the sand curled within my toes But I'd bleed on the glass if the pressure rose So I hopped on a flight, felt it popping my ears If I'm gonna die I ain't gonna die here! And you, you can come too Show me the bullfrog and show me the snail Show me the way down the Oregon trail Show me the sunset on crater lake park And show me the island where we'll hide in the dark Just please, don't call the police But the officers knocked on my caravan, said "We've got your prints on the prince's loose head" They scoff and they say "What a wonderful way to celebrate Saint George's Day" I said "Oh, I didn't know" I sang la da da la da da... And they sang... And the prince sang... And the lions sang... And the wizard sang... And the island sang... And the cowards sang... And George, he sang... Maybe tomorrow!