Fred Partington's Daughter
written by Currie
Published by Polygram Music Publishing Ltd.

I was sittin' in this five star place
going nowhere fast
When she caught my attention
through the bottom of my glass
She was a waitress in the hotel
above this smoky bar
She got up at dawn for breakfast
and worked on 'til it got dark
And at six o'clock when her shift was up
she'd drink the night away
Well wouldn't you
if you served gentlemen all day

Well she told me where she came from
was a petty kind of town
How her parents became born-agains
after her brother got knocked down
And how she found the magazines
in the boot of daddy's car
And he told her he was weak sometimes,
just like how all gentlemen are
And in summer she'd work in his shop
and then cry the night away
Well wouldn't you
if you served gentlemen all day

So she left her home and family
one cloudy afternoon
And she came here with her girlfriend
who had found them both a room
And everyday they'd wake up early
and go looking for a wage
In high-heels and makeup
they would lie about their age
With her first job as a barmaid
she's just dream her shift away
Well wouldn't you
if you served gentlemen all day

And one day by the dole office
a car window rolled down
And a gentleman asked for directions
to her old home town
And it transpired he knew her family
and he owned a string of bars
So he offered her a job
if she would kiss him in his car
So it was that she accepted
his advance of one week's pay
Well wouldn't you
if you served gentlemen all day

And as she told me all these tales
she picked a scab around her wrist
That she confessed it was self-inflicted
with a whisky glass like this
Then she game her name and number to me
I did not give mine
She said maybe I should call her
for some fun some time

And the funniest thing
was that that name stuck in my head
And eight months later
it was in a headline that I read
They had pulled her out the river
in that same black dress
And she lay there quite the lady
for the gentlemen of the press
And her picture in the paper
looked so small and far away
Well wouldn't you
if you served gentlemen all day

Another Letter Home

written by Currie
Published by Polygram Music Publishing Ltd.

There's a true blue moon
in the black city sky
But it looks white
as an eyeball from here
And I wonder tonight,
does it look white from where you are too?

And so far every morning,
I wake up missing you
The sweat in my T-shirts
and dust in my shoes
Reminds me that paradise
is only a point of view

You know, everybody here
seems to be sleepwalking
And pretending that they're free
But they are all owned by Coca-Cola
and maintained by better men, see

And there's freak shows and strip shows
and theme parks and all those
Standard distractions and curiosities
So I smile at strangers
like this is the place to be
But if you took away the sunshine,
dirt would be all you'd see

And someone should tell me
how to stop feeling small
Between sky-scraping offices
and 20 ft Marlboros
The squeeze of a hand
suggests love but first "How do you do?"

And it's all so sincere here
it just seems insane
Last night somebody told me
that there's two ways to bane
you can kill someone or
you can dress up and change your name

And you can be a has-been
without having been anything
But the light relief at the end of the news
when the hill of things you've thrown away
Is bigger than the things you've used
But they say you can still see your face
in the polish on the President's shoes

So everyone's laughing and living in style
The bill for the dentist as big as the smile
I open my eyes and toothpaste is all I see
You know, everyone's so friendly here
they just postponed WW3

April The First

written by Currie
Published by Polygram Music Publishing Ltd.

I woke up to bells this morning,
I woke up to birds
I woke up to someone yawning
and that yawn was hers
I was dreaming of a scene
where all my life was cursed
By the Law of Love which states
that things will just get worse
When she turned 'round and said
she loved me so much that it hurt
I thought it must be April the First

I put my hand upon my heart
and swear I'd never leave
That she wanted love
not just a room she could come to
I recall her asking me
what I was born to do
I said, "There's no place for me,
I'm simply passing through"
When she turned 'round and said
she loved me so much that it hurt
I thought it must be April the First

And by the Law of Averages, this won't last long
By the look of happiness, she'll soon be gone
But by the looks of things, I could be wrong
I could be wrong

So we went down to Glittertown
and bought ourselves a ring
When she announced that
now she was in love with everything
But I could not unlock
the pessimism in my soul
Surely scenes disasterly
and rings and things get sold
When she turned 'round and said
she loved me so much that it hurt
I thought it must be April the First

And by the Law of Averages, this won't last long
By the look of happiness, she'll soon be gone
But by the looks of things, I could be wrong
I could be wrong

I woke up to bells this morning,
I woke up to birds
I woke up to someone yawning
and that yawn was hers
I was dreaming of a scene
where all my life was cursed
By the Law of Love which states
that things will just get worse
When she turned 'round and said
she loved me so much that it hurt
Yeah when she turned 'round and said
she loved me so much that it hurt
Well she turned 'round and said
she loved me so much that it hurt
I thought it must be April the First

More Than You'd Ever Know

written by Currie
Published by Polygram Music Publishing Ltd.

I bet you I can tell you
just how much I love you
Quicker than you'd ever know
I won't send you flowers
or take you to some fancy show
'Cause I can tell you quicker
than you'd ever know

I love you
I love you
See, there you go

I bet you I can tell you
just how much I love
More simply than you'd ever know
I won't buy you no string of pearls,
I won't follow you wherever you go
'Cause I can tell you
more simply that you'd ever know

I love you
I love you
I love you
See, I told you so

So Many Souls To Change

written by Currie
Published by Polygram Music Publishing Ltd.

As the sun rises over Mexico
And sets on the African plains
On a tourist jet, the in-flight magazines
Sets out your rate of exchange

While the unhealed
and homeless are wondering
If they will ever feel safe again
They give you drinks and show you sailors
Dancing in the warm New York rain

So many souls to change

So mother and child
while travelling to Deli
Have to jump off a burning train
While the puppet rich bible class third world society
Meets to discuss it's slogan campaign

You are complicit in this conspiracy
You are unable to get free
They send the rich ones to University
And the rest get comics and TV

So many souls to change

You are shocked with shots of corpses
And seduced by scenes of greed
So your overloaded conscience
Goes out looking for some kind of relief

And the church, the government and charity
They collectively agree
You cannot simply print more money
Just to save some poor country from disease

So many souls to change

So when you die and go to heaven
Looks like there could be hell to pay
As the saints and angels ask how anyone
Could treat mortals that way

Don't I Look Like The Kind Of Guy You Used To Hate

written by Currie
Published by Polygram Music Publishing Ltd.

Oh Judy do you remember me
I'm second from the left in the black hat
We gave away our innocence
when we were fifteen
and since then I've been
trying to get mine back

You were the cutest of the crop
I was the second biggest drinker
in the whole hip flock
And everybody thought
we were headed for the rocks
But I guess that I got lost

So take a look at these
flash-lit photographs, you beautiful fake
Don't I look like the kind of guy you used to hate?

Well it was summer, I think,
when you said to me,
"Let's just run away"
But somewhere on that road
I got married to monotony
And that's what pays this wage

And these tiny symbols of success
Like my black chauffeurs forced friendliness
Are less the spoils of spiritual wealth
Then symptoms of distress

So take a look at these
flash-lit photographs, you beautiful fake
Don't I look like the kind of guy you used to hate?

Now everybody thinks that it's respectable
To get up like a dog each day
But you used to say, "Just shoot me baby if I ever end up that way"

So take a look at these
flash-lit photographs, you beautiful fake
Don't I look like the kind of guy
Don't I look like the kind of guy
Now I look like the kind of guy you used to hate

Evidence

written by Currie
Published by Polygram Music Publishing Ltd.

Saturday night,
the lights are all lit up
There's a bottle of wine
beside an overfilled paper cup
And the cigarette she left lit
is all burned up
But the heat from where she lay is not

Like smoke from factories,
we leave our heat behind
Like wound down batteries,
hearts stop sometimes

And between these sheets
her perfume lingers on
And in a couple of weeks
all the evidence will be gone
Like a dust free patch
where a magazine lay
A girl leaves a gap when she goes,
but someone else fills it up someday

Like smoke from factories,
we leave our heat behind
Like wound down batteries,
hearts stop sometimes

She took away the daydream
leaving nothing but daily life
She took away almost everything
but if you look you'll find
Evidence she left behind

A blue bar of soap left on the sink
And lipstick 'round the last glass
she used to drink
And those burned up books of matches
that she kept
And heat from the mattress
where she slept

Like smoke from factories,
we leave our heat behind
Like wound down batteries,
Hearts stop sometimes
Hearts stop sometimes

Talk It To Death

written by Currie/Harvie
Published by Polygram Music Publishing Ltd.

You have to laugh a lot at what
we throw away that half the Earth's not got
And who's in charge when there's barbed-wire
fences 'round the graveyards
And I know it's about time we got to the point
we've been denying
Maligning problems of the world is fine
But I can't keep talking
when it's running through my mind

So I've got the feeling and
you've got the feeling I guess
It's on the tips of our tongues
it's at the base of our breath
But though the night is young
it will grow up before too long
So say yes
before we talk talk talk it to death

Beneath the sewers there's stone
Beneath the stone there's the water
which we pipe into our homes
So when the rich mock what's below them
They mock the whiskey and the beer
and every burgundy they own
And I know now who's in love with you
so let's stop the conversation and see
I don't want you to think or hesitate
when I declare that who to be me

So I've got the feeling and
you've got the feeling I guess
It's on the tips of our tongues
it's at the base of our breath
But though the night is young
it will grow up before too long
So say yes
before we talk talk talk it to death

Okay girl, we both know outside
this room there's boardrooms of creeps
Calling famine kids cannibals
and killing for cameras
But tonight, it's right,
and forgive me for noticing
You're wearing a dress
So let's not talk this to death

Now I'm stuffing coins into a meter
And I'm cold and I'm bored
and I've wasted all my food
My mind is rotting
while my eyes are glued
To the last few minutes
of the flickering tube
And we know things get repeated
so no one gives themselves away
We try to disguise our feelings
but we just talk them all completely away

So I've got the feeling and
you've got the feeling I guess
It's on the tips of our tongues
it's at the base of our breath
But though the night is young
it will grow up before too long
So say yes
before we talk talk talk it to death

The Return Of Maggie Brown

written by Currie
Published by Polygram Music Publishing Ltd.

She stepped off the bus
with a burst suitcase and a frown
And she could smell the breweries
and abattoirs on the edge of town
And the man who owes her money
won't even lend her an ear
When she phones to demand his answer's vague
He says, "I'll get back to you
but right now I've got to catch the plague."

Down in a bargain basement
she goes to shuffle through careers
When all they offer her is friendship
and peace souveniers
And the receptionist
was playing with a pencil at her lip
She asked her if she knew a place to sleep
She says, "I'll get back to you
but now I've got appointments to keep."

There was a shop called B.J.'s
that she stepped into to get out of the gale
They sold only British manufactured
lifetime guaranteed to fail
And a store detective asked her
what she had under her coat
"It's just a little something that I wrote
It says, 'I'll get back to you unless first
your girlfriend slits your throat."

And by the time the sun set
she was penniless and frozen to the core
The Salvation Army girls refused her
on the grounds they didn't know her
So she asked some wino for advice
but it turned out to be
A Sunday sport reporter
who was following his nose
He said, "I'll get back to you
but first we need a picture without clothes."

So she stepped back on that bus
with a burst suitcase and a frown
She had come to the conclusion
that this was not the place for Maggie Brown
And it was 6 in the morning
when she telephoned me
Until then I'd been living on my knees
But I got back up when she got back to me