1. |
SHIRLEY ROAD
05:09
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Listen, I’ve been lawless and if word gets out I’m for it
Need a place to disappear in Sauvignon
I was arguing the toss with a victim of the times
When the thought of your skin made my numbers burn
Friday strikes an open chord, she shud-shudders out the door
And cuts through the orchard back to Shirley Road
It’s a place out in the sprawl built with time-resistant walls
Where our love is all that’s left of that old England now
Lately… lately, I’ve been trying to find Shirley Road.
Lately… lately, I’ve been salting the earth. Searching for sirens.
Back on Shirley Road, it’s a place where nothing changes
A sanctuary for things that had to end
Dancing to the dial-up as your dad dreams on the three-piece
‘Cos Cremonese-Atalanta’s on
Show me love and give me more, find her locking toilet doors
She ain’t no shrinking violet
There’s a boy on Shirley Road who would like to kick your face in
But he’s waiting for the fair to come to town
Lately… lately, I’ve been struggling for words. Coming to blows. Killing my time.
Lately… lately, I’ve been dreaming of you. There’s a river running through my memories of you.
Lately.
I came to in your arms taking pills down by the water
The trees they seemed to move in different ways
Your body and the sky bled a map of purple bruises
Leading me to IRL again
She whispered ‘Are you sure?’ as I bolted out the door
No more lizard brain English Sundays
Cos the walls were growing teeth beneath the posters from Athena
And time had come to find the blood in us
On Shirley Road
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2. |
SHADOWLANDS
03:20
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On listless, carefree summer nights, we'd drive from the drab estates deep in the London shadowlands, to the outskirts at the edge of our small town, up to the viewpoint at the summit of Winter Hill.
We'd take xtc and fly blind through the falling twilight, round lovers’ lanes and narrow country bends. Laughing like idiots as smoke poured through the windows and the aerial snatched pirate transmissions out of thin air. It wasn't big and it wasn't clever but neither were we. Wide-eyed. Teenaged. We were falling in love with hedonism for the first time, as our fingernails dug into the tatty seats of Dan's 1.4 Vauxhall Nova. In a humdrum town, with a typical suburban cast of snobs, bullies, cowards and divs, it was an adrenalised escape into a world all our own.
I just assumed we'd die at some point. But there was a freedom in surrendering yourself. Knowing as a passenger you had no control. You know how Egyptian princes were buried with certain possessions they wanted to take with them into the afterlife? I always thought of that Nova like our Egyptian coffin. Except instead of gold statues of cat people, we'd end up in Heaven with lost packs of Rizla, sapphire cider tubs, dog-eared copies of Max Power.
No one did die in that car. But gradually friends from those days started to slip away. Funerals are the sort of thing that change people, usually. But I found a way to defer all the grief. I ran off to find people like me. Who didn't want life to be anything other than that speeding car, running at full speed, all of the time.
I suppose it's one way of dealing with your problems. I knew they'd find me in the end. But I wouldn't change it for a second. My only regret is that I won't get a chance to make the same mistakes again.
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3. |
I REMEMBER HIGH STREETS
05:13
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I’ve got my late-night licence
I’m staying at yours, alright?
And somehow we’ll go swinging
Through the grey dawn mists of time
As hair gel stings my eyes
I remember high streets
I was never like the others
I was never them inside
But vodka neat kept me sweet
Girls’ school, drinking wine
And now I’m doing just fine
I remember high streets
A town that sings its secrets
To keep people in line
But I’ve been gone for ten long years
And I’m not scared of mine
I went west with the water
I crawled the county lines
And I saw our stolen future
In the flood plains of your eyes
So we settle this tonight
I said we settle this tonight…
Cos I remember high streets
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Real Lies London, UK
All the best ones sound like longing
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