Artist: Elvis Costello & The Attractions Album: Individual Songs

History repeats the old conceits
The glib replies, the same defeats
Keep your finger on important issues
With crocodile tears and a pocketful of tissues 

I'm just the oily slick
On the windup world of the nervous tick
In a very fashionable hovel

I hang around dying to be tortured
You'll never be alone in the bone orchard
This battle with the bottle is nothing so novel

So in this almost empty gin palace
Through a two-way looking glass
You see your Alice

You know she has no sense
For all your jealousy
In a sense she still smiles very sweetly

Charged with insults and flattery
Her body moves with malice
Do you have to be so cruel to be callous

And now you find you fit this identikit completely
You say you have no secrets
Then leave discreetly

I might make it California's fault
Be locked in Geneva's deepest vault
Just like the canals of Mars and the great barrier reef
I come to you beyond belief

My hands were clammy and cunning
She's been suitably stunning
But I know there's not a hope in Hades

All the laddies cat call and wolf whistle
So-called gentlemen and ladies
Dog fight like rose and thistle

I've got a feeling
I'm going to get a lot of grief
Once this seemed so appealing
Now I am beyond belief

I've got a feeling
I'm going to get a lot of grief
Once this seemed so appealing
Now I am beyond belief

I've got a feeling
I'm going to get a lot of grief
Once this seemed so appealing
Now I am beyond belief

He thought he was the King of America
Where they pour Coca-Cola just like vintage wine
Now I try hard not to become hysterical
But I'm not sure if I am laughing or crying
I wish that I could push a button
And talk in the past and not the present tense
And watch this hurtin' feeling disappear like it was common sense

It was a fine idea at the time
Now it's a brilliant mistake

She said that she was working for the ABC News
It was as much of the alphabet as she knew how to use
Her perfume was unspeakable, it lingered in the air
Like her artificial laughter, her mementos of affairs
"Oh," I said, "I see you know him, isn't that very fortunate for you?"
And she showed me his calling card
He came third or fourth and there were more than one or two

He was a fine idea at the time
Now he's a brilliant mistake

He thought he was the King of America
But it was just a boulevard of broken dreams
A trick they do with mirrors and with chemicals
The words of love in whispers and the axe of love in screams
I wish that I could push a button
And talk in the past and not the present tense
And watch this lovin' feeling disappear like it was common sense

I was a fine idea at the time
Now I'm a brilliant mistake
I was a fine idea at the time
Now I'm a brilliant mistake

Yeah
Don't tell me you don't know what love is
When you're old enough to know better
When you find strange hands in your sweater
When your dreamboat turns out to be a footnote
I'm a man with a mission in two or three editions

And I'm giving you a longing look
Everyday, everyday, everyday, everyday I write the book

Chapter one - we didn't really get along
Chapter two - I think I fell in love with you
You said you'd stand by me in the middle of Chapter three
But you were up to your old tricks in Chapters four, five and six

And I'm giving you a longing look
Everyday, everyday, everyday, everyday I write the book

The way you walk, the way you talk, and try to kiss me
And laugh in four or five paragraphs
All your compliments and your cutting remarks
Are captured here in my quotation marks

And I'm giving you a longing look
Everyday, everyday, everyday, everyday I write the book
Everyday I write the book

Don't tell me you don't know the difference
Between a lover and a fighter
With my pen and my electric typewriter
Even in a perfect world where everyone was equal
I'd still own the film rights and be working on the sequel

And I'm giving you a longing look
Everyday, everyday, everyday, everyday I write the book
Everyday, everyday, everyday I write the book
Everyday, everyday, everyday I write the book, yeah

I'm giving you a longing look
Everyday I, I write the book
I'm giving you a longing look
Everyday I write the book, everyday
I'm giving you a longing look
Everyday I write the book

Some things you never get used to
Even though you're feeling like another man
There's nothing that he can do for you
To shut me away as you walk through
Lovers laughing in their amateur hour
Holding hands in the corridors of power
Even though I'm with somebody else right now

High fidelity, can you hear me
Can you hear me, can you hear me
High fidelity, can you hear me
Can you hear me, can you hear me

There's a new kind of dedication
Maybe you'll find it down the tunnel
Maybe I got above my station
Maybe you're only changing channel

Even though you're nowhere near me
And I know you kiss him so sincerely now
Even though the signal's indistinct
And you worry what silly people think
You just can't wait to feel so frozen out
I bet he thinks that he was chosen out of millions
I suppose he'll never know about

High fidelity, can you hear me
Can you hear me, can you hear me
High fidelity, can you hear me
Can you hear me, can you hear me
Can you hear me

I've been on tenterhooks ending in dirty looks
Listening to the muzak, thinking bout this and that
She said that's that, I don't wanna chitter-chat
Turn it down a little bit or turn it down flat

Pump it up when you don't really need it
Pump it up until you can feel it

Down in the pleasure center, hell bent or heaven sent
Listen to the propaganda, listen to the latest slander
There's nothing underhand that she wouldn't understand

Pump it up until you can feel it
Pump it up when you don't really need it

She's been a bad girl, she's like a chemical
Though you try to stop it she's like a narcotic
You wanna torture her, you wanna talk to her
All the things you bought for her
Putting up your temperature

Pump it up until you can feel it
Pump it up when you don't really need it

Out in the fashion show down in the bargain bin
You put your passion out under the pressure pin
Fall into submission, hit-and-run transmission
No use wishing now for any other sin

Pump it up until you can feel it
Pump it up when you don't really need it
Pump it up until you can feel it
Pump it up when you don't really need it
Pump it up until you can feel it
Pump it up when you don't really need it
Don't really need it, don't really need it
Don't really need it