| The Lyrical Santa Sprees |
| The Unreadable Santa Sprees The Inseparable Santa Sprees The Petrified Santa Sprees The Opinionated Santa Sprees The World Outside The Outside World BACK TO INDEX |
| Our Charity Parts 1-3 I - The chapel's latest float is setting a course Buckets overflowing for the worthy cause Spit-wiping pears on your sooted shirt Saying prayers for the working dirt But that's what you are since you got so give-in Holding out your hand, ripe for the taking Some detail caught in the lantern glow Saw frayed cuffs wiping at a dripping nose And red wheels on a donkey's hide that'll never come off Can roll and roll in the pasture but it'll never come off Is this where you are since you got so feeble Huddled down in the crypt where you fight evil So wet blessed with Jerusalem and jam Your cloak soaked right through and drowned the precious little lamb You can't be shook or hurt because the ark's already built Well if only cream gets in then let's pray God cradles milk That's what you are though you try so hard To keep the devil down in your own backyard Our charity began at home and set sail on a boat Through looks stuck in rivers and arrows stuck in throats Left in shelves of silt deep down in the banks Lies an invisible interest and someone to thank For all that you are since you got so lived in A place you can trust when our charity's willing II - Aah the meeting was good and the friends were kind and the temperance brass band struck up just in time (give the blind man change) It's like the sap is rising on the trunk (root and branch) And some of the guys were rolling round drunk(looking for love) Beaks wet with lipstick and elderberry wine (the homemade kind) tap out SOS to a lilied high tide (find out we're tied...) and think of all the misfortune they might yet find (..to this life) and others they've dodged or left behind And that's what they are since you got so giving, held out their hands waiting to be shaken. Brass plates and forelocks, manor gates and sweatshops (from little acorns grow) railings and sidings and triumphs over weaklings (I bend saplings and they bend me) Beatings and hidings going strong in quire stalls and I've grown quite feint at Victorian mores Sure the poorhouse scrubbed up well but still had to pull it down Peel the lice paste from your skin and the gilt from your crown So what part did you play in the latest crusade? (Plans that relayed..) These ventures for good (...national trust) and gottens for gain. Who stumped up the readies, the willings and ables (into which we poured our love..) through canes, sticks and birches and twelve times tables (..long after the cause left us) It's quite a feat to make the world blush pink To get knee deep in mud and not even flinch III - The veil's been parted so keep your twisted legs hid 'cos no rods are spared on a surly cripple of a kid And when you're all three you should keep low in the ditch. Pawn your locket for blankets on nights blacker than pitch. When oaks begin to creak and lungs start to wheeze (when folks begin to say amen I'll think again) and you've made your last farthing from gathering leaves you'll meet a monkey in a pulpit who'll pour silver on your hands and make chimp out of Jesus and tell you how it began. (Oh baby if only I'd made it all up see...) Hell the blzzard's here and I've not spoken (...I want you to treat me like I was equal) freely or dammed or closed or open (She's open or not see...) Ever ready, upright (..but my heart was unlocked) you'll be lashed soon enough for those spells, short and smashed, when I was looking for love It's time for a change beyond your control, clippers are tossed as the seas start to roll The kid got low slithering around stomach on cinders eating worms that she found Has a plague pit for a neighbour and first pick on a plot Gnaws long and yellow on roots that won't rot The bit bores black and the bed spits it out leaves our sopping wretch with five tenths of a shout In the earth's juice 'neath the crust she's taken aback to the glory years of sudden attack That's what you got if you add it up - gum, bottletops and pennies in a pewter cup And that's what I am since I got so give in - held out my hand and I waited to be shaken. (c) words and music Anthony Dolphin. Written in October 1998. Recorded in Kashiwa, Japan March 1999-August 2000 by Anthony Dolphin, Katherine Marshall and Makiko Nakao. For the alms and victoria |
| Bird-Shaped Pastry For The Birds Feeling peckish on the garden path Draining tap water from the cracked bird bath They're checking the bird-shaped pastry for the birds Yeah one finch looked shocked but my belief held firm That bird-shapes are better than worms They're eating bird-shaped pastry for the birds No matter what you have in your hands You can't remake what you had in your head Lost notions now plainly absurd Bird-shaped pastry for the... (wood pigeon solo) Fumbling forming beaks and wings Dusting glazed feathers in the baking tin We're making bird-shaped pastry for the birds Were likenesses in those shapes discerned? What did them sparrows learn From eating rough, sweet, profile, bird-shaped pastry For the birds? I guess we'll never know If the juice overflowed from my heart and my lungs And I bottled it up and went back in among Those Saturdays of yore when I threw on the lawn Would I relent? Would I stand firm? Would I give in and give 'em worms? Or them testing shapes that they deserved? Bird-shaped pastry for the birds (c) words and music Anthony Dolphin Written and recorded in late summer 2000. in the Silver Loft, Koganehara, Japan. Dedicated to Nell and her cold pastry hands. |
| writers' cramp |
| Alcoholic Gunslingers Are Cool The limit of his tether is getting stretched But this don't matter Because he'll have to swig another Before he slays his brother Don't start on misadventure The missing money that he lent yer Fat profit ran amok There's one thing that you forgot Alcoholic gunslingers are cool Alcoholic gunslingers are cool If anyone thinks there's cooler Let me tell you about the ruler Against which all others must be measured No matter how loved Or how treasured I'm talking abou Dean Martin in 'Rio Bravo' Made the second fastest gun look slow Like they were taking aim Underwater Like a big barn door Swimming towards yer Alcoholic gunslingers are cool Alcoholic gunslingers are cool On the floor scrambling for change Even then he kept the bad guys in range All the guns and the girls Gathered 'round Dino's spirit world And though his liberty was taken He'd need another drink to stop his shooting-arm from shaking And his magnetic appeal Well it sure looks real Alcoholic gunslingers are cool Alcoholic gunslingers are cool Alcoholic gunslingers are cool Yeah heh Alcoholic gunslingers are cool (c) words and music Anthony Dolphin and Katherine Marshall Written in September 1998. Recorded in Minami-Kashiwa, Japan, 1999. Dedicated to all talented drunks. |
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I Wish I'd Been An Extra In Dawn Of The Dead There was a film, there was a film... Set in a mid-western shopping mall Made by George A. Romero the best of all His monster movie oeuvre's got the skill to shock yer The wit to amuse yer & the power to rock yer I got no desire to be a movie star Except for that one minor part Of a limping zombie all covered in blood I wish I'd been an extra in Dawn Of The Dead There was a film, there was a film... Oh I wanna be a zombie & take all those shots And carry on staggering around all those shops And tangle with Ken Foree & Gaylen Ross Try to out think them down in the rink Yeah and if I was offered another role insted Those moans & screams would've been the only script I'd've read I wish I'd been an extra in Dawn Of The Dead I wish I'd been an extra in Dawn Of The Dead (c) words and music Anthony Dolphin and Katherine Marshall Written and recorded in London For George |
| Petrified Steel myself a treadmill god Split my lip in the morning sod (There's no stopping us) To slow to can me (From growing up) I'm a Santa Spree Over stile and gates of boot smoothed mud With truceless weather overhead (There's no keeping still) Fat chance of comely (There's no feeling well) Be still Tiger Lilly Said save me save me from myself My loins in heaven but my pride's in hell (There's no stopping up) All risk and no trade (There's no growing up) Come on up to my cave My fitness for itness declines with age God woman ain't yer past that stage (There's no stopping us) Flophouse and coolie (From growing up) Did their worst to soothe me And every branch I tried Turned out petrified (c) words and music Anthony Dolphin Written in November 1998 and recorded in Minami-Kashiwa, Japan, 1999. For hamsters on the wheel |
| She Wallks Through Walls Well she had a body that rankles From her fat lip to the shallow in her ankles And a painted smirk like she found the world amusing And a crick in her neck from constant accepting And for all the outlay, all the men laid, Was she happy? Well only lately See she was bored at 20 - dead at 30 Now she's completely weightless And see-through too Now I have seen it all... She walks through walls Was a skeleton rose from filing clerk She had no body to speak of Plenty upstairs but not much around the middle She had no body to speak of But now she's vapour they don't lgawp at her form She can pass as paranormal Them fireproof ghosts don't come much colder She passes as paranormal Feigned conviction in space religion So I could find out what had got in to him Found him frozen from hat to toes He had pricks of light in his eyes He had seen it all... She walks through walls He'd seen gods made of rope and unravelled silver And their plaited arms had embraced him longer than his mother Electric cloaks hummed with reason He forgot the tune but he caught the meaning Said something about a middle way Yeah a middling mantra of rank and stature Mild, elastic, faintly rustic Vaporous, gluttonous, nearly useless Without this instance He'd be lost to nonsense Without seeing this He would not have seen this I have seen it all... She walks through walls (c) words and music Anthony Dolphin Written and recorded in the Silver Loft, Koganehara, Japan, 2001. |
Dead People This is a call to my arms. I'm demanding offensive charms even though I know you're still on the mend. Can it be so tough to lift the topsoil up, rip holes in the meadow with all your friends? Dead people don't take it lying down! I ran with the crowd but it never brought me nearer to you. Dead people don't take it lying down! Look where I am now - stuck in this plot next to you. You hollered s.o.s. via e.s.p., l.d.r.s.v.p.a.s.a.p. but I'm warning you don't ever talk in code again Because I'll unravel any medium - happy, bent, or genuine - if they fail to pass this message on (chorus) Bells started ringing, teak coffin lids were flinging open and I wondered aloud how you'd got out alive. Oh you told me it just took attention allied with feeling and concentration That had wandered while we'd been killing time. (chorus) (c) words and music Anthony Dolphin Written and recorded in the Silver Loft, Koganehara, Japan, 2001. For the more common of the species whilst I'm rare enough to comment |
Family Planning It's a ma & pa thing Bits of kids string Minds-eye monsters Playpen fixtures Opaque doormat Plate glass rough patch Overcame romance Kept fucking on the off chance Of all this going our way Replaced birthdays Dream home heartache Gas bills court case Baby blue cots daubed with two coats Wax works we don't Dead boy dead girl Kept it from her That our family planning's undone Yeah our family planning's undone (c) words and music Anthony Dolphin Written and recorded at the Gomarusan studio, Takegahana, Japan. 2002 For all kinds of mothers |
| Ghosts Moan Too Much So the permafrost of purgatory Is not cool enough for him He'd swap dialling out for pizza For the death he has cheated He craved an office romance With that girl from accounts Too bad but he moans too much For a ghost in his position He lingers too long For a ghostly apparition He's not settling in Death's not brought out the best in him Just one bedroom in your haunted house And the tenants are rather plain He's not exactly thrilled with The spines he has chilled They'd rather mow their lawn Than watch him change his form So sad but he moans too much For a ghost in his position He lingers too long For a ghostly apparition He's not settling in Death's not brought out the best in him He wanted to be the colour of cold steam Whatever that is And he pictured a mansion With flock paper? Yeah...and a maid... Whose top he could look down His was a spiritual vision Indeed Yeah an eternity of rattling cellar doors Well I guess the time could begin to drag But to live in organ pipes And make science rub its eyes He don't like the clothes he died in He said they make him look thin It's too grim but he moans too much For a ghost in his position He lingers too long For a ghostly apparition He's not settling in Death's not brought out the best in him Ghosts moan too much Ghosts linger too long (c) words and music Anthony Dolphin Written and recorded in the Silver Loft, Koganehara, Japan, 2001. For the last, icy breath |
| Back There tumble in thistle and thrash through corn show your mettle over nettles and your scars from thorns pour fuel on a wasps' nest and climb the highest tree hide from witches play with matches twenty one kids staging world war iii torture insects and make rope swings dam the stream and play out dreams there's nothing harder on the world than the little things craft bows and arrows and guns with care air rifle geese and pull girls' hair you might remember it soft but it's a jungle back there (c) words and music Anthony Dolphin and Katherine Marshall written in London in 1996. Recorded in Minami-Kashiwa, Japan 2000 I thought everybody grew up like this |
| If You're In Town (Look Me Up) It was down the track behind your house i'd split some rosehips and put the seeds down your blouse being a tender, wordless moment you thought you'd speak and you declared your undying love and it was just that for four whole weeks for the first week i had a kind of airsickness from being permanently off the ground but i got over this by holding your hand tighter to keep my weightless body down now in the second week I began to show you off around school and i wrote your name on my bag and carved it on my desk too yeah that had to be a sign, an indelible seal proof, if proof were needed, that this love was real and by week three i was dabbling in poetry even though your name was a devil to rhyme and despite the fact that my freer verse never captured the severity of the time and although a fifteen year olds' vocabulary is artless, pompous, selfish back then i absolutely knew that i meant it when i think back to those days it's you you you that i miss first loves and all that....how did it come to this? if you're in town (look me up) i want to catch up on (what what) what you've been doing for the last fifteen years so if you're in town (look me up) oh you were the brightest stream and you only had to ask me and i'd go on at length about our future in the green grass see us running side by side together - lots of future, lots of past no work, no worry, no struggle...i knew it was going to last oh if you're in town (look me up) i want to catch up on (what what) what have you been doing for the past fifteen years if you're in town (look me up) if you're in town (look me up) if you're in town (look me up) if you're in, if you're in...(look me up) yeah if you're in town (look me up) (c) words and music Anthony Dolphin written in the Haybarn, Stafford late autumn, 1998. Recorded in Minami-Kashiwa, Japan 2000 For my oldest flame |
| I Want To Get My Carriage Clock Hunched on all fours in the furthest reaches when my matress ices over in the dampest patches These days when I'm inspired it's only in flashes but when I give in it lasts for weeks See rashes bloom on the downy down and I scratch meself daft in the horse & hounds I've written a rough draft of a past improved in which I lied a lot to lighten the mood I want to get my carriage clock, I want to get to the end I have a chalet sleeps 5 if 2 of 'em ain't proud & 3 of 'em are spied on & 1 ain't allowed to breathe out between 9 & 9. It's made of chipboard but at least it's mine. The villagers are desperate & the natives are restless, it floods twice a year & nobody cares less I am the glue man sticking to his tanks, my frozen forces are shooting blanks I want to get my carriage clock, I want to get to the end Well I hollered dumb decibels of delight to a palmist holidaying nearby She told me "you need a goal in life...don't get no clocks if you don't do the time" Been trying to cultivate spectacle-tinted roses with petal lenses and autofocus Only eight pounds fifty to you passers-by who have thorns & fleas you want to magnify I'm as terracentric as a worm, 24 carats is all I've earned Have no faithful wife or country pile Will golden timepieces make it all worthwhile? I want to get my carriage clock, I want to get to the end I want to get my carriage clock, I want to live to the end I want to get my carriage clock, I want to live to the end (c) words and music Anthony Dolphin and Kazuko Machida written and recorded in the Gomarusan studio, Takegahana, Japan October 2003 Because it comes to us all |
| Wasted On You She had a withered arm that she flopped around you And she had a dependency on prescription drugs & alcohol too But she had a basic charm that you couldn't see through And I think that she was wasted on you Desire is a constant only weakness is fleeting His head might have been spinning back then but his heart was still beating I know she sucked on you for valuable nutrition But did you have to introduce her to all the competition One by one in the court of the coffee morning queen As she tried to keep your house clean You kept picking at her weakest seem Until she came undone, 'til she came undone She had a baby son that she doted on through t he night when the fates did for him as they'd done for you And although you could've run until your feet were sore you hung around (yeah you hung around) I still think her troubled looks were wasted on you I think her pasty form was wasted on you You can't argue, you can't argue...well Lying there with my knickers twisted the air is blue and the paint is blistered Another mouthful of ashen bathwater - had it cut off, last, lost quarter No exit with feet aflame this fella don't feel the same I lost it a while ago. Said forever so the time goes slow I'm wasted on you I'm wasted on you I'm wasted on you (c) words and music Anthony Dolphin written in Karditsa, Greece, 1998. Recorded in Minami-Kashiwa, Japan 2000 BACK TO INDEX |
| This Hotel Is Cheaper Than I Am The soap in the bathroom has worn real thin The lemon scented shampoo is watered down The curtains aren't lined so they let the light in And the 'vacancies' sign is never turned 'round This hotel is cheaper than I am Has it been that long since I checked in? UNDER CONSTRUCTION (c) words and music Anthony Dolphin and Kazuko Machida Written and recorded Autumn 2002. at the Gomarusan studion, Takegahana, Japan. |
| Mayflies He lisped "I luth you, I luth you" She took her braces out and threw 'em on the dashboard There was no unzipping, de-clasping She insisted on asking "When you gonna' get me that ring?" He thought for a while watched some mayflies die And picked holes in a ladder fern (don't know the real name) He could see a life ahead with more good in it than bad (This lot've been learning all along so how come he...) He was never very good with words And this time was no different He said "You are my fossil fuel" You wouldn't've understood it But it must have meant something to them Something deep...meaning...full I don't know where they're living now I have no idea if they're still together I'm not even sure if they're alive or dead I don't know OK, I'm obscuring, I'm projecting (yeah you are a bit) When I should be collecting facts But I'm too squeamish to look Maybe it was just a holiday hit She saw his trunks didn't fit that August in the water chute Or maybe they split up over money Or did they share every penny 'til they were 102? Maybe they had 5 healthy kids, or maybe they couldn't have any Or they beat all 5 black and blue I don't know where they're living now I have no idea if they're still together I'm not even sure if they're alive or dead I don't know So, are you a betting man? Lay me 2-1 on not even a card at Christmas Saying she doesn't miss much The knowing's terrrible...ah,but the not knowing, the not knowing, the not... I only saw them for one minute Like you'd watch mayflies on the white tiles in urinals Nothing is final We all need stories with potential We need potential We need them stories We need them I've been waiting around for years for you to call with news of them (c) words and music Anthony Dolphin written in 2001, recorded in the Silver Loft and Gomarusan 2001-2002 For those we might not meet again |
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| Crackers and Bananas I met a girl marked exit sign She was pretty green but her heart was inclined To meet me half way at the psychic fayre I spent a whole stone age there Being driven crackers and bananas Young pups come and ruffle my foal She's in the meadow doing forward rolls Don't need no crashmat to break her fall Don't have much need for what's gone before Being driven crackers and bananas Being villains on the run and cursed And all the contact with unrecorded germs The neverminds and weren't meant to be's Made plain by you not being with me Being driven crackers and bananas (c) words and music Anthony Dolphin Written and recorded in 2003 at the Gomarusan studio, Takegahana, Japan For Smudge |
| There Is No Pleasing You i dared to bend my bedside manner to scour at your bright stainless appeal imagine the melamine is marble when the flames are licking at my feet keep your knickers on because the night is long when i couldn't hold the sun in its arc i knew there is no pleasing you i gave you crabs when you wanted ponies fanfare kazoo instead of harps and horns in sunlit idylls where eternal music is piped to ripen the failing corn keep your knickers on because the days are long when i couldn't hold the sun in its arc i knew there is no pleasing you it's like having the eiderdown from a duck that still loves you it won't happen, it won't happen, it won't... keep your knickers on because life ain't long when i couldn't fix the sun in its arc i knew there is no pleasing you (c) words and music Anthony Dolphin & Kazuko Machida Written and recorded 2003 at the Gomarusan studio, Takegahana, Japan |