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1. |
Sink or Swim
03:26
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SINK OR SWIM
Let's go down to the beaches
And run from the edge of the sea
See what the movement teaches
A frail sense of autonomy
Cold toes in the water
Two steps from freezing feet
Feel the strength as you go in deeper
And the cold consistency
And if there's anyone watching
You dare not turn around
Till your arms are doing the clutching
As your feet leave the ground
Control or capitulation
A new sense of affinity
Having lost all the hesitation
But back there it was just the sea
Just a blue mass on the postcards
Just a place to race the boats
Just a waveline on the blackboard
And now see how long the illusion floats
With risk co-ordination
Swim half as far as you can
We lose control of the situation
When we think we've got it all pre-planned
Back in dead-air building blocks
We lose the urge to take a risk
And calmly change our sandy socks
Wishing there was more that this
Stuck in these concrete houses
We dry out in the heat
Invent the worst excuses
To stay there permanently
Too many regulations
Too many rituals
The biggest risk was taken
Deep-ending in the swimming pool
The structured sand and water
Reflects our structures lives
We swim but never further
Than the constraints of our minds
Let's get back to the beaches
Wider than a postcard
And run straight into the sea
Longer than a holiday
That's what the movement teaches
Sink or swim spontaneity
See what citizen can be
If we recall the deep blue sea
That evolved our weary brains
Getting shrunk from too much stress
We either get back into swimming
Or we sink into a mess!
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2. |
Language Barrier
04:19
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LANGUAGE BARRIER
You know nothing will ever get solved
If you feel you shouldn't get involved
Claiming ignorance of what to say
Or how to say it the 'proper' way
Well you're nodding your head but building walls
By keeping your thoughts invisible
And blaming ignorance from everyone else
For leaving you stranded by yourself
Well they presumed that you were happy like that
If you dropped the scowl you'd be in for a chat
Maybe - it's as simple as what they see
And they can see a lot
So don't point the finger till you shaken the hand
Get to know to way these people understand
From strangers at a party - Who's that over there?-
To those in a different country where the language makes you scared
If you're in a solo situation
Face to unknown face
Start a walking conversation
And then increase the pace
The walls get built by silence
But are easily replaced
Cos in every style of language
It is easy to relate
And a smile or open signal
Can lay the barriers to waste
Pack a few less self-images
And make it less of an ego trip
And the distance will be nothing
Between visitor and visited
Words used such as 'strangers'
Make us sink in hesitation
But the language of intention
Speaks out loud in all directions
Once you've cleared your inner fears
You can carry on for years!
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3. |
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SAME OLD 'STARVING MILLIONS'
There's a lot of people
There's a lot of food
There's a lot of money
All being misused
You feed the starving millions with donations of a quid
Then you buy another telly cos that's what the neighbours did
You flick across the channels
And catch the evening news
All those starving children
Are staring right at you
You're no longer feeling guilty cos you've given to the cause
And there's another royal baby to help you ignore
Who's doing very well thank you
And that's all from the news at ten
We'll be back with the sordid facts
Covered over with trivial crap
To help you stop thinking
To keep you relaxed
Same time tomorrow night
See you then
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4. |
Conditional Silence
02:19
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CONDITIONAL SILENCE
Silence
Considering musical violence
As the airwaves break those anytime pauses
Quiet reflection on the nature of noises
Disturbing suburban platitudes
Heard a yell that created a solitude
Outside
Opened the window wide
My curiosity satisfied
It was no-one I knew so I carried on hiding
My instinctive reaction to join in the shouting
And increase the volume, but a sense of doubt in
My head
Told me to shut up instead
Return to the previous peace I'd been seeking
For no other reason than to work out a theory
That noise is just sound on a different scale
To what we expect, so I started to yell
Out loud
Soon a curious crowd
Was standing outside looking up at my window
I looked out, they could see I was no-one they knew, so
Their instinctive reaction to be part of the noise
Or part of the reason for the silence destroyed
Got hid
"Nobody does" what I did
Except for the person whose total immersion
In this social excursion was more than diversion
With a similar yell I could tell who he was
The voice with a noise that I'd heard, and because
One yell
Had sort of broken the spell
We laughed and we shouted in a lack of respect
For the conditional silence that has come to connect
All the neighbours as strangers living under the treat
Of discovering life beyond what they expect
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5. |
Big Big House
03:33
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BIG BIG HOUSE
Picture a scene and pull it apart
Who owns this field? Who drives that car?
Who put up the sign saying this is mine
Keep of the grass and keep in line
CH-
Big big house in the country side
Souvenir shops don't close till nine
Postcards do when the sun don't shine
Please be gone by closing time
Picture a scene and pull it apart
Who built this house at the very start?
Who was forced to work for some food in their hand
And some space in the corner of the master's land?
CH-
This exploitation based on class
Is here in the present like it was in the past
History builds an image that we never look behind
Someone's giving orders while the rest are kept in line
Here it is your heritage
Based on class and privelege
Mr. and Mrs. Average
Are thinking ''This is fine"
Living somewhere in between
The cardboard box and the limousine
Part of their same society
Conveniently re-defined
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6. |
Mind Bomb
04:42
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MIND BOMB
I've got a mind bomb disposal unit knocking on my head
Checking out the rumour that I meant just what I said
They've drawn so many chalk lines that I may as well be dead
On the blackboard, on the pavement, but I won't eat what I'm fed
I've seen the public access but they wouldn't let me in
Conformity has dress code and I'm two stone overthin
And anyhow the chances are they wouldn't let me in
Presumptions give the innovator no chance to begin
CH-
It's either "Be one step ahead" or "Keep up with the rest"
There's so many messages telling me they know what's best
I've got a mind bomb disposal unit knocking on my head
They've opened up the corridors and left the doors ajar
With anoraks and plastic bags the consumer can go far
Ashtrays fill and pinballs tilt to emphasise the scars
Of a society raised on promises, falling back on credit cards
So let's go on a cathode raid and steal some empty minds
Fill 'em full of hopes and dreams and call it leisure time
There's a guy who's got no T.V. and we've got him on the line
Stay detuned for further progress, here's a few things you can buy
I've strolled across the empty roads as pedestrianos stare
At lights to turn from red to green, to get from there to there
Billboard faces mock attention given unaware
Reliance on subliminals and a defiance of being scared
And here's a token comic strip at the bottom of the page
It isn't very funny but we're laughing anyway
Smiles are hard to come by when the picture starts to fade
And someone's favourite punchline is another person's wage
CH-
I've thought in terms of relaxation, giving things a rest
Cos the constant realisation leaves presumptions in a mess
But every turn in the situation seems to be a test
A dotted line for the mind to sign away its intellect
The altered state of reality that's printed screened and said
Is feeding time for the mind that knows of nothing else instead
Keen to kill the essential will of refusing to be fed
I've got a mind bomb disposal unit knocking on my head
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7. |
Chili Pain
01:39
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CHILI PAIN
The heat is hot like desert rain
Floods of fire as I perspire
All sensation feeds the flame
"Did it before"... do it again!
Something transmits to my brain
Through chemical sparks that quickly drain
Into the arteries and veins
And throat! The scarcity
Of any type of other need
Like the cut without the bleeding
Some intensity of feeding
From the mass slowly reeling
With physical mental sharpened feeling
I could attack or defend
Choose the time I spend
Without counting the cost
Without feeling a loss
Almost any space increases
As the twitching face decreases
So push the essence and feel the gain
Trace the source through the fire and pain
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8. |
Give Me Beethoven...
03:30
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GIVE ME BEETHOVEN...
Give me Beethoven or give me death!
Fasten your seatbelts hold your breath
Don't wanna think about watery graves
Blow me away on the turbulent waves
Earphone chatline to the creator
Keep this plane up a few hours later
The C60 cycles the number five
Across the air as we wave goodbye
Give me Beethoven or give me death!
To having any destiny control
A new sense of fear with a love of the old
Being able to gain from a shaking plane
A proximity to death and maybe living again
In musical form!
Unconsidered before!
Well that's quite a lofty ambition kid
To be shaking up the aerospine like Ludwig did!
But while the neighbours, unattached
To Ludwig Van, were unrelaxed
By thoughts of turbulence making cracks
In their temporary home
I was gone... despatched
Give me Beethoven or give me death!
To the flights of fancy nightmare edged
That grasping strings, leap from the ledge
And punctuating air with fists
Like orchestrated masochists
Cry "Freedom from all rational fear!"
And hit the waves prepared to dive
For what goes reaching down as deep
As that which takes us all so high?
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9. |
Talk It Over
02:42
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TALK IT OVER
If all the things you say to me
Were steps towards some unity
I wouldn't keep on staring
In semi disbelief
Because as you say you'd do one thing
You behave so contradictory
So don't propound your theories
If they don't reflect reality
I don't know you very well
I find it hard to even tell you
That you don't do what you could do... if you wanted to
So drop the image you have of me
And talk a bit more openly
Sat across the table in an empty house
Are we ever really able to talk it out?
Don't stop to count the amount of times we've tried
Watching the walls as the conversation died
Open the windows and look outside
A million strangers walking by
And us creating alibis
For what we really feel inside
You don't know me very well
I don't know you very well
We find it hard to even tell
Each other that we'd like to talk it over
Remove the cover, talk it over
Find a corner, talk it over
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10. |
Offended
03:42
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OFFENDED
Grabbed by the shoulders he shook his head in desperation knowing whatever was said in this situation would only lead, like it had already led, to having his shoulders shaken again, by those that believed that when nothing was said then nothing was meant: yet by the shaking they could only prevent any one-to-one making clear of intent
Not that merely waiting would've guaranteed a different state in this latent situation, and no amount of patience can replace a caring statement lined with an indication of the kind of slow frustration that no offered explanation of an action, lying beyond the comprehension, builds
All the will in the world is never enough, nor the animosity that gets rough - some nameless touch is needed to calm the gaps between the offender and the offended, until the cracks that nature unintended in the minds of those where any hope has ended, are closed
And once where necks were almost wrung the voices sing things never sung together, maybe not so much forever, but enough to keep unsevered the connections once begun
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11. |
Central Nervous System
03:35
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CENTRAL NERVOUS SYSTEM
Comfort? Sofa chair pacifying words
A touch on the shoulder to tell me that you'd heard
Understanding to attention just in case you heard it wrong
A fear of contradiction cos your feeling can't belong
To this given situation that no-one can take away
A smile, a nervous glance, "Well I'll be back some other day"
But you really had to go and left this atmosphere behind
So now it's back to circumstance, solutions hard to find
As I turn the burning embers of a past that recently
I'd found harder to remember than I thought was good for me
But once confirmed the truth had pulled that 'recently' to shreds
Now the obvious lies bleeding and the future holds my breath
Shall I turn the page and start again?
Or throw the book away
Shall I tell you of these feelings?
Or find something new to say?
It's the act of making choices
Asking questions, hearing voices
Mixing pain and self-resentment
With a knowledge that contentment
Is a process of selection
Cos in every situation
There are good and bad directions you can go
You can wallow in the fantasy
Regenerating memories
Or use the open scenery
Impulse flow more easily
If all the good things disappear for what seems like eternity
Remember you created them by being what you'll always be
Receiving input, giving back what makes you tick in time
Natural instinctive tack running up the spine
Use your central nervous system
To help make up your mind
Looking out with indecision
Wastes a lot of time
If it feels good take the risk
And here I am talking like this
And saying 'you' instead of 'me'...
But experience is globally perceived as being basically
a common sense capacity to understand the variety
of influence upon the way we are
Having gone so far
There is no reasoning can stop us once we've reasoned what we've got
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12. |
Traffic Lights
02:18
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TRAFFIC LIGHTS
When the traffic lights turned red
And a car kept going, well, nothing was said
It was quietly understood
That if he could do it, anyone could
But the queue remained and we felt the strain
Of being the majority obeying the authority
Of traffic lights turned red
When the traffic lights turn green
And the car in front couldn't start, it seemed
Like he was holding us up to show
We were happy to stop until told to go
And the queue remained and we felt the strain
Of being the majority needing the authority
Of traffic lights turned green
When the traffic lights broke down
There was a whole lot of cars reaching out of town
We were all too scared to move
Until a man in a uniform told us what to do
And as we drove on by
We wondered why
We hadn't gone the other way
Or gone ahead and said "Hooray!
The traffic lights are broken down!"
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13. |
Smells Like Home
08:47
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SMELLS LIKE HOME
You can't see the moon above the city
The sky is always full of clouds
Even when the sun's gone down
It's like living on the underground
Black and white in shades of brown
And you can't breathe the air in the city
With the fumes of cars and factories
Your lungs ain't what they're used to be
Breathe in the new complacency
At least it's good for industry
At least it's smells like home
And you can't get a job in the city
With all the new technology
Robots run the factories
It's sanitized economy
Robots don't get lung disease
And you can't get healthy in the city
The sky is so grey
It's like forty fags a day
And the water is hard beneath the foam
The despondency inside
Merely reflects the concrete sky
So let's go out
Let's stay in - at least it smells like home
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