Tom Robinson complete lyrics

Fighting with the kids on the fairground
Caravans and TV masts
Generating trucks and Alsatians
I never seen you run so fast
Picking through the litter left afterwards
For .22 shells in the grass
Found a pound note and a keyring
Martin, it's funny them days are past

Saturday flicks at the fleapit
When we had the money to go
Always on the side of the outlaws
And staying for the second show
Bonfires down at the bombsite
And watching the embers glow
Candles and cake in the dugout
Martin, it seems so long ago

1967... it seems so long ago
We were only eleven
It seems so long ago

Day return to Southend Central
Nanny's little treat on the train
Every year we sat on her blanket
And every year it started to rain
Eating apples off the allotments
And swapping cigarette cards
Lending Fat Freddy's train set
And treading on his restaurant car

1967... it seems so long ago
We were only eleven
It seems so long ago

Now I don't wanna give up football
And I don't wanna settle down
Maybe there's life after 25
But I don't feel like sticking around
I don't wanna work in a garage
I don't want my dreams to fold
Never want to have to stop laughing
Martin I'm terrified... of getting old

1967... seems so long ago
1967... it seems so long ago

from "Cabaret 79" album recorded live in 1979, released 1982
("Glad to be Gay" CD in Germany)

Drive my truck midway to the motorway station
Fairlane cruiser coming up on the left hand side
Headlight shining, driving rain on the window frame
Little young Lady Stardust hitching a ride... and it's

	2-4-6-8  ain't never too late
	Me and my radio truckin' on thru the night
	3-5-7-9  on a double white line
	Motorway sun coming up with the morning light

Whizzkid sitting pretty on your two-wheel stallion
This ol' ten-ton lorry got a bead on you
Ain't no use setting up with a bad companion
Ain't nobody get the better of you-know-who

	2-4-6-8  ain't never too late
	Me and my radio truckin' on thru the night
	3-5-7-9  on a double white line
	Motorway sun coming up with the morning light

Well there ain't no route you could choose to lose the two of us
Ain't nobody know when you're acting right or wrong
No-one knows if a roadway's leading nowhere
Gonna keep on driving home on the road I'm on...

	2-4-6-8  ain't never too late
	Me and my radio truckin' on thru the night
	3-5-7-9  on a double white line
	Motorway sun coming up with the morning light

1977 debut single by Tom Robinson Band

On the twenty-fifth of July deep in the night
Sat outside that door
I was out of my mind
The tension in my body was so strong
Trying to imagine what was going on
Waiting for you...
Listening for you...

Baby girl, little baby girl
Don't cry tonight 
(Smile smile smile)
You will have enough time to cry
When some young guy breaks your heart
Hello Lucile - welcome to this world
We're gonna love you, hold you and cherish you

As I walked through that door and heard you cry
I picked you up and held you in my arms
Gazing at you... 
Listening to you...

Baby girl, little baby girl
Don't cry tonight 
(Smile smile smile)
You will have enough time to cry
When some young guy breaks your heart
Hello Lucile - welcome to this world
We're gonna love you, hold you and cherish you

Lyric by Manu Katchè, Connie Fisher & TR
from Manu's 1992 solo album "It's about time"

The old romance is over
We made our bed of nails
My faith remains unshaken
Until the day we fail
My bitter degradation
Down under Charing Cross
If I could buy my time again
I'd never start the clock

Shut off inside
On automatic drive
(five two five two five two five two)
My real life
Surviving 
525

3.00 am and overcast
And left without a doubt
Got cornered by the butcher boy
And never raised a shout
There was no room for reasoning
No time to hope or pray
When I met my end on Bleeker Street
In the dark and far away

Cut off inside
On automatic drive
(five two five two five two five two)
Might be alive
When I get home tonight

From 1980 album "Sector 27"

We don't see no place for hatred
Real life's too good to waste it
No-one here's afraid to face it
Take it while we can
Keep a space for other faces
Keep the faith and never break it
Now you're round we're bound to make it
Whole world in your hands

	 Alright all night
             Everybody understands
             Alright all night
             We've got the whole world in our hands

Debt collection, high connection
Gonna get some insurrection
Time to set some fresh direction
Whole world in our hands
Let them run for re-election
Let them get police protection
Cash injection, state correction
Just won't mean a damn

	 Alright all night
             Everybody understands
             Alright all night
             We've got the whole world in our hands

From 1979 album "TRB TWO"

Prejudice poison 
Polluting this land
I'm a middle-class kiddie
But I know where I stand
We got brothers in Brixton
Backs to the wall
Bigots on the backlash
Divided we fall

But we ain't gonna take it
Ain't gonna take it
They're keeping us under 
But we ain't gonna take it no more

Women with children 
Have to carry the can
Till they lose them in divorce courts
To some pig of a man
We got Benyon and Whitehouse
Trying to get us stitched
Cos abortion and a gay scene
Only meant for the rich

But we ain't gonna take it
Ain't gonna take it
They're keeping us under 
But we ain't gonna take it no more

Sisters and brothers 
What have we done
We're fighting each other
Instead of the Front
Better get it together 
Big trouble to come
And the odds are against us
About twenty to one

But we ain't gonna take it
Ain't gonna take it
They're keeping us under 
But we ain't gonna take it no more

From TRB's first album "Power in the Darkness" 1978

If you think you're slumming when you're coming with me - don't do me any favours
If you think you're slumming when you're coming with me - don't do me any favours
If you think you're slumming when you're coming with me - don't do me any favours

I never get to meet your friends or folks	(Don't do me any favours)
But I'm the butt of all your jokes		(Don't do me any favours)
You talk down to me like a clapped-out fool	(Don't do me any favours)
If you're so clever and cutting and cool	(Don't do me any favours)
	And...

If you think you're slumming when you're coming with me - don't do me any favours
If you think you're slumming when you're coming with me - don't do me any favours
If you think you're slumming when you're coming with me - don't do me any favours

Well you may be pretty 
And you might be young...		(Forget it - don't do me any favours)
You think the sun 
Shines out of your bum...		(Forget it - don't do me any favours)
You're so sarcastic
Ha ha ha...				(Forget it -  don't do me any favours)
Just who the hell 
Do you think you are...		(Forget it - don't do me any favours)

Talk, talk, talk...   	
Talk, talk, talk...
Bitch, bitch, bitch...	
Talk, talk, talk...

If you think you're coming 
When you're slumming with me...

Forget it.

'B' side of "Atmospherics: Listen to the Radio" single in 1983

Don't you worry, I'm alright, Jack
We've never had it so good
House in Hampstead, fallout bunker
Done everything we could
Fitted the Rolls with a shatterproof windscreen
Soon as we heard the news
Harrods do a nice little teargas
Even a woman can use

All good men at Number Ten
Everything's understood
Don't you worry, I'm alright, Jack
We've never had it so good

Don't you worry, I'm alright, Jack
We've never had it so good
There's plenty of grouse at the country house
We're eating as we should
Hugh's at Sandhurst, everything's safe
With Perkins running the farm
Half a dozen shotguns in the Land Rover
Ready for the call to arms

Gin traps down around the grounds
Trip wires out in the wood
Don't you worry, I'm alright, Jack
We've never had it so good

'B' side of "Up against the wall" single 1978

We decimate the hedgerows
Our fields are filled with rape
We heap our beef in mountains
Our milk in frozen lakes
Our eggs from hens in cages
Are poisonous and cheap
We set aside our pastures
And burn the surplus wheat

Corn and flower arrangements
So bright and beautiful
Across the land of plenty
At Harvest Festival

We raid the fridge and larder
For gifts we have to bring
The rich kids with their basketful
The poor ones with a tin
The Granny Smiths from Capetown
The Heinz spaghetti rings
Presented at Assembly
With sentimental hymns

Corn and flower arrangements
So bright and beautiful
Across the land of plenty
At Harvest Festival

We count our many blessings
Forgetting all our debts
Ignore the hungry multitudes
And overfeed our pets
We skip the foreign headlines
And spurn the World at One
The festival is ending
Our harvest still to come

Corn and flower arrangements
So bright and beautiful
Across the land of plenty
At Harvest Festival

Ersatz harvest hymn commissioned by Simon Elmes for 
BBC Radio FourUs RCut the MustardS
Tom Robinson, September 1993

Leave the bureau in the snow
Catch a tram to Onkel P?
Early evening ring around the moon
Slip in by the concierge
By the bikes and up the stairs
Snap the latch and creep into the room

You throw off your coat, pick up the post
And put a coffee on
Lie down on the bed, lay back your head
And smoke a cigarette
	
	And listen to the radio
	Listen to the radio

In the city late tonight
Double feature, black and white
"Bitter Tears" and "Taxi to the Klo"
Find a bar, avoid a fight
Show your papers, be polite
Walking home with nowhere else to go

You throw off your coat, pick up my note
Put another coffee on
Lie down on the bed, lay back your head
And smoke a cigarette
	
	And listen to the radio
	Listen to the radio

Atmospherics after dark
Noise and voices from the past
Across the dial from Moscow to Cologne:
Interference in the night
Thousand miles on either side
Stations fading into the unknown:

So throw off your coat, we'll butter some toast
And put a coffee on:
We'll lie down on the bed, lay back our heads
Smoke another cigarette
	
	And listen to the radio
	Listen to the radio

	All night long...

First released on 1982 album "North by Northwest"
re-recorded for TR solo single in 1983 & album "Hope and Glory" 
subsequently featured on at least six live albums and compilations
Music co-written by Peter Gabriel

Getting a refectory breakfast
Laghing in the midday sun
Kawazaki Z9OO
Two-up over the ton
Visits in the winter vacation
Vino in the afternoon
Long term away on location
Letters from the Venice lagoon

		Hey ho baby you're an angel
		Choking on a cheap cigar
		Red head lecherous angel
		Propping up the Union bar

All night parties with Charlie
Swimming in the middle of May
Eyeing up the rival bikers
Hanging out at Mac's Cafe
Stoned cold over in Cromer
Rolling up a last resort
Kissing at the Saturday disco
Riot on the studio floor

		Hey ho baby you're an angel
		Cutting up a couple of cars
		Red head lecherous angel
		Propping up the Union bar

I must have been crazy to end it
I must have been out of my brain
I felt he was getting dependent
So I said I'd never see him again
Now I miss him when I listen to a jukebox
I miss him when I'm having a shave
I miss him in the middle of the morning
I miss him at the end of the day

		Hey ho baby you're an angel
		Propping up the Union bar
		Red head lecherous angel
		I'm missing you wherever you are.

from "Cabaret 79" album recorded live in 1979, released 1982
 available  in Germany as "Glad to be Gay" CD from Line Gmbh

Your twenty years of adulthood
Have left you well and looking good
And fitter than you've ever been before
And though you're more resigned to life
With little children and a wife
It seems to me you've fought a private war

The kids we used to be
Turned into you and me
With the baby raging on inside
You force yourself to swim
And work out at the gym
With the baby raging on
But the iron discipline
Is only paper thin
And the baby's raging on
The baby's raging on... 
Inside

The way you laugh, the things you said
The rueful way you shake your head,
Remind me just how little things have changed
It's always hard to act your age
When choking back a baby's rage
And savage jokes can never ease your pain

I feel like I'm alone
with a prisoner, in your home
And the baby's raging on inside
You've done the best you can
To impersonate a man
With the baby raging on
But the streak of anarchy's
Still fighting to be free
And the baby's raging on
The baby's raging on... 
Inside

Fascinated by the faces
That we knew when we were young
Distrusted and disgusted
By the strangers we've become
Though I'm laughing as I'm marching
To the sound of my own drum
Never told you - wanna hold you
Like a mothering son...

Our younger days have gone
With the winters rolling on
And the baby raging on inside
	I'm sad but not ashamed
	Of the people we became
With the baby raging on
But I swear I felt the knife
As I kissed your kids and wife
With the baby raging on inside...
I climbed back in the car
Trying to cover up the scar
With the baby raging on
The baby raging on... 
	Inside

from 1990 album "We Never Had It So Good"  
by TR and Jakko Jakszyk

I had guinness with a Hot Press photographer in a Dublin pub
He wore a crucifix and a short fat beard
Showed me pictures of Gavin Thursday, Three Men And A Dog
With the Joshua Duo stood around looking weird

Met a Sid Vicious lookalike and he was six foot four
Had spikes on his dog collar made of solder
He was sitting in Bewley's caff in a dirty old gaberdine mac
He was 17 but he looked about ten years older... that was

	Back in the Ould Country, back in the Ould Country
	Back in the Ould Country, back in the Ould Country

10am one Sunday, Diceman hadn't been near his bed
And he was gargling cr me de menthe just to keep awake
He'd been rolling through night, and got ossified in Sides
He look so smashed and happy it made my day, that was

	Back in the Ould Country, back in the Ould Country
	Back in the Ould Country, back in the Ould Country

Headed into Limerick on the Clonmel road
In a beat-up rented Nissan with no brakes
Saw a Garda on the beat with two size 13 feet
Ten convent girls and a nun on roller skates... that was

	Back in the Ould Country, back in the Ould Country
	Back in the Ould Country, back in the Ould Country

Reworked version of "Back in the Old Country"
from 1992 album "Living in a Boom Time"

Had dinner with a softcore pornographer at a mansion in Earls Court
He wore a dressing gown and a short fat beard
He showed me pictures of balding cowboys and a chicken with false teeth
All those horseflesh hustlers stood around looking weird

I met a Sid Vicious lookalike and he was six foot four
Had spikes on his dog collar made of solder
He wore a dirty old gaberdine mac and a ring with a rat
He was 17 but he looked about ten years older... that was

		Back in the old country, back in the old country
              	Back in the old country, back in the old country

10am one Sunday, Herman hadn't been near a bed
And he was knocking back rum and tea just to keep awake
He had a black string tie and a gleam in his eye
He look so wired and wicked it made my day

Headed up to Edinburgh on the Great North Road
In a lefthand German Rabbit with no brakes
We took a two-room tenement flat but we soon got rid of that
When it was our turn to wash the common and pay the rates... that was

		Back in the old country, back in the old country
              	Back in the old country, back in the old country

Flooded drains on a hot dark night in Kreuzberg
Taxis splashing by in the neon light
We got halfway across the red and white concrete blocks
When a telephone rang and the major said " Tut mir leid"... wish I was

		Back in the old country, back in the old country
              	Back in the old country, back in the old country

TR solo single in 1984
included on cassette  version of "Hope and Glory" album. Live version
on 1987 "Midnight at the Fringe" album ("Last Tango"CD  in Germany)

Beat the other man 
Beat him up, beat him down...
Work that beautiful body 
Work it over, work it good

Cos all you ever want to do is 
Beat the other man
That's trying to get the better of you:
Beat him to the draw
Beat him to the floor
Beat him off the mark
Beat him at his own game

Leading us ever deeper into this isolation 
Trying to meet the other man 
Trying to reach the other man 
Trying to cheat the other man  
And defeat the other man 

And in this isolation, this splendid isolation
All those I know keep growing old
The young get ever younger
While day by day by day the fancy slips away

This sexual obsession
This infantile regression
This insincere confession
These truths that wound so painfully

It's oh so easy now to sneer 
At who we had and what we were
And doomed no doubt to re-enact
Our parents' faults before us:

The slogan choking in our throat: 
"Trust no-one over 30" 
While hungry tigers at our backs 
Now challenge or ignore us

And as the fever starts to rise
Here in this sunbleached desert place, 
Strange visions flash before my eyes
Way, far away now from the time and land
Where we were young

Those empty plans all laid in vain
And stranded on this arid sand
So many thousand miles from home
Surrounded by the dry-picked bones
Of those who passed before

What might I else have done or been
Or realised and said
To friend and mentor, lover, mother -
Long since gone, long since dead
Forgive me, father I have sinned
In thought and word and deed.

For seven, ten and fifteen years 
I falsified my heritage, a Judas to my roots
Still haunted by the distant past
And frightened by the darkness 
In the tunnel up ahead.

When will we waken from this dream
Or slide into untroubled sleep ?

Tonight we make the same old moves
And same old sterile gestures 
Degrade each other and ourselves
Enact our darkest fantasies
And try and try and try again
To beat the other man

We may not hope to live forever -
Hope although we may
But value precious life 
The best we can from day to day
And balance what it is we want
With what we want to pay.

There may be much to weep for 
In the way that we have been:
The weakness and the vanity
And empty superstition 
The domineering empty lust 
for power and recognition

Let not this premonition 
Fade away or be forgotten...

God grant the chance to make amends.

Poem from Edinburgh Fringe show
"Robinson Caruso" performed 1988

Well the way he treats you
Makes you feel so small
I've seen him cheat you
And try to make you crawl
I have to watch him hurt you
With the things he says
I see you standing stranded
When he goes away

I'm beg - beg - begging you baby
Come over to my side
Forget - get - get about everything
He's putting you through

I hate to see you running
Each time he calls
Hat to see him beat you
Everytime you brawl
Why don't you leave him - oh yeah
Come over to me
You'll be warm and welcome
And that's a guarantee

I'm beg - beg - begging you baby
Come over to my side
Forget - get - get about everything
He's putting you through

'B' side of 1984 "Back in the Old Country" single

All you downtrodden people
Always bear the brunt
Just sit back on you fat backsides
Till you have to face the Front
Waiting till the bullyboys get you
Don't make no kind of sense
And pretty soon there'll be no room
For sitting on the fence

You better decide which side you're on
This ship goes down before too long
If Left is right then Right is Wrong
You better decide which side you're on

Too bad for the gay revolution
This is as far as we get
And if you think you're free, well listen to me
You ain't seen nothing yet
We're all gonna feel the backlash
Of puritannical power
And kicking us down into the ground
Gonna be their Finest Hour

You better decide which side you're on
The chips go down before too long
If Left is right then Right is Wrong
You better decide which side you're on

Too late, trendy thinkers
Your time is running out
Ain't no time to wonder why
Ain't no time for doubt
Joseph, Reed and Whitehouse
Are out to get your guts
You better decide which side you're on
Forget those ifs and buts

From TRB's first album "Power in the Darkness" 1978

Just what do you think you're playing at - it's high time you began
To wake up, act your age and start behaving like a man
Your manners are disgusting, never seem to give a damn
Don't even lift a finger when your mother needs a hand

Your school reports are in disgrace
An absolutely hopeless case
We're bitterly disappointed
There's opportunities you've had 
I used to dream of as a lad
We're bitterly disappointed
Why can't you be like our Paul -
He's a credit to us all

You never do a stroke of work or try to settle up your debts
All your clothes are bloody awful and your hair's a bloody mess
There's always something new - you want to be like all the rest
But every penny that you get is spent on beer and cigarettes

When I was young we weren't afraid
Of working hard to pay our way	
We're bitterly disappointed
There's opportunities you've had
I used to dream of as a lad
We're bitterly disappointed
Why can't you be like our Paul
He's a credit to us all... you're

No son of mine
No son of mine
A bitter disappointment to your mother and me...
You're no son of mine

All your friends are rude and common or trouble with the law
Always come in after midnight then you stay in bed till four
Dirty pictures on your window, dirty clothes across the floor
I shudder when I think of what they think of us next door

You're always starting something new
You never try to see it through
We're bitterly disappointed
You change your mind from year to year
You could have had a good career
We're bitterly disappointed
You've let us down, betrayed us all
Why can't you be like Joe and Paul... you're

No son of mine
No son of mine
A bitter disappointment to your mother and me...
You're no son of mine

From 1980 album "Sector 27"

Steve was a rebel and a boozer
The AC king of teenage cool
He was a clean-cut calculating cruiser
Broke the heart of every kid in the school
Well I never had him figured for a loser
Till one morning no-one could foresee
He fell in love with a sweet black angel
In Brixton Market  SE23*

I've been in South Kent, Clapham and Cleveland
I've been in love and I've been deceived
But I've never been a sucker like Steven
Who lost sight of everything he'd achieved
Well he told me on the night he was leaving
(Though I found it pretty hard to believe)
You'll fall in love with the sweet black angel
He said I had it coming to me

I've got a friend in Borstal
I've got a friend next door
I've got a friend in my own double bed
I've got a real friend in the law
I've got a friend in Jesus
But we're just good friends you see
Cos I'm in love with the sweet black angel
I know he's coming after me

In love with the sweet black angel
In love with the sweet black angel
I'm in love with the sweet black angel
I know he's coming after me

from 1979 album "TRB TWO"
(*Geographically challenged lyric)

Well you know how the last seven years 
Haven't been all that easy
Times you'd feel so weak 
Cos you can't seem to speak 
When you're angry

All those things that they say 
When they stand in your way
Just seemed to eat you up deep down inside
Well they force you to crawl till you make it
Then they all want to own you

CHORUS: 	Blond and Blue
		You fight like a tiger
		Blond and Blue
		You'd better come home

All that smiling and lies 
All that long swallowed pride
Used to make you choke up
All those high-flying friends 
Keeping up with the trends
Who couldn't wait to get the blade in

For your own peace of mind 
Try and give me some sign
And show me you still want me
After so many years can you take it 
Now it's here for the asking?

CHORUS: 	Blond and Blue
		You fight like a tiger
		Blond and Blue
		You'd better come home

So for both of our sakes 
Won't you give me a break
And let me prove that I won't use you
When you're so terrified 
I can't stand to stand by yet again:

CHORUS: 	Blond and Blue
		You fight like a tiger
		Blond and Blue
		You'd better come home

From 1984 album "Hope and Glory"
Different live versions also included  on
"Midnight at the Fringe" 1987 and
 "Last Tango" (Germany only) 1988

He wasn't a loony with a sawn-off gun
A dangerous  terrorist on the run 
He'd  never been mugging or molested a nun
He was really quite a regular guy...
Six pints sober in the club one night
He started to argue with the law outside -
Gets arrested and his hands are tied
Liddley-die...

	Lie lie lie diddley lie
	Die die die Liddley die

Well they kicked him far and they kicked him wide
He was kicked outdoors, he was kicked inside
Kicked in the front and the back and the side
It really was a hell of a fight...
He screamed blue murder in the cell that night
But he must have been wrong cos they all deny it
Gateshead station - police and quiet
Liddley-die...

	Lie lie lie diddley lie
	Die die die Liddley die

It was eight to one and the one man died
But the coroner said he was satisfied
Killing Liddle was justified
He really was a desperate man...
So if you figure on staying alive
Button your lip and just swallow your pride
And don't make trouble when your hands are tied
Liddley-die...

	Lie lie lie diddley lie
	Why why why Liddley die ?

Liddle Towers' adventures at Gateshead Police station
from 1979 album "TRB TWO"

Ben was born in Lincoln County and he grew up in the fens 
Teased and bullied by his brothers in a family of ten
Sociable and easygoing - helping out around the home
While his inner life ticked on like an unexploded bomb
Just waiting for his moment

Going shopping with his mother like a whippet on the leash
Always straining at the traces - out of sight and out of reach
And anytime the house was empty he would work out on his own
Disappearing on his bike in the middle of the night
And stealing from the kitchen

	Open your eyes... 
	Open your eyes... here I am 
	I'm your blood brother

Well he saved up his allowance and he studied like a slave
Worked his passage to Australia to try and make his getaway
I was single when I met him - he was bitter and nineteen
And he so reminded me of someone I used to be
A long long time ago

	Open your eyes... I said
	Open your eyes... here I am 
	I'm your blood brother

Now the years have been and vanished and I've lost a lot of friends
I do twenty at the pool then take my kid to school
Since the party had to end;
But at a benefit last Sunday we met again as if by fate
I barely recognised Ben when he grabbed me again
And whispered in my ear:

	Open your eyes... he said
	Open your eyes... here I am 
	I am your blood brother            

1990 single taken from album "We Never Had It So Good"
  by TR and Jakko Jakszyk - subsequently re-recorded 
for 1992 album "Living in a Boom Time"

The Brits come back to Dover
With our hovercraft and hats
With slogans on our T-shirts
And salmonella snacks
Our beer is warm and cloudy
Like the water in our taps
A welcome on the quayside
When the Brits come rolling back

You set 'em up... we'll knock 'em down
We are the champion diplomatsJ
You set 'em up... we'll knock 'em down
When the Brits come rolling back

The Brits come back to Dover
Wearing blazers and cravats 
We ponce about in Volvos
Full of beaujolais in racks
Our flesh is singed a lobster red
And peeling from the backs
Of screaming savage children
When the Brits come rolling back

You set 'em up... we'll knock 'em down... etc

The Brits come back to Dover
With our tolerance and tact
Our famous sense of humour
And behaviour at the match
We shout about who won the war
And roam around in packs
You'd hardly know it's over 
When the Brits come rolling back

You set 'em up... we'll knock 'em down... etc

From 1992 album "Living in a Boom Time"

Been collecting pennies
In a hat and a mask
On a cold November evening
Before the fireworks start
Woodsmoke drifting into the trees
Crackle of bracken and burning leaves
At the height of the season
I'm looking for bonfire

		See the smoke and cinders fly
              	Feel as if I'm on fire
              	Just another jealous guy
              	Looking for a bonfire

Well we found our matches
And we started a spark
Now we're touching the paper
And standing back in the dark
Hot potato - better for some
But I've burned my fingers 
And bitten my tongue
I can never remember...
I'm looking for a bonfire

		See the smoke and cinders fly
              	Feel as if I'm on fire
              	Just another jealous guy
              	Looking for a bonfire

Oh - I don't want to turn away
We've been on the wheel
Now we're watching it burn away
Burn away...

First released on "North by Northwest" album 1982
Subsequently re-recorded for 1984 album "Hope and Glory"

Cut the cackle cos we're getting to the facts now
Guilt edged security hold me back now
Cold blanket at the drop of a hat man
Bully for you - I'm just mad about that man

I hear the sound of dogs in the rain
I know you won't be back again
We seen it three times on the run
Pass up a chance to
Cut the crap and make it happen...
Giving can be fun.

		We don't  need no aggravation
		We don't need no aggravation.

I ain't afraid but I just don't wanna fight now
This movie's over - so switch that light out
Turn of the screw and tomorrow soon come man
Wake in the morning, wonder what've you done man

There ain't another place in town
I'm moving over, going down
Killing time, the morning drop
The final judgement
Stayed a day to try your way to
Make the aching stop.....

		We don't  need no aggravation
		We don't need no aggravation

 final TRB single,  from 1979 album "TRB TWO"
music by Peter Gabriel - occasionally featured live by him

I wanna go to 'Frisco bay
Drink my liquor and spend my pay
Sling my hammock and hoist the boat
Knuckle under and learn the ropes
Action stations, all correct
Trim the rigging and swab the deck
Hard to starboard - man ahoy
I wanna be your cabin boy
All night...all night

Cabin boy work night and day 
Cabin boy goes all the way
Man the capstan, work the pump
Cook and carry and fetch and hump
Set the sextant, strip the guns
Bite the biscuit, beat the drums
Do the hornpipe - jump for joy
I wanna be your cabin boy
All night...all night

	I wanna be your cabin boy all night
	I wanna be your cabin boy all night...

Set the sextant, strip the guns
Bite the biscuit, beat the drums
Do the duties I enjoy
I wanna be your cabin boy
All night...all night

		I wanna be your cabin boy all night
		I wanna be your cabin boy all night
              	All night. 

From 1984 album "Hope and Glory"

Darlington station at a quarter to four
Down in the tearoom watching the wall
Wait till forever for the boy next door
Daylight fading and I'm hating it all

Can't keep away - I can't keep away... 
Can't keep away - I keep coming on back for more...
Can't keep away - I can't keep away... 
I can't keep away from the other door
From the other door

The door says welcome when you're all alone
Come in, sit down - make yourself at home
Can't help crying when I'm lying in bed
Cos I need this feeling like a hole in the head

Can't keep away - I can't keep away... 
Can't keep away - I keep coming on back for more...
Can't keep away - I can't keep away... 
I can't keep away from the other door
From the other door

Single by Sector 27 in 1980
subsequently re-recorded  on 1982 album "North by Northwest"

Well I woke up screaming when I found you gone
And now I can't even sleep without the TV on
Cos I can't stand the silence 
In the night

Well the bed is empty but the room is full
Of all the memories of things you used to do
I just can't stand the silence 
In the night.

When it's four in the morning and I'm lost in the dark
Cos I can't find the target and I'm missing my mark
All my faith starts fading as the palpitations start
This silence is a nightmare and it's tearing me apart

I can stand the loneliness
Friends who never call
The chance remarks of strangers
And the writing on the wall
I just can't stand the silence 
In the night

Coincidences make crazy sense
And I still feel you with me in the present tense
I just can't stand the silence 
In the night

I can take uncertainty
And I can handle pain
And I can stand the emptiness 
That's with me once again

I can stand the loneliness
Friends who never call
The chance remarks of strangers
And the writing on the wall
I just can't stand the silence 
In the night.

written 1990 - unreleased

Every night I'm getting flak 
For being lazy, talking back
It's murder keeping up the act  
I never live my own life

Fooling people for a while
Charm the bastards with a smile
Wishing I could run a mile
I never live my own life

Behind my back you made the plans you had for me
You're aiming at a future that will never be... cos I'm

	Fighting for the right to live the way I like
	You've taken everything I ever owned
	But nothing you can ever do will hold me
	I'm fighting for a life to call my own

Going crazy in my room
Suffocating, in a tomb
Can't say what may happen soon
I've got to live my own life

You try to keep me in your debt
Rob me of my self-respect
And crush me till there's nothing left
I've got to live my own life

Behind my back you made the plans you had for me
Still aiming at a future that will never be... cos I'm

	Fighting for the right to live the way I like
	I feel like I'm a stranger in your home
	But nothing you can ever do will hold me
	I'm fighting for a life to call my own

Can't stop... got to keep on
Can't stop... got to keep on

from 1990 album "We Never Had It So Good"  
by TR and Jakko Jakszyk

Where the sun lights up still waters in the harbour,
And where hungry eyes once stared out to the sea,
Yes it's there that I'll come home, across the dancing foam,
And once again I'll walk on Castle Island.

I remember years ago the place seemed quieter,
The rain fell softer still, the moon shone brighter
Maybe memory plays its' games, and the beauty's still the same
As when I took my first steps on Castle Island.

I smiled as I walked up past the old ballroom
Where in sharp creased suits we'd laugh and dance till dawn
And when Mary said "I will" my heart with joy was filled
But we cried as we sailed out from Castle Island

The city that we came to was a stranger,
Where neighbours passed you by without a word,
The work we did was hard and filled with danger,
Never found the promised land of which we'd heard.

We met up with fellow souls who'd left the old place,
And we'd drown our dreams in pints and whiskeys smooth,
And when Liam would sing a song, we'd be carried all along,
Transported through the tune to Castle Island

Now the years lie heavy on my aching shoulders,
And my weary bones cry out for rest at last,
When the circle is complete, the good earth will taste so sweet,
As they lay me down to sleep on Castle Island,
With my own folk I shall sleep 'neath Castle Island.

Lyric by Brian Mulligan, Steve Gribben and TR
from 1992 album "Living in a Boom Time"

Do yellow roses redden in the spring
And do yellow leaves... fall in winter
Do little children grow up overnight
And does smooth skin turn to wrinkles ?
Who... will answer 
Who... I wonder ?

Change... 
Everything will change
Is the answer
But who we change into
Is up to me and you
Change... 
Never-ending change, yeah-yeah
Don't try to fight it anymore

Will the walking wounded learn to love again
Can a drunkard give up drinking
Will the broken soldier walk away from war
Can a cynic keep from sinking
Who... will answer 
Who... I wonder ?

Change... 
Everybody,
Change is the answer
But who we change into
Is up to me and you
Change... 
Never-ending change, yeah-yeah
	Don't try to fight it anymore

Lyric by  TR and Manu Katchè
from Manu's 1992 solo album "It's about time"

The first night I dared to come out on the town
It was hard believing my eyes
Met a fresh faced teacher in a big leather coat
On a dancefloor crowded with guys
And though he never told me he loved me
I know he never told me no lies

Hoping... moping
Freezing at the bus stop in Coldharbour Lane
Blew it... knew it
Hitting the bottle I could hardly remember his name

		Wasn't too easy
		It wasn't slow
		You wanna leave me 
		You'd better go

Time out taking the tube into town
To the upstairs room on the right
Stuck in the middle but feeling the need
To keep it up night after night
One time I hit the jackpot
Made out with the hottest in sight

Grinning... winning
He was a slim dark mover
With devastating eyes
Fun night... one night
He came and left me there barely saying goodbye

Boozing... cruising
Bitterly sipping a half pint of 'E'
Who's he... choosing
Clenching my toes
And just wishing to God it was me

		Wasn't too easy
		It wasn't slow
		You wanna leave me 
		You'd better go

from "Cabaret 79" album recorded live in 1979, released 1982
("Glad to be Gay" CD  in Germany)

Alice at it again 
With three Italian men
Gino once was a cop,
Then he soon had to stop
Outrageous, stuck on a limb
Full of papal bull...
Gun rusty, wet to the skin
The blasted english weather
Stops him getting it together so he's

	Crossing over the road
	Crossing over the road
 
Walking out of the store 
I met a mob at the door
Six civilians in drag
Ten cadets in a bag
Big bust-up, lead in the air
Somebody start a siege...
Fur flying everywhere
I ain't no bad samaritan - 
A dirty rat is what I am, I'm

	Crossing over the road
	Crossing over the road

Trying to be nice to the next-door neighbours
Leering over the fence
Feeding their cat on my racing pigeons
Just don't make any sense
 
I met a daddy today 
Got invited to stay
Put my stuff in the van
Went and told the old man
He turned purple, tore out his hair
What will Grandma say...
Look son, it's not that I care
But what about your fiancée 
I said, I'm better off this way - I'm

	Crossing over the road
	Crossing over the road

from 1979 album "TRB TWO"

In a cafè on the South Side
As the conversation died
I said "Fair enough, I'll see you"
But I never meant I'd try
Dissillusion's nothing new
Every God has feet of clay
Put on your cruising shoes
And fly away

My clothes were full of creases
And my mind was fit to burst
Trying to figure out the pieces
As I headed in to work
I never knew that losing you
Could have cracked me up this way
Put on your cruising shoes
And fly away

Far away...
Far away...
Put on your cruising shoes
And fly away

Now the years have passed so quickly
Haven't seen you in a while
But I still recall that doorway
And a coinbox with a dial
I was glad to hear you're happy
Too bad you couldn't stay
Put on your cruising shoes
And fly away

Far away...
Far away...
Put on your cruising shoes
And fly away

Written 1978 - unreleased

Seeing is believing a feeling
And something needs seeing to fast
I've had seventeen years of nowhere
Now they're trying to put me out to grass
Well I've always been a bit of a loner
And never had a life of my own
Coming of age I'm feeling the rage
That I never had the bottle to show

Every year of bitter submission
Been plotting my bitter revenge
The endless humiliations -
Gonna tear their eyes to pieces
Same way you treated the Peaches
Breaking their hearts and their bones
Now you gonna face the hatred
Of the dog you wouldn't have in your home

Now I'm coming out in the open
I ain't about to step on the rail
Footsteps follow on the tube train
But God help the man on my tail
Every one of you can take it or leave it
But you'd better get out of my way
I'm a jackal on the ultimate rampage
And a killer at the end of the day

Watch out wild women doctors
Witch hunt's out with the pack
Even if you're high and mighty...
You gonna feel that steely backstab
This time I mean to get even
It's the last time I mean to be hurt
They'll never get to figure what hit them...
Unless they get a gun to me first.

from 1979 album "TRB TWO"

It was in the days of discontent
Of  anarchy and rage
When Babylon was burning 
That the music came of age
The bands were fast and furious
Commitment was the word
The future still unwritten 
In the days that changed the world

It started out by word of mouth
That great unholy din
From auntie's midnight rambler 
And the NME within
An empire seemed to tremble
As the revolution stirred
The pistols they were loaded
In the days that changed the world

Days that changed the world...
The days that changed the world...
The pistols they were loaded in
the days that changed the world

When Ziggy got his big idea 
And Slowhand showed his cards
We rallied to the carnival 
And partied in the parks
Fat Martin and his bullyboys
From marching were deterred
When black and white united in
The days that changed the world

But later on the telethon
The stars came out to play
The global conscience came alive 
To feed the world that day
And after famous, rich and laid
The saint became a sir
He earned his reputation in
A day that changed the world

The days that changed the world...
A day that changed the world...
He earned his reputation in
a day that changed the world

The songs have been forgotten 
And the Verses have been burned
While dirty Mags and Rupert's rags 
Have left no stone unturned
With talking vermin crawling out
In colours new unfurled
Like you and I they all survived
The days that changed the world

Now Johnny's wearing Mambo suits 
With thinning orange hair
And Joseph in his combat coat's 
a denim millionaire
And me - so glad to be a dad
and living with a girl -
I hardly ever think about
The days that changed the world

Days that changed the world...
The days that changed the world...
I hardly ever think about
The days that changed the world

But sometimes in the dead of night 
I dream of other men
Of Rolan Adams, Rodney King 
and Jean Marie Le Pen,
The many friends who passed away
Whose voice was never heard...
Humanity's still waiting for
The days that change the world

Days that change the world...
The days that change the world...
Humanity's still aching for
The days that change the world

written 1992 - released 1994 
on RLOVE OVER RAGES album

We first met in the winter
Said "let's give it a try"
I swallowed my fears 
A couple of years
Just living a lie
I'd just come from the country
Wide-eyed and naive
I signed on the line
I signed a long time
Now you won't let me leave... but you

        		Don't take no for an answer (x3)
        		When you've nothing to lose... no you
        		Don't take no for an answer( x3)      
		Put yourself in my shoes

I don't want any trouble
I ain't after a fight
But well-respected man 
Please understand, man
You're standing in my light
No use sticking together
I've gotta get out and get off
I offered you a slice 
You told me no dice
Cos you wanted the lot... but you

        		Don't take no for an answer (x3)
        		When you've nothing to lose... no you
        		Don't take no for an answer( x3)      
		Put yourself in my shoes

from 1978 EP by Tom Robinson Band "Rising Free"

Got a pre-war hotrod Super Estelle
She been fitted with the four wheel drive
And she flies like a rocket if the octane's hot
And the time and the lights are right
Well we took the old road from Rostock
In the moonshine clear and bright
Where you can make180 on the straight
When the radar's off for the night

The Northbound carriageway's covered in cars
There's a couple of bridges down
But you figure out the sliproads soon enough
When you know your way around

Drive all night
Drive all day
Trying to drive 
My worries away

We crossed the border 'bout a quarter to four
As my brain began to ache 
With the checkpoints empty and the turnpike clear
As the day began to break
Well we had a few packs of vaccine
And a crateful of Duracell Two's
So we tanked her up and took a couple of cans
At a backstreet depot in Bruges

We ran into a lone control point
And it could have been the end of the line
But they recognised Eddie and they waved us on
And they took apart the car behind

Drive all night
Drive all day
Trying to drive 
My worries away

There were gasoline robbers at Salzburg
And we only had a couple of rounds
It was touch and go for an hour or so
But we shook 'em with our foot right down

Drive all night
Drive all day
Trying to drive 
My worries away

From 1986 album "Still Loving you"

Seems like yesterday you first started
As a rodeo cowboy in the big bull market
As the enterprise culture reached its pinnacle
Driven by an upbeat privatised miracle

Life is hard, though and times are leaner
For the banker, the broker and the window cleaner
And nobody's straw's shorter than yours
As the cuts get tougher and the streets get meaner

When the dividend of a divided nation
Is stepping over bodies in the underground station
The just rewards of the high and haughty
Are the P-45 and the UB40

In a downward spiral with zero option
You're fleeced in a deal of your own concoction
As the panic grows you suddenly know how it feels
As the boss says RWe're letting you go nowS

Ain't gonna be in that driving seat no more
Ain't gonna be in that driving seat no more

So hang up your braces and your paisley tie
You've lost your shirt, now you're wondering why
Your fairweather friends have all disowned you
And only your banker and the bailliffs phone you

Repossessing everything they burst the bubble, you
Hand back the keys to your BMW,
Lose your home with the sky high loan
And the lows on the Dow Jones cease to trouble you

Ain't gonna be in that driving seat no more
Ain't gonna be in that driving seat no more

Well maybe you could lecture on management structure
Or work part time as a driving instructor
But the business college is undersubscribed
And the motoring school's on an economy drive

You become a expert in adversity
Enrolled in the Hard Knocks University
Students everywhere beg and borrow, now
Praying they can pay it all back tomorrow, now

Ain't gonna be in that driving seat no more
Ain't gonna be in that driving seat no more

Originally commissioned for BBC Radio Four "Word of Mouth"
under title "What you gonna do now?" in 1992  
Released on 1994 album RLove Over RageS

After a month here out of the country
Thought I'd go up the wall
Twisted and turning - can't stop the burning
It isn't any better at all
Drove me over the wall...

So I'm stood at a slip road tired and unshaven
Next day at quarter to three
Left all the troubles so far behind me
I know where I want to be:

	I... wanna see Duncannon
	I... wanna see him
 
Found the name in a phone book, 
Major obsession - a mile away in the rain:
Out in the darkness,  psychotic schoolboy
Watching your window again
Looks like nothing has changed
(Always me, always me...)

	I... wanna see Duncannon
	I... wanna see him

Originally "Dungannon" on 'B' side of Sector 27 single "Invitation" 1980
subsequently re-recorded  on 1982 album "North by Northwest"

This is the place I got punched in the face
By another boy at school about the age of ten
I was a prissy little kid all smug and self-important
And too goody-goody by half
Having failed as a fighter, I tried to be a lover 
In my own small way - don't get me wrong 
These are not the days to be screwing around at all
Not if you can help it

Spent six years in an overcrowded manor 
For disturbed adolescents, in my fading teens
Haunted by the past and terrified by the future
The old man's words, I hasten to add...

	Driving through the desert as the sun beats down
	Where would we all have been without him

This is the way we used to go to Wenden's Ambo 
To cool off swimming after evensong
The place has hardly changed - only grown a little smaller
And quite a bit smarter since the estate agents came
And over there's the line of the old branch railway 
You wouldn't even notice now that the cutting's been filled 
I can still hear the railbus shuttle back and forward
But most of all, we miss the river 

It was many miles later, just around that corner
That I met the King Pistol - as he used to be then 
He said we had to gatecrash down at the Speakeasy 
Seeing as neither of us could even stomach the place 

	Driving through the desert as the sun beats down
	Fucking champagne socialists...

Another two hundred kilometers on 
And the sun's getting higher in the sky... 
I can't remember when we last ate fresh vegetables 
Or tasted cold water from a tap. 
Mirages shimmer in the distance 
But I couldn't give a toss about that anymore
Cos we've got enough gasoline to keep us going 
Well into the next century

Still, this road carries on, carries on
Must end up somewhere, I suppose
And who needs water when we've got Castlemain XXXX 
And a king-size box of rubbers 

	Driving through the desert as the sun beats down
	Driving through the desert as the sun beats down
	
	Look out for that gully - 
	last thing we need is a busted back axle at a time like this
	
	Driving... we are driving home
	Driving... we are driving home
	
	I think this is where I get off

from 1990 album "We Never Had It So Good"  
by TR and Jakko Jakszyk

Seventeen years I've been running and hiding
Never thought loving was sweeter than this
Now I'm alone again I'm only thinking
Of soul brother Steven, the man that I miss

Now I'm alone again I'm only thinking
Of soul brother Steven
The man that I miss

Carry on cruising the crowds at the Catacombs
carry on hustling into the night
Easy way out for the suckers and chickens
But I've lost my mainman, the love of my life

Easy way out for the suckers and chickens
But I've lost my mainman
The love of my life

Steal me a car and a bottle of Teachers
A few dozen downers - I'll go out in style
Goodbye sweet Steven and pretty boy Peter
I'll see you on Easy Street after a while

Goodbye sweet Steven and pretty boy Peter
I'll see you on Easy Street 
After a while.

from "Cabaret 79" album recorded live in 1979, released 1982
 ("Glad to be Gay" CD in Germany)

Staring all alone 
At your grace and style
Cut me to the bone 
With your razorblade smile
Cynical and lean... 
I lie awake and dream
About you

Love your gypsy hair 
And dark brown eyes
Always unprepared 
For your pointed replies
I watch you playing pool
It's all around the school
That I love you

If you only knew 
What I'm going through
Time and again I get ashamed to say your name
It's hard to grin and bear 
When you're standing there
My lips are dry, I catch your eye and look away

Sitting in my room 
I've got it bad
Crying for the moon
They all think I'm mad
They say it isn't real
But I know what I feel
And I love you

If you only knew 
What I'm going through
Time and again I get ashamed to say your name
It's hard to grin and bear 
When you're standing there
My lips are dry, I catch your eye and look away

Sitting in my room 
I've got it bad
Crying for the moon
They all think I'm mad
I would give my life
For a single night
Beside you.

Music by Elton John
 from his 1980 album "The Fox"

We set sail on a Monday
Tuesday was all at sea
Scrubbed the decks on a Wednesday
Thursday locker and key
Friday came to the coastline
Saturday I was ashore
Someday I'll quit this crazy business
And testify the law

Get even, Steven
Go down the line
Come in and get happy
And the sun will shine
Come on the right side
Get off your pride
Come in and be happy
And get satisfied

Met a young girl on a Monday
Tuesday I was in love
Saw her again on a Wednesday
Thursday wasn't enough
Friday I gave her a halfpenny
Saturday sat on her knee
Someday I'm gonna have to tell that girl
You're the only boy for me

Get even, Steven
Go down the line
Come in and get happy
And the sun will shine
Come on the right side
Get off your pride
Come in and be happy
And get satisfied

We made love on a Monday
Tuesday woke up alone
Broke out in a rash on a Wednesday
Thursday I lost a stone
Friday they certified me
Saturday I was in bed
Someday I'll quit this stupid song
And go back home instead

Get even, Steven
Go down the line
Come in and get happy
And the sun will shine
Come on the right side
Get off your pride
Come in and be happy
And get satisfied.

from "Cabaret 79" album recorded live in 1979, released 1982
 ("Glad to be Gay" CD in Germany)

Lock that door and turn out the light
Close the curtain on the world outside
Under the cover where I'm safe and warm
Feel so happy, like I'd never been born...

Feel so good... like I never been born

Don't bother knocking on my bedroom door
When I get this obsession I don't care no more
The need is on me and my need comes first 
Feel like the centre of the universe

Feel so good... like the centre of the universe

And it feels so good
But it's the worst feeling I've ever had
If it feels so good
Why does it always hurt so bad

I gotta get some money and I don't care how
I need satisfaction and I need it now
Gimme a problem and I'll fix it fast
But satisfaction just don't last...

Feel so good... but satisfaction just don't last

And it feels so good (feel so good)
But it's the worst feeling I've ever had
If it feels so good (feel so good)
Why does it always hurt so bad

Laid on the line 
I've been waiting and aching
Wasting my time
If I've got a problem
Well at least it's mine

Lyric by TR & Steve Jolley 
From 1986 album "Still Loving you"

What if we live to be fifty
And the optimists win by a mile
Supposing we stop the starvation and slaughter
And the century ends with a smile

Maybe recycling paper
Will bring back the forests again
And maybe the five year old psychos with knives 
Will grow up to be happy and sane

So give up your cigarettes
Work out and study
And carry a packet of three
We'll live to be rich and a hundred and seven
Unless you know better than me

What if we live to be fifty
And help all the weak and oppressed
We'll cancel their debts & no-one will expect us
To work any harder for less

We'll spend our way out of recession
The West will invest in the East
So hordes of the poor never swarm at our door
Demanding a share of the feast

So give up your cigarettes
Work out and study
And carry a packet of three
We'll live to be rich and a hundred and seven
Unless you know better than me

Science will beat every fatal disease
And plutonium's perfectly safe
They'll find a solution to all the pollution
It's only a matter of faith

What if we live to be fifty
And the bomb doesn't drop after all
And we never lie destitute, freezing and sick
As the mortar shells batter our walls

We'll cheer as our glorious leaders
Develop new weapons for peace
They'll base a new military laser in space
And the ozone will heal in a week

So give up your cigarettes
Work out and study
And carry a packet of three
We'll live to be rich and a hundred and seven
Unless you know better than me
From 1994 album RLove Over RageS
Tom Robinson

The many years that you have had me
Some went well and most went badly
That was nothing new
Lie in bed and think back sadly
Days we loved each other madly
Vanished in the blue

I come back home when I've been drinking
Tired and dirty, drunk and stinking
Broke and bitter, too
Shoot my mouth off without thinking
You just take it without blinking
Like you always do

Give us a break, that's all I ask
Won't you forgive me and try to bear with me
I've stolen just about everything you could give me
But give us a break, that's all I ask

Tried to work and sometimes made it
Ran in debt and sometimes paid it
Jobs came far and few
Thought of moving, then delayed it
Bit by bit our prospects faded
Always making do

Round the bookies, at the boozers
Drink my wages, back the losers
Still no change for you
Rent and tax men all but choke us
Hocked my raincoat at the brokers
To raise a bob or two

Give us a break, that's all I ask
People have used us, and creditors sued us
But beggars like us just can't be choosers
Give us a break, that's all I ask

First published lyric, written 1973 
recorded on "Cafè Society" album 1975 

What are you doing tonight old friend -
Do you fancy heading south ?
I need another drink
To wash this city from my mouth

I could call Macauley 
Get the boys out for the crack
But he just walked out on Mary
Says he won't be going back

It seems like only yesterday
We went to cheer the Reds
When half a pint of cider
Had us talking off our heads
We must meet up more often
Don't leave it quite so long
And though I'd love to talk some more
Old friend I guess I must be getting on

Dick Hennessey's a teacher now
And over six foot tall
He turns up nearly every day
And hardly drinks at all

And Tommy's back at college
Says he'll see it through this time
Macauley's got a book out
And he's giving five to nine

And it seems like only yesterday
We went to cheer the Reds
When half a can of lager
Had us shouting out our heads
We must meet up more often
We've left it way too long
I'm frightened by the silences
Old friend I guess must be getting on

Do you still see Theresa
Now they say she's quite a star
Is it wedding bells I'm hearing
Or last orders at the bar

Cos it seems like only yesterday
But people need to grow
Macauley thinks I'm dreaming
But Macauley doesn't know
I need to leave this place behind
I've waited way too long
It's time to find my real life
Goodbye old friend I must be getting on

Lyric by Brian Mulligan, Steve Gribben and TR
unreleased

The British Police are the best in the world
I don't believe one of these stories I've heard
'Bout them raiding our pubs for no reason at all
Lining the customers up by the wall
Picking out people and knocking them down
Resisting arrest as they're kicked on the ground
Searching their houses and calling them queer
I don't believe that sort of thing happens here

	Sing if you're glad to be gay
	Sing if you're happy that way

Pictures of naked young women are fun
In Titbits and Playboy, page three of The Sun
There's no nudes in Gay News our last magazine
But they still find excuses to call it obscene
Read how disgusting we are in the press
The News of The World and the Sunday Express
Molesters of children, corruptors of youth
It's there in the paper, it must be the truth

	Sing if you're glad to be gay
	Sing if you're happy that way

Don't try to kid us that if you're discreet
You're perfectly safe as you walk down the street
You don't have to mince or make bitchy remarks
To get beaten unconscious and left in the dark
I had a friend who was gentle and short
Got lonely one evening and went for a walk
Queerbashers caught him and kicked in his teeth
He was only hospitalised for a week

	Sing if you're glad to be gay
	Sing if you're happy that way

So sit back and watch as they close all our clubs
Arrest us for meeting and raid all our pubs
Make sure your boyfriend's at least 21
So only your friends and your brothers get done
Lie to your workmates, lie to your folks
Put down the queens and tell anti-queer jokes
Gay Lib's ridiculous, join their laughter
"The buggers are legal now, what more are they after ?"

	Sing if you're glad to be gay
	Sing if you're happy that way

Written in 1976 for Campaign for Homosexual Equality as "Glad to be Gay Part II" quickly eclipsing the well-meaning-but-dire original Part I (see following pages)  
Released on 1978 EP "Rising Free" by Tom Robinson Band

The British Police are the best in the world
I don't believe one of these stories I've heard
'Bout them spending three million to bust up a ring
Of consenting Leather Men doing their thing
It might have been private, where no-one complained
But the judge put an end to their S&M games
He sentenced the members to four or five years
I can't believe that sort of thing... happened here

	Sing if you're glad to be gay
	Sing if you're happy that way

The Liars of Wapping are really the pits
They pack them with trivia, bingo and tits
With racialist murders on council estates
You get Fergie and phone-in Dianagate tapes
With Clause 28 they all twisted the knife
They hounded Boy George to an inch of his life
If it's "Poofs in the Pulpit" or "Lesbian Scum"
If it's filth and it's fiction it's... there in the Sun 

	Sing if you're glad to be gay
	Sing if you're happy that way

And now there's a nightmare they blame on the gays
That's brutal and lethal and slowly invades
The figures have risen, the bigotry grown
While people are dying despised and alone
Attacked by the Vatican, bashed by The Bill
With cheap politicians all making a kill
The message is simple and obvious, please -
Just lay off the patients and let's fight the disease

	Sing if you're glad to be gay
	Sing if you're happy that way
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

(various other alternative verses performed 1979-92)

The British Police are the best in the world
I don't believe one of these stories I've heard
About pretty policemen in leather and jeans
Showing their leg through a split in the seams
Leering at people and leading them on
Then running them in when they start to respond
The press all ignore it, they don't want to see
Except when the case is... a Tory MP

Pictures of naked young women are best
In the News of the Screws and the popular press
They plaster their pages with bingo and tits
Then add all the scandal and slander that fits
The women at Greenham they smeared and despised
They crucified Elton with gossip and lies
If it's paedophile teachers or lesbian nuns
If it's filth and it's fiction... it's there in the Sun

A sense of proportion is where we begin
We're fighting a virus, not punishing sin
The medical facts are ignored or forgot
By the bigots who think it's the Judgement of God
The medics are baffled and caught on the run
They tell us the nightmare has barely begun
While government funding is worse than a joke
Cos saving our lives doesn't... win any votes

Now enemies everywhere laugh at the sight
Of gay against lesbian, dyke against dyke
I don't give a toss about who's in the wrong
The ins and the outs - or the faults in this song
We're getting oppressed and arrested and banned
While we bicker politically where we should stand
Forget the aggression from everywhere else
We still do a wonderful job... oppressing ourselves

With friends and supporteers from over the land
We're gathered together and making a stand
To fight for the right for a home and a job 
And to walk without fear of a kick in the gob
Slagged in the media, bashed by the bill
With cheap politicians all making a kill
We're lesbian women, we're men who are gay
We're here and we're human and... won't go away

With grateful thanks to Eric Presland for his help and suggestions 
over the years in keeping the references current and up-to-date
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Good To Be Gay (Glad to be Gay Part I)

	 It's the same old story all over the world
             When a boy meets a boy and a girl meets a girl
             We all come together cos we're happy to say
              It's a natural fact that it's good to be gay

We've been analysed, ridiculed and driven away
By our elders and betters just for growing up gay
They trampled on our feelings till we hid them for shame
Well now "Glad to be Gay" is the name of the game

	 Cos it's the same old story all over the world
             When a boy meets a boy and a girl meets a girl
             We all come together cos we're happy to say
              It's a natural fact that it's good to be gay

Don't feel guilty if you're passing for straight
If you wanna be yourself, well it's never too late
People won't mind if you're honest and gay
You might even find they prefer you that way

	 Cos it's the same old story all over the world
             When a boy meets a boy and a girl meets a girl
             We all come together cos we're happy to say
              It's a natural fact that it's good to be gay

Written as "Glad to be Gay" for Campaign for Homosexual Equality in 1975
 who pressed up a few hundred copies on their CHEBEL label. Later renamed to avoid confusion with better-known sequel "Sing if you're glad to be Gay"

Parisian Paul lives round the corner
Spends all his time at my place
He keeps on hanging around my girlfriend
She laughs a lot and never complains 
He makes me mad and so suspicious
He's patronising and rude
He calls me "Mr Beautiful" and treats me like a stooge
Remember creep, you're eating my food

Hey Mister Go-Getter 
Go get out of my life
Don't diss my girlfriend and me
Wise up sucker 
You talk too much, I'm sick and tired
This house ain't big enough for three

Let's all take a walk 
Let's go to the pool 
He's always crowding my space
I don't wanna go out walking 
I don't wanna hear him talking
Just want him out of my face

Hey Mister Go-Getter 
Go get out of my life
Don't diss my girlfriend and me
Wise up sucker...
You talk too much, I'm sick and tired
This room ain't big enough for three

Hey Mister Go-Getter 
Go get out of my life
Lay off my girlfriend and me
I'm no sucker...
I've had enough, I'm getting tired
This bed ain't big enough for three

Lyric by  TR and Manu Katchè
from Manu's 1992 solo album "It's about time"

We got water in bottles for a dollar a litre
Melamine Chippendale by the metre
Beer without alcohol, twice the price
Meat free sausages, nice nice nice
So sit up and listen to the marketing man:
We can save the environment for twenty five grand
We just need a brand new executive car
Just how green do you think we are ?

Green green green...a lovely BMW is
Green green green...just buy a new detergent and you're
Green green green green green green green green...

It's an eco-revolution using market forces
As we carry on guzzling the world's resources
There's a special green credit card to help the poor
It's just an excuse to sell you more more more
The nuclear fools are getting in on the act
Even late lamented Maggie's been saluting the flag
And if she gives a shit about the ozone layer
Then I'm a banana and a poll tax payer

Green green green...they're cynical and greedy but they're
Green green green...they'll sell you up the Amazon
Green green green green green green green green...

There's a gaping hole in the enterprise zone
And there's human pollution half a mile from home
All the biodegradable teenage creeps
Who beg in the subways, sleep on our streets
Recycle paper to escape the cold
Breathing lead-free fumes at the side of the road... they're

Green green green...they're ice cool, baby
Green green green...they're chilling out together, cos they're
Green green green green green green green green...

From 1994 album RLove Over RageS
Tom Robinson

You can't fool all of the people
And it galls me to remember I tried
Those whom the Lord 
Has joined with his sword
Let no man put aside
The kiss on your lips tastes of wormwood
So swing low, Iscariot, my friend
I'm promising you 
I'm gonna see it right through
I'm gonna hold out to the bitterest end

I'm gonna hold out... hold out
Hold out to the bitterest end

I fear neither hell nor high water
Come October this time I'll be gone
There's changes to be made 
And some debts to be paid
I'm a desperate man from now on
How are the mighty fallen
Living to regret every day
There's music to be faced
So I'm leaving this place
I'm gonna hold out and find my own way

I'm gonna hold out... hold out
Hold out and find my own way

from 1979 album "TRB TWO"

Men are husbands, men are dads
Casanovas, Jack the Lads
Men are brothers, men are sons 
Pray their fathersU will be done
Men of science, men of God
Men of action, in a squad
Men are Real and men are New
And men are people just like you

	So hard...

Men are friendly, men are flip
Laugh a lot and give you lip
Men are crazy, men are kind
Men are angels, men are swine
In the movies, men are brave
Seldom ever misbehave
Macho men are all the rage
Selling jeans and aftershave

	Men are sexy, men are sweet
	Men are faithful, never cheat
	Men are tough and never cry
	Men are truthful, never lie - and itUs

	So hard... 

Men are restless, men are shy
Commit themselves, theyUd rather die
Hide their feelings with a front
Say RI love youS when theyUre drunk
Throw their clothes off in a heap
Crawl in bed and fall asleep
Kiss you quick and say goodbye
And I should know, cos IUm a guy

	Men are sexy, men are sweet
	Men are faithful, never cheat
	Men are tough and never cry
	Men are truthful, never lie - and itUs

	So hard...
	To be a man.

At the factory, at the pool
At the match or sat in school
Riding bikes or making deals
Sat behind a driving wheel
In the playground, in the pub
In the bedroom - thereUs the rub
Boys impersonating men
And I should know - IUm one of them

	Men are sexy, men are sweet
	Men are faithful, never cheat
	Men are tough and never cry
	Men are truthful, never lie 
	Clever men with clever brains
	Spend the weekend watching trains
	Handsome men with happy lives
	Damaged men with damaged wives...

	So hard... theyUre
	So hard... and itUs
	So hard...
	To be a man.
From 1994 album RLove Over RageS
Tom Robinson

I was a fighter no-one could scare away
Hard and fast... hard and fast
Fancied myself as a bit of a tearaway
Hard and fast... hard and fast

	The harder the cases, the faster the race is
	The harder and faster we fall
	As we get older the world becomes stranger
	I don't understand any more

	Hard and fast... hard and fast

Each time I try to act like a man again
Hard and fast... hard and fast
Finish up busted, back in the can again
Hard and fast... hard and fast

	The harder the cases, the faster the race is
	The harder and faster we fall
	As we get older the world becomes stranger
	I don't understand any more

	Hard and fast... hard and fast

They use you and bruise you and strain you to breaking
Be glad if you leave here alive
You wish you could run but you're trapped in a corner
And duck as the punches arrive

Hard and fast... hard and fast

	The harder the cases, the faster the race is
	The harder and faster we fall
	As we get older the world becomes stranger
	I don't understand any more.

1988 single & theme song from Central TV series of same name
from album "We Never Had It So Good" by TR and Jakko Jakszyk 1990

One destiny in store for us
Our day will surely come
No nation more victorious
Our islands in the Sun
	
	Some hope, some glory
            Some future before me
            Some days... 
	Before the glory fades away
            The glory fades away

Yellow skies in strange formation
Warm wind and blinding rain
High seas and strange contagion
Our nation great again

	Some hope, some glory
            Some chance, some story
            Some hope... 
	Before the glory fades away
            The glory fades away

Our boys so brave and glorious
Our fathers' will be done
Our lady pray for all of us
Amen in kingdom come

	Some hope, some glory
            Some future, some story
            Some days of hope...
            Before the glory fades away
            The glory fades away

Fire on the hillside
Smoke on the waterfront
Wreckage in the harbour
Rats in the basement.

From 1984 album "Hope and Glory"

If I had my chance IUd do it all over again
If I had my chance IUd do it all over again
Been treated badly, been abused
Been suicidal and confused
But if I had my chance IUd do it all over again

I was seventeen when I made my way to the smoke
I was seventeen, I was homeless, hungry and broke
I hustled subways for a bite
And crashed in the cardboard city at night
But if I had my chance IUd do it all over again

I asked for change and you smiled, the day that we met
I asked for change - you offered me food and a bed
You gave me back my selfrespect
Yeah, loving youUs one thing IUll never regret
And if I had my chance IUd do it all over again

You werenUt cute but you knew what I wanted to do
You werenUt cute but you knew what I wanted from you
Where you took me IUd never been
Or dreamed of in my wildest dreams
And if I had my chance IUd do it all over again
----------------------------------------------

Since youUve been gone I canUt sleep easy at night
IUve got this cough and I canUt sleep easy at night
The friends we had are gone and dead
But youUre one friend I can never forget
And if I had my chance IUd do it all over again

From 1994 album RLove Over RageS
Tom Robinson

Darkness passing at the break of day
The groundswell high and the tide was grey
Invitation from the other side
But we have our reasons and I got my pride

	What have we got to lose if we try it on ?
	None of them bastards notice when we're gone
	What have we got to lose if we try it on ?
	Not one of them bastards notice when we're gone...

Hide or sleep and we shall find
It's either me scares easy or it's you that's blind
Invitation from the other side
But we have our reasons and I got my pride

	What have we got to lose if we try it on ?
	None of them bastards notice when we're gone
	What have we got to lose if we try it on ?
	Not one of them bastards notice when we're gone...
	

	Try...
	Try...
	What have we got to lose ?

From 1980 album "Sector 27"

I thought of you 
As Irish John 
The boy with everything
Most every time
I saw your face 
Around the scene

Then one evening come midsummer
Across a cruisebar
I saw you drinking alone and lonely
And caught your eye

You stumbled over 
And you mumbled a drunken something
I held your shoulder
And I told you a little lie

You never knew me
You never asked 
Too many questions
Although you talked 
For endless hours
About your past

Dropping downers from the doctor
To stop you trembling
Trying to follow as your speech 
Got soft and slurred

Stoned or sober
Drunken dramas I couldn't handle
And when I left 
You never said another word

I found a message 
Beside the phone
About a funeral
It took a minute 
Till it hit me
Just what you'd done

And at Gravesend in the morning
Twin brother standing there
Pathetic handful of people
Crying in the wind

In my mind 
I swore blind that I'd remember you
Irish John - the guy with nothing
Who just couldn't win.

Written 1977- unreleased

Sometimes my memories
Lead down this broken road
Alongside all the casualties and losers
And though the details 
Barely matter anymore
One night of darkness still pursues us

She wore that face 
No-one could penetrate
I smiled that smile 
I never could hide 

Somewhere in Jonestown
My childhood disappeared
One final showdown
That burned away the years
No-one leaves Jonestown
Unless they leave in tears
Don't go to Jonestown -
It's everything you feared

Someone once told me
What glittered wasn't gold
But I was too enlightened to believe him
I tried to find you 
As I stumbled through the night
But couldn't look behind as I was leaving

She'd worn that face 
No-one could penetrate
I'd smiled the smile 
I never could hide 

Somewhere in Jonestown
My childhood disappeared
One final showdown
That burned away the years
No-one leaves Jonestown
Unless they leave in tears
Don't go to Jonestown
It's everything you feared

Hey Joe, get out of the way
Somebody's got a hold on me
Go on, get out of my way
Somebody's got a hold
On me.

Lyric by Jakko Jakszyk and TR  1992 - unreleased

I was slumped in my chair full of apathy
With an ice-cool beer and a friend or three
Watching Bob Harris and Margaret T.
Doing Old Grey Nuremburg on my TV

With the King...				(King Kong, King Kong Elvis)
With the King...				(King Kong, King Kong Elvis)
At the Old Grey Nuremburg Rally 
On my TV

He was one mile tall with a big guitar 
There were planes and Argies and a coup d'etat
The manager was smiling with a big cigar
And talking to reporters from the Daily Star

About the King...				(King Kong, King Kong Elvis)
About the King...				(King Kong, King Kong Elvis)
At the Old Grey Nuremburg Rally 
On my TV

There were new romantics and the boys in blue
I saw skins and punks and Michaelangelo too
A dozen war reporters and a TV crew
And the King Kong Elvis sang right on cue:

"I'm the King..." 				(King Kong, King Kong Elvis)
"I'm the King..." 				(King Kong, King Kong Elvis)
At the Old Grey Nuremburg Rally 
On my TV

He was singing "I'm the King..."  		(King Kong, King Kong Elvis)
"I'm the King..."                           		(King Kong, King Kong Elvis)
At the Old Grey Nuremburg Rally 
On my TV

Everyone was singing "He's the King..."   	(King Kong, King Kong Elvis)
"He's the King..."			      	(King Kong, King Kong Elvis)
At the Old Grey Nuremburg Rally 
On my TV

Tribute to the obsessions of NME cartoonist Ray Lowry
from obscure 12 inch EP  "Atmospherics"  in 1982

Circling the earth in free rotation
High in the atmosphere
Space walking, space stations
We're all alone out here
Now is the time to kiss and roll over,
Lying awake at night

Above the curve of Mother Earth
Lock into orbit now
Over the oceans and rolling tundra
Pillows of nimbus spread out beneath us
We gravitate...

Won't you come home with me -
Why should we stay here ?
What will become of us -
Where shall we go ?

Who will look after us
When we get older ?
Who'll be here when we're gone - 
How shall we know ?

Now is the time to kiss and roll over
Lying awake at night

Meeting up together 
In a way we never do on earth  
(We never meet this way)

Meeting up together 
In a way we never do on earth   
(The way we do in heaven)

Won't you come home with me -
Why should we stay here ?
What will become of us -
Where shall we go ?
Who will look after us
When we get older ?
Who'll be here when we're gone - 
How shall we know ?

Now is the time to kiss and roll over
Lying awake at night

Lyric by TR and Dan Hartman 
from 1990 album "We Never Had It So Good"  

Well I'm six foot nothing of muscle and bone
With my Colt .45 I weigh seventeen stone
Got a Stetson hat and a big cigar
And I clean up trouble with my little tin star

		Law and Order... trouble in a bulletproof vest
        		Law and Order... I'm the troubleshooting king of the West

Well I cleaned up the commies and the longhaired bums
All the Chinee, queers and Red Indian scum
I cleaned out the liquor, loose women and dope
And put the uppity niggers on the end of a rope

		Law and Order... trouble in a bulletproof vest
        		Law and Order... I'm the troubleshooting king of the West

My mommy held tupperware parties
Had acne when I was a boy
Headed out West - expanded my chest
Now they treat me like the real McCoy

Now I never get trouble from nobody else
I can sit right back and feel proud of myself
Got the cleanest city this side of the West
It's so damn clean there ain't nobody left

		Law and Order... trouble in a bulletproof vest
        		Law and Order... I'm the troubleshooting king of the West

		I'm the cotton-pickin', high fallutin', 
		Rooty-tootin', put-the-boot-in 
		Troubleshooting king of the West

Lyric by TR and Dolphin Taylor
from 1979 album "TRB TWO"

After the thunder 
Jets from the junta
Over the countryside
See my amigo
He got the fever
Shelter him here tonight
On the estates 
And in the plantations
Settlements far and wide
Convoy arriving 
Son disappearing
Children afraid to cry

Let my people be
Thirty years of empty declarations
Set my people free
Hounded down in towns across the nation

How long will it take
How long do we wait?

High wind arising 
Out on the pampas
Villages lying awake
Pretty Pepito 
Why are you weeping ?
Friends are not far away
Rumour this evening
Government gunboat
Sunk on the river today
In the Sierras 
Something is stirring
Liberty blowing our way

Let my people be
Thirty years of empty declarations
Set my people free
Hounded down in towns across the nation

How long will it take
How long do we wait ?

From 1979 album "TRB TWO"

I hardly see your face above the paper
You can't recall a single thing I say
You hardly seem to notice my existence
And when I catch your eye you turn away

You disappear each morning after breakfast
And when you're late you never even phone
You crawl in after drinking time is over
And when I try to talk you start to moan:

Let's talk about it in the morning
I don't really wanna fight...
Cos I've only just got home
And I'm weary to my bones
And I need to sleep tonight

Let's talk about it in the morning
I'm not even half awake
I don't wanna start a fight
In the middle of the night
I've taken all that I can take

The days we work are long and soul destroying
For me the bank and you the motorway
I long to try and tell you how I'm feeling
But when we get to bed you always say

Let's talk about it in the morning
I don't really wanna fight...
Cos I've only just got home
And I'm weary to my bones
And I need to sleep tonight

Let's talk about it in the morning
I'm not even half awake
I don't wanna start a fight
In the middle of the night
I've taken all that I can take

Too tired to think of sex 
From one week to the next
To kiss is such a chore
You leave me wanting more
We're props upon a stage
Our lives have disengaged
We never seem to laugh
And you never clean the bath...

Let's talk about it in the morning
I don't really wanna fight...
And I know you just got home
And you're weary to your bones
So we'll sleep on it tonight

Let's talk about it in the morning
And yes, I guess it's kind of late
There's no use trying to fight
It's the middle of the night
And everything will have to wait

No it's no use trying to fight
And perhaps you could be right
And IUll try to change my ways

Written by Martyn Joseph and TR 1993
MJ version due for release 1995

Sick and lonely to a man
Cutting through the Zuider See
Limping in to Amsterdam
Battle weary and fatigued
Docking on Saint Stephen's Eve
As four and twenty hours of foreign leave 
Came into sight
Saw the city shining bright
A beacon in this flooded countryside
We'll spend the night...

Living in a love town
We were hungry to a man
Living in a love town
In the heart of Amsterdam

Boys and women on the quay
Broken english in the street
Cold and famine sweeping south
Such a welcome still we meet
After half a year at sea
The cobblestones and snow beneath our feet
Were soft and sweet
Castaways from far and wide
Wrecked together in this town tonight
On every side...

Living in a love town... we were hungry to a man
Living in a love town... in the heart of Amsterdam
Living in a love town... as the carnival began
Living in a love town...

After half a year at sea
The cobblestones and snow beneath our feet
Were soft and sweet
Saw the city shining bright
A beacon in this flooded countryside
We'll spend the night
Cast away from far and wide
Wrecked together in this town tonight
On every side...

Living in a love town... we were hungry to a man
Living in a love town... in the heart of Amsterdam
Living in a love town... as the carnival began
Living in a love town...

Lyric by TR and Peter Acock 
from 1986 album "Still Loving you"

Whatever happened to the old brigade
The hopes we had and the plans we made
Days and nights we spent together
Now those days are gone forever

Martin studied and he made the grade
Emigrated to the USA
Now he's working for Edison Con
On a research project, making a bomb

Ben's been selling retirement homes
Pinstripe whistle and a cellnet phone
Ripping off pensioners don't look good
If he didn't do it some other guy would

Pad those shoulders, swing those hips
Don't get angry, read my lips...we've all got

New opportunities
Knock-knock-knocking in a boom time
New opportunities
Let's forget about the gloom time...these are your 
New opportunities
Knock-knock-knocking in a boom time
New opportunities
Let's forget about the doom time (soon time)

Margo's happy with her cats and dogs
Given up people as a total loss
Says dumb animals got no choice
Firebombs laboratories to give 'em a voice

Dave just privatised his council flat
Home owner, drop of a hat
Interest went up, he couldn't pay
Big corporation gonna take it away

Shrug those shoulders, let's get hip
Don't get angry, read my lips... we've all got

New opportunities 
Knock-knock-knocking in a boom time... etc

Living in a boom time, we're
Living in a boom time, said
We're living in a boom time... now

Jamie's working out at the gym
No more dangerous living for him
Given up alcohol and ecstasy
Ever since he diagnosed HIV

No more parties, no more trips
Wise up suckers, read my lips... these are your

New opportunities 
Knock-knock-knocking in a boom time... etc

Living in a boom time, we're
Living in a boom time, said
We're living in a boom time... now

From 1992 album "Living in a Boom Time"

I grew up living in a Welfare State
Just the other side of the Brandenburg Gate
It's called East Germany everywhere
But locally we know it as the DDR     

Waiting for tomorrow, living for today
Living in the DDR
Sitting on a time bomb, we don't care
We're living for today
Living in the DDR

It's a people's paradise, you better believe it
Every other week people dying to leave it
Trucks full of Russkis carrying guns 
We'll be first in the fire when the third war comes

Waiting for tomorrow, living for today
Living in the DDR
Sitting on a time bomb, we don't care
We're living for today
Living in the DDR

After the party when the Wall came down		
They closed all the factories in my home town	
Shops full of everything money can buy		
Skint and miserable, wishing that I 
Was still living in the DDR		

Waiting for tomorrow, living for today
Living in the DDR
Sitting on a time bomb, we don't care
We're living for today
Living in the DDR

*pronounced RDay Day AirS
written 1990 - released on 1994 RLove Over RageS album
Tom Robinson

Riot out on Sunset
Foxes in the sand
Inspiration -
Anvil in my hand
Disconnection Friday
Kindest cut of all
Gonna fix some chicken
Have myself a ball

Watch out for the loner boy
Watch out for the loner

Craze across the water
Keep it on the one
Skinflicks in the quarter
For a crumb
Inside information
No skin off my nose
Trying to tell a tiger
By his clothes

Watch out for the loner boy
Watch out for the loner

I've seen it on the sidewalks
Seen it in the town
I feel it deep inside me
Feel it all around
The moon is high and rising
The night is young and warm
I won't be heading home 
Before the morning dawns

Sometimes strike acquaintance
Sometimes pay the bill
It's time to pick a winner - and I will
No two ways about it
See just what I like
Tonight is gonna be my lucky night

Watch out for the loner boy
Watch out for the loner

1979 lyric by TR and Jo Burt
from 1984 compilation album in aid of British Deaf Association
"Sometimes a great Notion" released through EMI ( TOP CAT 1)

Hey Joe, get up and go
Wouldn't like to tell you twice
Hey mac, get off my back
Didn't ask your advice
There's all this heat 
Out in the street
Telling us to move along

	It's gonna be a long hot summer
	From now on

Hey man, I don't understand
We ain't hardly bothering you
Say fag, you're just a drag
We ain't nearly finished with you
There's all this heat 
Out on the beat
Telling us we don't belong

	It's gonna be a long hot summer
	From now on

Hey Dan, give us a hand
We won't make it alone
But we can all make a stand
Next time the whistle's blown
So get your feet 
Out on the street
When you hear the heat is on

	It's gonna be a long hot summer
	From now on

	Look out sisters
	Look out brothers
	We won't be fooled again.

From TRB's first album "Power in the Darkness" 1978

It's four in the morning and I'm ready to drop
Sweat running off in a state
Out of the front door and into the street
Still 105 in my shades
There's an army of angels revving at the roadside
Seventeen stone to a man
Dissatisfied customer pinned against the wall
By a man with a hook for his hand

I try to hide and sidle by half a dozen queens of the night
Stand right by a Girlie who tells me she's knocking off early
And pulls me aside
There's people keeling over trying to lean in the doorway
But the bodyguard's seven feet wide

Looking at you, kid - they're looking at you
They're looking at you but what can you do ?

A big fat limousine crawls along the kerb
And the man with the hand clambers in
Sat in the back I'd have sworn that I saw
A black beauty and the silverhaired king
Band running out, jumping straight in a cab
Sirens out in the bay
Teenage nurse starts crying on the sidewalk
Limousine heading my way

Electric window roll down and somebody pulls out a knife
The women just listen, say
"Sonny, there ain't no commission on this one tonight"
I'm scared as a cat and it's just another Saturday morning
On the lower East Side

Looking at you, kid - they're looking at you
They're looking at you but what can you do ?

Lyric by Jo Burt and TR
From 1980 album "Sector 27"

Don't want to meet your family, I don't want to know your friends
I don't even need to know if this story has an end
I don't want to get no card on Valentine's day
Please don't write me letters, babe, inviting me to stay
Don't want to spend my evenings staring at the clock
Don't wanna be a-worrying every time your parents knock
But this sweet song within me is needing to be heard
We both know the rhythm, now come on and say the word

I just wanna be loved by you
Loved by you... 
I wanna be loved by you

Don't want no big commitment, don't wanna plan our lives
Don't need no fancy dinners by romantic candlelight
This fire inside me is burning to get out
I don't care who hears me - I just wanna shout

I just wanna be loved by you
Loved by you... 
I wanna be loved by you

Our love don't need maturing like some fine old claret wine
Let's uncork the bottle, now - I'm tired of wasting time

I just wanna be loved by you
Loved by you... 
I wanna be loved by you

Lyric by Steve Gribben, TR and Brian Mulligan 1992 
Released on 1994 RLove Over RageS album

Have you heard an ugly whisper
Is the rumour really true
Just in time, we're next in line
They're really after me and you
Since the demonstration
Clamping down on every side
Rounding up the kids at random
Army curfew every night

Don't repeat this conversation
Don't let on we've met before
Try and make like I'm a stranger
I'm a man you never saw

Church police were round this morning
And the army's on our track
Took away my books and papers
Only just got out the back
I just called in to tell you
That your place is being watched
Don't go into work tomorrow
Try and make it down the docks

Don't repeat this conversation
Don't let on we've met before
Try and make like I'm a stranger
I'm a man you never saw

Dump your car and burn your letters
Smash your glasses, cut your hair
Buy a suit and take a raincoat
When you go, don't tell us where
Take a look outside my window
I don't recognise that van
Someone standing in the doorway
Better make it while you can

Don't repeat this conversation
Don't let on we've met before
Try and make like I'm a stranger
I'm a man you never saw

From TRB's first album "Power in the Darkness" 1978

I just want to tell you about Martin
Cos nobody I know has got a brother like him
As kids we could never be parted
The neighbours all knew us as the terrible twins
At school some kids were always looking for a fight
But Martin never wanted a fuss
Bigmouth Brown thought he'd push him around
Being three years older than us
So I smashed him in the mush with the cloakroom stool
I got six of the best and suspended from school

	But it was worth it with a brother like Martin
	It was worth it with a brother like him

We used to nick motors for a joyride
Till we rammed a Black Maria in this XJ6
To give Martin time to get clear
I tried to punch a few policemen before I got nicked
I got Borstal for taking and driving away
And beating up the boys in blue
But Martin never missed a single visiting day
He hitched from Clapham to Crewe
With all me racing mags and the little bits of news
Smuggling in ciggies and a little bit of booze

	No-one ever had a brother like Martin
	No-one ever had a brother like him

People get the wrong impression with Martin
I know he doesn't mix much but he's no snob
The weekend I got out of remand home
He'd got Uncle Ruby to find me this job
And back at my Nan's he'd repainted my room
And bought me a brand new carpet
There was all me old records and books on a shelf
And a secondhand telly from the market
You can get a bit hard when you've been inside
But I hugged the old bastard and I almost cried
	
	Cos no-one ever had a brother like Martin
	No-one ever had a brother like him

from 1978 EP by Tom Robinson Band "Rising Free"

Crowbait clamouring 
Dark and hard
Penned in, pack of lies
Plaza yard
Barefoot, blubbering
"What's your name ?"
Front fork buckled up
Pump and chain

	Face to face to face to face 
	With Mary Lynne
	Silver street, December in the rain
	Facing failure takes a bit of burying
	Memories of memories 
	Of Mary Lynne

Now and then I think about
A place I knew
Dead of night, out of bed
A boy like you
Overweight, underhand
Out of bounds
Shelter in.. the waiting room
Council town

	Face to face to face to face 
	With Mary Lynne
	Audley junction waiting for the train
	Let's face it, failure takes a bitter burying
	Memories of memories 
	Of Mary Lynne.

From 1980 album "Sector 27"

Me and Joanna 
We met on the run
I was with my lover 
And she was with her mum
The restaurant was crowded -
I stepped out to use the phone
She slipped away to join me 
And invited me back home
I miss you Joanna
Been lonely ever since we've been apart

Me and Joanna
We mystified them all
We ran away to Gretna
And got married in the fall
I worked to make her happy -
She worked to pay the rent
We lived it up in Brixton 
And we settled down in Kent
I miss you Joanna - 
Been lonely ever since we've been apart

Joanna... you don't know what you do to me
Joanna... the only one I'll ever need
Joanna... the only woman ever broke my heart
Joanna... I've been lonely ever since we've been apart

Me and Joanna 
Threw parties for a spell
We shared our every pleasure
And our party guests as well
Till one who stayed for breakfast 
Stepped out to use the phone
She slipped away to join him 
And that night I slept alone
I miss you Joanna - 
Been lonely ever since we've been apart

Joanna... you don't know what you do to me
Joanna... the only one I'll ever need
Joanna... the only woman ever broke my heart
Joanna... I've been lonely ever since we've been apart

written  by TR and James MacMillan 1991 - unreleased

Everybody's on vacation -
Have a holiday, take a break
Spend and borrow, there's no tomorrow
So get your present today
Take some time and stuff the turkeys
Watch the Western world go by
Pull a cracker and light the candles
Merrily up on high

Lets all party -
War has started
Let's forget about days gone by
We won't see another year like it
So drink your dinner tonight:
It's no use to face the future
Count to twenty -
Close your eyes
This year, next year
Thermonuclear
Merrily up on high

End of term administration
Private prison or public school
Graduation celebration
Everyone playing the fool
Family gathering - strained relations
Festive gesture, don't say die
Drunken patients, old acquaintance
Merrily up on high

Lets all party -
War has started
Let's forget about days gone by
We won't see another year like it
So drink your dinner tonight:
It's no use to face the future
Count to twenty -
Close your eyes
This year, next year
Thermonuclear
Merrily up on high.

Written for Christmas charity concert by TR and Peter Gabriel 1978
Subsequently released  on 1982 "North by Northwest" album
Music by PG

Day after day I've been living in dread
Cheating at work and lying in bed
No hard feelings, just a bit of regret
I could have been lying in your arms instead
I'm glad that I married and I love my kids
I wish I'd never met you 
But I'm glad that I did
Now I'm sitting in the middle 
Trying to fit in more lives than one

Day after day I've been slipping away
Playing the games I don't want to play
Sooner or later there's a reckoning day
I'm so, so sorry - but what can I say ?
I feel like a heel but I can't decide
Between the life I always wanted 
And the loving that I like
So I'm sitting in the middle 
And it's hitting more lives than one
It's a bitter situation 
And it's taken more lives than one

originally commissioned in 1984 as theme music 
for the BBC2 Play For Today "More lives than One"
and featured on 'B' side of 1985 single "Prison"
Re-recorded on 1992 album "Living in a Boom Time"

Give me all of your money and I won't  kill you
Sounds like a straight-up, fair enough deal to me
I want your cash card, watch, your wallet and car keys
My trigger's getting itchy - gotta empty my magazine

You've got a way... a way with words
You've got a way... with ladies, baby
You've got a way... to get rich quick
But you'll never get away with murder -
And it's murder  
At the end of the day
And you'll never get away with it

Give me all of your money - maybe I won't kill you
But you'd better not hold anything back from me
I want your wallet and I won't take no for an answer
My trigger's getting itchy just to empty my magazine

You've got a way... a way with words
You've got a way... with ladies, baby
You've got a way... to get rich quick
But you'll never get away with murder -
And it's murder  
At the end of the day
And you'll never get away with it

All at sea
All at sea
Out at sea
Steve and me
In the wreckage of a lifeboat
In the wreckage of a burnt-out lifeboat
We were washed ashore in the dawn of a Monday morning
Got back to the flat, it was shattered and black with the roof stowed in
Look out, Lusaka and London - there's a hurricane blowing tonight
Fireball and high water rising - gonna see this beauty 
Shoot.

So give me all of your loving and I won't kill you
But you'd better not hold anything back from me
I want your body and I won't take no for an answer
My trigger's getting itchy - gotta empty my magazine

You've got a way... a way with words
You've got a way... with ladies, baby
You've got a way... to get rich quick
But you'll never get away with murder -
And it's murder  
At the end of the day
And you'll never get away with it

From 1984 album "Hope and Glory"

I grew up on the Gaza strip
A pirate and a clown
And no-one in authority
Could ever grind me down

Been upside down and inside out
More cynical than sinning 
And if you think you know me well
I'm only just beginning... 

Hey, hey... I can't stay
I'm gonna go my own sweet way
Living life from day to day
No matter what you do or say
Hey, hey, hey.... my own sweet way

Society has lied to me
I grew up and believed
That men were men and never cry
Or show the way they feel

You filled me up with prejudice
And tried to waste my time
You won't get any more of me
The rest is strictly mine

Hey, hey... I can't stay
I'm gonna go my own sweet way
Living life from day to day
No matter what you do or say
Hey, hey, hey.... my own sweet way

I wish I'd seen it all before
I wish I'd wondered how
to smell the rain and see the trees 
I'm glad to have it now

And looking back on everything
I've undergone and known
It's funnier than words can say
And way too close to home

Hey, hey... I can't stay
I'm gonna go my own sweet way
Living life from day to day
No matter what you do or say
Hey, hey, hey.... my own sweet way

lyric based on the life and experiences of Frank Gilchrist
from album "We Never Had It So Good" by TR and Jakko Jakszyk
 subsequently re-recorded on 1992 album "Living in a Boom Time"

Never meant to be so friendly
Never made the room look nice
Never heed a word of warning
Never take my own advice...
Oo-ooh, I got a brand new problem:
Pretty and he's five foot ten
I've been in love three times this week -
I'm just about to fall again...

I don't wanna fall in love
I'm never gonna fall in love 
Again...
No I don't wanna fall in love
Never gonna fall in love
I'm never gonna fall in love
Again

Never meant to be so sexist
But it's so hard to overcome
Trying hard to fight the feeling
Lechery can be such fun...
Cos everywhere there's lots of foxes
And every cat I meet's a Tom
I wish he didn't make me rabid
Wish he wouldn't turn me on... cos

I don't wanna fall in love
I'm never gonna fall in love 
Again...
No I don't wanna fall in love
Never gonna fall in love
I'm never gonna fall in love
Again.

Music by Elton John, from his 1979 album "21 at 33"

For christsake Chrissy, won't you open the door -
Don't tell me you're still sleeping
All hell's going on in the street outside
All the roads are closed this evening
Tried to call you but the lines are jammed
Don't say you're not ready after all we planned

Sail on the night....
Sail on the night tide.

There's no need packing, you can leave your keys
We're running out of time now
That money's worth nothing when we're all at sea
Leave it all behind now
Down the culvert and across the tracks
Down to the river as we turn our backs

Sail on the night....
Sail on the night tide.

There's only one way out of town tonight
Miss the mayhem if we time it right

Sail on the night....
Sail on the night tide.

Lyric by TR and Jo Burt
 from "North by Northwest" album 1982

Open your eyes and take a look around you -
Is this your idea of paradise ?  
With chickens running in the middle of dusty roads
And broken pickup trucks 
Rusting in the ditches
Where men work night & day 
With hammers in the scrapyards

No country...
No country's free

Some people have more money
Some people have more fun
Some people have more choices
Some people they have none
Some people find enlightenment
Some people go insane
Some people find their freedom
Some people live in chains

Freedom is strictly relative -
One man's pillow is another man's doorstep
Look left, look right, look left again
There are no certainties anymore
Anyone who tells you different 
Is either a liar or a fool

No country...
No country's free

Lyric by TR, Manu Katch  and Connie Fisher
from Manu's 1992 solo album "It's about time"

I've been around, I've had my kicks 
And I've picked up one or two party tricks
There's those that drink, those that smoke
And those that like a little line of coke
There's cocaine places, cocaine folks
Cocaine mirrors and cocaine jokes
It's a little bit wicked and widely done
And everybody tells you it's a bunch of fun

Well it ain't as sweet as people say
You're up all night but you're down all day
It rots your nostrils, burns your brain
And it kills your liver instead of your pain
You call up dealers, rack your brains
When they ain't at home or the line's engaged
In your heart of hearts you know it's true
Cocaine's a killer - and it's killing you

Well you're killing off years of your life right now
Cos we might all die soon anyhow
Well in five years time you're gonna look so dumb
When we haven't been blown to Kingdom Come
Remember life before cocaine - 
Ain't it time you started living again
You spend your money hand over fist
In an ideal world would you live like this ?

Now I'm not saying it's morally wrong
I did it myself for far too long
And I'm not saying I know better than you -
I'm saying I know and you know it too
I ain't no killjoy, ain't no shrink
And I ain't a preacher - whatever you think
I'm simply giving my point of view
And if you don't like it... fuck you

The real thing...
It ain't nothing like the real thing...
The real thing...
I'm talking 'bout the real thing...

(Charlie C - you're such a creep
Got no money, get no sleep
Tense and edgy, ill at ease
Taking my friends away from me
Charlie bastard - you're to blame, 
Acting crazy, feel insane
If I had my time again 
I'd never mess with King Cocaine...)

Lyric by TR and Paul Harvey
TR solo single from 1986 album "Still Loving you"

The lights of home are burning low
And time ran out a little time ago
The ranks are closing and the lines are drawn
They call for surrender but it's almost dawn
I'm not ready, I'm not ready

	And I'm down... down... down
	Down on my knees - I'm not ready
	Yes I'm down... down... down
	Down on my knees

It's hard to be paid and it paid to be hard
I've fallen for a sucker and it's only the start
Moonlight meeting up under the trees
My heart starts hurting and I'm down on my knees
I'm not ready, I'm not ready... 

	And I'm down... down... down
	Down on my knees - I'm not ready
	Yes I'm down... down... down
	Down on my knees

I never expected a pie in the sky
But anything's better than a kick in the eye
I'm not ready, I'm not ready... 

	And I'm down... down... down
	Down on my knees - I'm not ready
	Yes I'm down... down... down
	Down on my knees

	I'm not ready...
	I'm not ready.

From 1980 album "Sector 27"

Martin's gone... Martin's gone
Things will never be the same again
Now Martin's gone

I told my mother and the boy next door
The girl at the garage and my brother in law
I talked to the doctor and I told my boss
The launderette lady and the corner shop
I told the postman, then I told a gag
I told Claire Rayner and the local rag
I told the barmaid and the landlord too
I told everybody in the world I knew

Martin's gone... Martin's gone
Things will never be the same again
Now Martin's gone

I told our father and my favourite guys
Ten Hail Marys and a few white lies
I told the Samaritans, I told my dog
I talked to the telly and the talking clock...

Back on the wagon when the nights are dark
I drive by the diner where I made my mark

Martin's gone... Martin's gone
Things will never be the same again
Now Martin's gone

First released as Sector 27 single "Martin's Gone" 1981
subsequently re-recorded  on 1982 album "North by Northwest"

Well we used to see his roller all around the Gate
With the smoked glass windows and the personal plates
In the big league bastards he was Number One
He had half of North Kensington under his thumb
Sweet as razorblade, twice as cruel
Compromising as a paranoid mule 
Warm and assuring as a sawn-off gun
Everyone was terrified of Number One

	Get some protection
Everybody had to get protection
	Get some protection
You'll never get ahead without protection

He had a half-inch barnet and Italian shades
Went jogging with the doberman every day
Had a West End attorney in a jacket and tie
And all the cops in his pocket that his money could buy
Sweet as razorblade, twice as cruel
Compromising as a paranoid mule 
Warm and assuring as a sawn-off gun
He was Notting Hill's answer to Atilla the Hun

	Get some protection
Everybody had to get protection
	Get some protection
You'll never get ahead without protection

Well he got a bit cocky - so the story goes
And he ended up treading on too many toes
The Ali supermarkets they decided to fight
And the sons of Mohammed took him out that night
The police followed them to Acton Town
But a burnt BMW was all they found
Nobody testified, everyone
Was glad to see the back of him - Number One

	Get some protection
Too bad he never had protection
	Get some protection
You never get ahead without protection

From TRB's final album "The Winter of 89" released 1992

B-R-I-T-A-I-N
Living in the world today
Our people been here for twenty-five years
Together and we're here to stay

Black, white dynamite
Together we're doing OK
Black, white together tonight
Together we are here to stay

Welcome to the UK carnival
Yorkshire chapatis for tea
Mister please won't you leave us in peace
That's the only way we want it to be

Black, white dynamite
Together we're doing OK
Black, white together tonight
Together we are here to stay

We had better get it together
We had better get it together
Together forever
Together forever

1978  theme song from Thames TV series of same name
'B' side of "Bully for you" single 1978
Not the duffest lyric ever written
But pretty close

These will be the days 
That we'll remember in days to come
The years slipped by so quickly
Now we're none of us so young
I'm frightened by emotions 
Too wild for my control
Sometimes I've tried to hurt you
And at times I hurt us both
I cry out loud thinking back about 
How I've been so blind and dumb
And I'm still shaken by your grace and innocence
After all we've been and done

And if I should dream, it'd be of you
Of you old friend, oh yeah
No one I know has the power to move me
The way you move me
And you do...

Loving you has never been easy
Oh but maybe I've been trying too hard
Cos at last I can start to see you 
And to know you as you really are
You walk ahead with a spring in your step
And a twinkle in your eye
I'm so weary and I'm aching all over
But I finally feel alive

And if I dream, it'll be of you
Of you old friend, oh yeah
No one I know has the power to move me
The way you move me
And you do...

Loving you has never been easy
And I never thought I'd get this far
But at last I can start to see you
And to know you as you really are
I'm a bit of a cynic and too long in the tooth 
To try and overstate the case
And I don't want to embarass us both tonight
By saying this to your face

But if I should dream, it'd be of you
Of you old friend, oh yeah
No one I know has the power to move me
The way you move me
And you do...

Think I'd better go
Think I'd better go now
Old friend, I think I'd better go now

From 1984 album "Hope and Glory"
Re-recorded for EMI compilation "The Collection" 1987

One fine day... In the middle of a month of Sundays
One fine day... When the engines stop
One fine day... Won't be in to work on Monday
One fine day... To this scumbag job
One fine day... When I won't be undecided
One fine day... Gonna pay my round
One fine day... Looking back I'm gonna laugh about it
One fine day... When I've gone to ground

	It's just a matter of time
	Only a matter of time

One fine day... I'm gonna take the wages
One fine day... Underneath my nose
One fine day... I'll be on that train to Boston
One fine day... With a change of clothes
One fine day... I'll be happy as a one man bandit
One fine day... When I'm clean and cold
One fine day... When I'm wide awake at daybreak
One fine day... When the Pullmans roll

	It's just a matter of time
	Only a matter of time

Travel in the daylight
See you on the train
Station in the starlight
Never seen again
It's only the beginning
Whatever we intend
Nothing to live up to
Nothing to defend

One fine day... when I won't be undecided
One fine day... Gonna paid my round
One fine day... Looking back I'm gonna laugh about it
One fine day... When I'm gone to ground

	It's just a matter of time
	Only a matter of time
	It's just a matter of time
	Only a matter of time

From 1980 album "Sector 27"

Got an earsplitting headache 
And it's driving me blind
Can't work any faster 
And I'm falling behind
Mr Gillett's always on at me 
Getting hard on my case
Picking me up on...
Every little mistake

	Out-out-out in the cold again
	Out in the cold

There's a kid down the corridor doesn't know what to do
Standing in the passage, blue eyes on you
It could be the first time -
What on earth would he say ?
He'll never dare approach you
Now he's walking away

	Out-out-out in the cold again
	Out in the cold

Seems such a long way
Looks like a long way
Feels such a long way 
To go...

Stood up on your doorstep - try the buzzer again
Waiting on the pavement like a fool in the rain
Well you said seven twenty - now it's nine fifteen
Maybe you're trying to tell me something
I don't want to believe

	Out-out-out in the cold again
	Out in the cold

 from "North by Northwest" album 1982

Tom it's Colin here. Er... are you there ? 
If so, don't forget lunch today, erm...12.30 Ian Randall. 

Er... give me a call, or something, so that... it takes place
Bye.

You're not there are you ?  Tom, Colin here...
Tom, it's extremely urgent: we're meant to be having lunch with Ian Randall - where 										are you?
Tom... Tom, this is Colin - are you there?  
Are you there ? This is EXTREMELY urgent. 
I'm ringing to remind you we're meant to be having lunch with Ian Randall.
If you DO get in, while I'm at lunch, will you PLEASE go to L'Escargot 
(at the bottom of Greek Street) as fast as possible. The lunch is due to start at 12.30 
I shall be there. See you later. Bye.

Hi, I'm ringing on behalf of Colin Bell regarding your lunch date today.
Thanks very much - goodbye.

Tom, it's Colin here - are you there?  
Are you there, Tom ?  
You're not there.  
Well, I'm at L'Escargot. 
Alright...
Bye.

Hello - I'm calling on behalf of Colin Bell at the Press Office 
regarding your lunch date today.  This is Jill. 
Thanks.
Bye bye.

Hello - this is Jill here from Phonogram press office regarding your lunch date today.  Thanks.
Bye bye.

Here are you there
Here are you there
Here are you there

Are you there, Tom...Tom
Are you there, Tom...Tom
Are you there, Tom...Tom

Hello - it's Jill again ringing on behalf of Colin Bell at the press office...

EXTREMELY urgent
EXTREMELY urgent
EXTREMELY urgent

Lunch with Ian Randall
Lunch with Ian Randall
Lunch with Ian Randall

Tom, you lucky schmuck - you've missed a wonderful lunch with Ian Randall 
Heh heh 
Give me a call when you get in - don't worry about it, alright ? 
See you later
Bye.

With love, thanks and apologies to Colin Bell
'B' side of "Atmospherics: Listen to the Radio" single in 1983

Chained to the table, stuck in  a rut
Drinking tea with sugar in a plastic cup
I know every brick in the wall outside
Never been so bored in all of my life

	Sitting in prison
	Down in a dungeon

I listen to the rattle of the railway track
Wanna leave this place and never come back
I'm sat here looking at the fire escape
I just can't wait till visiting day (on a Friday night)

	Sitting in prison
	Down in a dungeon

I know this prison like the back of my hand
How can I make you understand
There's bars on the window, neon light
Electric fencing, dogs outside
I'm sat here watching you talk to me
Through a plate glass window you can't see
I wanna come out and make love to you
But I've got another ten years to do

	Sitting in prison
	Down in a dungeon

(Pigeon on the window
Little old lady in the park outside
Watching the clock
Every hour of the day and night)

	And I've gotta get out of here
	And I've gotta get out...
	Sitting in prison.

From 1984 album "Hope and Glory"
subsequently re-recorded as TR solo single in 1985

Portobello Terrace standing empty
Battened with corrugated iron
Broken bottles in the basements
Even the stinging nettles dying
Unfit for human habitation
Daylight showing through the rooves
Waiting for council renovation
Years since tenants were removed

Can't rent a room for love nor money
The council waiting list was seven years
Rather than cardboard on a pavement
One dark night we broke in here
A week of work was all we needed
To fit in doors and fill the frames
We patched the damp and fixed the windows
And settled in to stake our claim

We woke up one Sunday morning
Bailiffs breaking down the door
Council clerks, police and newsmen
Watching the squatters face the law
Threw our bedding out the windows
Hurled our clothes across the floor
The place was gutted top to bottom
And barricaded up once more

Portobello Terrace standing empty
Battened with corrugated iron
Broken bottles in the basement
Where mattresses and chicken wire are lying
Unfit for human habitation
Only one house has a roof
Waiting for council demolition
Years since squatters were removed

Written 1977 - unreleased

Power in the darkness
Frightening lies from the other side
Power in the darkness
Stand up and fight for your rights

Freedom...we're talking bout your freedom
Freedom to choose what you do with your body
Freedom to believe what you like
Freedom for brothers to love one another
Freedom for black and white
Freedom from harassment, intimidation
Freedom for the mother and wife
Freedom  from Big Brother's interrogation
Freedom to live your own life... I'm talking 'bout

Power in the darkness
Frightening lies from the other side
Power in the darkness
Stand up and fight for your rights

(Voice from The Other Side:) "Today, institutions fundamental to the British
	system of Government are under attack: the public schools, the house
	of Lords, the Church of England, the holy institution of Marriage,
	even our magnificent police force are no longer safe from those who
	would undermine our society, and it's about time we said "enough is
	enough" and saw a return to the traditional British values of
	discipline, obedience, morality and freedom. What we want is:

Freedom from the reds and the blacks and the criminals
Prostitutes, pansies and punks
Football hooligans, juvenile delinquents
Lesbians and left wing scum
Freedom from the niggers and the Pakis and the unions
Freedom from the Gipsies and the Jews
Freedom from leftwing layabouts and liberals
Freedom from the likes of you..."

Power in the darkness
Frightening lies from the other side
Power in the darkness
Stand up and fight for your rights

From TRB's first album "Power in the Darkness" 1978

One roaring morning at the break of day
Me and my buddy were still wired awake
Though the fog was freezing and the streets were cold
We went hell for leather up the coastal road

Stopped the Honda on a cliff
My buddy threw up, I rolled a spliff
In the glorious autumn... 
Of our roaring days

The mist made haloes in our hair
As we came down slowly through the market square
A fresh fruit trader gave us one plum each
We sucked and swaggered till we hit the beach

Shouting down the esplanade
Two shifty misfits acting hard
In the glorious autumn
Of our Roaring Days

The tide comes in, the tide goes out
We go our separate ways
Our roaring twenties came and went
And vanished in a haze
Driven, drunken, discontent 
Our oats were sown, our savings spent
In the glorious autumn... of our Roaring Days

In a jacked-up Datsun gleaming on the slip
Saw a teenage greaser eating eel and chips
We admired his styling - how we laughed and lied
Till he asked my buddy if we'd like a ride

Radio blazing Queen and Quo
All greased up, no place to go
In that glorious autumn
Of our Roaring Days

The tide comes in, the tide goes out
We go our separate ways
Our roaring twenties came and went
And vanished in a haze
Driven, drunken, discontent 
Our oats were sown, our savings spent
In the glorious autumn... of our Roaring Days

We were deaf and selfish - we were smug and dumb
And our bleak mid-winter, it was still to come
My buddy turned ugly and so did I
He took my money and never said goodbye

But in my daydreams now and then 
I long to wake up once again
In the glorious autumn... 
Of our roaring days

The tide comes in, the tide goes out
We go our separate ways
Our roaring twenties came and went
And vanished in a haze
Driven, drunken, discontent 
Our oats were sown, our savings spent
In the glorious autumn... of our Roaring Days

From 1994 album RLove Over RageS

We've been through the seasons
And circled the tide
We've ridden high horses
And laughed till we cried
You bring me back home
When I'm stranded inside
You can settle the tempest
In the deep of the night

Reach out to me... reach out and see
Reach out like the stranger
You want me to be
Reach out to me... reach out and see
Reach out like a stranger
And come back to me

There's no need to please me
I'm hung, drawn and down
We've suffered the silence
With feet on the ground
This peace is unbroken
So speak out you mind
We can keep our own counsel
And reap as we find

Reach out to me... reach out and see
Reach out like the stranger
You want me to be
Reach out to me... reach out and see
Reach out like a stranger
And come back to me

Written 1979 with music by Elton John - unreleased.
French language version "Les Aveux" by EJ & France Gall 
reached Numer One in France 1980.

My name's Duncannon and I used to deal
As a radar rigger on the Forties field
But in my face you'll see the scar
Of the petrodollar and the German car

	Oh, no no - Rigging it up Duncannon
	Oh, no no - Rigging it up tonight

Worked on a pipeline pumping crude 	
And lived with the shiftwork, gales and food 	
But the greatest danger, near or far 	
Were the boardroom barons with a German car 

	Oh, no no - Rigging it up Duncannon
	Oh, no no - Rigging it up tonight

They'd save on safety maintenance
They were mean and underhand
They'd maximise their bottom lines
In shelter on the land...

It was 0300 on the brig 	
When the nightmare happened on our sister rig 
I can see the fireball in my dreams 	
As the dot disappeared from the radar screens 

	Oh, no no - Rigging it up Duncannon
	Oh, no no - Rigging it up tonight

They sent for their insurance men
They sent for Red Adair
They sent the rescue services
To the rig that wasn't there...

You whizzkid cowboys of the range 	
As you make your killing on the Stock Exchange 
Remember the men you pressed too far 	
For the petrodollar and a German car 

	Oh, no no - Rigging it up Duncannon
	Oh, no no - Rigging it up tonight

From 1992 album "Living in a Boom Time"

She's a right on sister
And she knows what she likes
She needs you and me, man
Like a fish needs a bike
Suffragette city
Don't bother her none
Cos the women's revolution
Is bound to come... and I say

Right on, sister
Right on sister, right on

She's a clear level thinker
Just look at her play
She's got it together
In most every way
The women's army is marching
And the weak shall be strong
Power to the sisters
Right on, right on... and I say

Right on, sister
Right on sister, right on

Hamfisted tribute to feminist photographer Jill Posener
from 1978 EP by Tom Robinson Band "Rising Free"

You've a certain sartorial eloquence
And a style that's almost all your own
You've got the knack of being so laid back
It's like talking to the Great Unknown
You've got a selfsufficient swept-back hairdo
Pretty certain that you've got it made
Oh, your lifestyle shows in the clothes you chose
Sitting pretty in the Masquerade

Don't you wanna play this game no more
Don't you wanna play no more ?
I wouldn't really mind, but you seem so bored
Don't you wanna play no more, no more
Don't you wanna play no more ?

You remain the only mean contender
Though you never meant to lose at all
Down at mouth, yet unsurrounded
Adamant before the Fall
Oh when you go, you know I might be lonely
But I'll keep it under close control
Go and get your kicks and we can call it quits
I believe I'm feeling indisposed

Don't you wanna play this game no more
Don't you wanna play no more ?
I wouldn't really mind, but you seem so bored
Don't you wanna play no more, no more
Don't you wanna play no more ?

Music by Elton John, included on his 1979 album "21 at 33"
also on TR's "Cabaret 79" album recorded live in 1979, released 1982
available  in Germany as "Glad to be Gay" CD from Line Gmbh

Dressed for the disco ready to kill
Gonna burst my buttons 
And drink my fill tonight - alright
I've been sitting on the sidelines far too long
If I play my cards well 
I can't go wrong tonight - alright
And I won't give a damn about the whole wide world
If a Northern boy meets a working girl 
At the Saturday disco 

Once in a while there's a God-sent chance 
And I've just seen mine
Walk into this dance tonight - alright
Seems he's finally seen the light
And come out on the town 
For a real good time tonight - alright
Well I know what I want and I won't think twice 
Gonna get that fella if it takes all night 
At the Saturday disco 

Tonight... tonight
Let's get together at the end of the working week
It's gonna be... alright 
If it takes all night 
At the Saturday disco

I don't wanna hang around here and sulk
With you making eyes at the Incredible Hulk tonight - alright
You never care about the ones you hurt
And you're treating my feelings like a piece of dirt tonight - alright
But I know one day you're gonna change your mind 
I'm gonna keep out of trouble and bide my time
At the Saturday Disco - yeah yeah

Tonight... tonight
Let's get together at the end of the working week
It's gonna be... alright 
If it takes all night 
At the Saturday disco

Hey pretty women, Mad Max is here
I've been working all week 
Now I'm getting in gear tonight - alright
There's gonna be some laughs when I've had some beers 
Cos I've got no worries 
And I feel no fear tonight - alright
Well I ain't goodlooking but I wheel and deal
And I know how happy I can make you feel 
At the Saturday disco 

Tonight... tonight
Let's get together at the end of the working week
It's gonna be... alright 
If it takes all night 
At the Saturday disco.

Originally written for Hull Truck production of John Godber's "Cramp"
'B' side of "Still Loving You" single 1986

I've got to admit it
You do it so well
You're flashy and handsome
And clever as hell
You grin like a winner 
With twinkling eyes 
Then glance in the mirror 
And straighten your tie
You flirt and you flatter with panache and poise 
Look into the camera and lower your voice
You dress to perfection to please and appeal
Why do, why do, why do, why do
Why do I feel...

As you smile and smarm 
With your guile and charm
And your weasel words 
Seem believable as can be
There's a voice I hear 
Whispering in my ear
"Why's this slimeball lying to me ?"

You think that I'm stupid
You think we're all blind
You think you fool everyone 
All of the time
You think you're convincing
You glitter and smile
You think you're a hit 
But you miss by a mile
You lie in a whisper, you lie when you shout
You lie about lying when you get found out
Your manners are plastic, you wheel and you deal
Why do, why do, why do, why do
Why do I feel...

As you smile and smarm 
With your guile and charm
And your weasel words 
Seem believable as can be
There's a voice I hear 
Whispering in my ear
"Why's this slimeball lying to me ?"

I wish for an hour, or a minute, each day
You'd say what you mean and mean what you say
Forget all the cleverness, spare me the spiel
Why do, why do, why do, why do
Why do I feel...

As you smile and smarm 
With your guile and charm
And your weasel words 
Seem believable as can be
There's a voice I hear 
Whispering in my ear
"Why's this slimeball lying to me ?"

written 1989 - unreleased

I'm sorry if the soldiers have to hurt you, Mr Harris
You haven't really left them any choice
This must be quite a trial, you haven't eaten for a while
I wonder what's the matter with your voice?

If you told us what you know it might be wiser
No need to knock your head against a wall
If you told us who you know it might be wiser
I think it might be better for us all

I'm sorry but we simply don't believe you Mr Harris
We've seen you with these people several times
I appreciate your pains, but we need to know their names
It would really take a load off all our minds

If you told us what you know it might be wiser
No need to knock your head against a wall
If you told us who you know it might be wiser
I think it might be better for us all

That fellow Mr Jones you were detained with, Mr Harris
I'm afraid we found him hanging in his cell
So I've asked your little brother to assist with our enquiries
I hope he won't be difficult as well

If you told us what you know it might be wiser
No need to knock your head against a wall
If you told us who you know it might be wiser
I think it might be better for us all

I think it might be wiser if you told us
Then you have my word of honour you can go
I don't mean to twist your arm, we don't mean you any harm
But it's really quite important that we know

If you told us what you know it might be wiser
No need to knock your head against a wall
If you told us who you know it might be wiser
I think it might be better for us all.

from 1979 album "TRB TWO"

Leaving London in the pouring rain
Climbed high into the blue again
Over Europe, above an ocean
I was out on my own
On the tarmac, sunlight in my eyes
Like a furnace - half hypnotised  
In the haze I saw the mainland
Then I knew you were home

Spain... I finally came to Spain
Across the straits in Spain
Where I want to be...
Won't you come home with me ?

Battered taxis in the marketplace
Narrow streets, little alleyways
I was restless - kind of breathless
Still trapped in the past
Nightfall under the battlements
Sidewalk cafes and mandolines 
Across a table in the lamplight
When I met you at last

Spain... I finally came to Spain
Across the straits in Spain
Where I want to be...
Won't you come home with me ?

Spain... you finally found me
Spain... your arms around me
Spain... where I want to stay  
Won't you come home

Don't go - won't you stay with me
Leave home, fly away with me
Who will find us or remind us
When our moment is gone

Spain... I finally came to Spain
Across the straits in Spain
Where I want to be...
Won't you come home with me ?

Spain... you finally found me
Spain... your arms around me
Spain... where I want to stay  
Won't you come home

Lyric by TR and Peter Acock
from 1986 album "Still Loving you"

The first essential for a trawler, decreasing
She's icing up faster and faster
But they was really rough in their ways
I got a shilling for each pound
Recommended, laddie
She gave me a sixpence
Wooden built, they were -
the crew consisted of three men and a boy
Three or four years before you got accepted as a man
When you could do a man's work
I'd sooner be a convict...

The drifters, just like a town lit up
There'd be times nobody got any sleep
All come into it and every herring pulled out of it 
If there was a shimmer - a heavy shoal 
Halibut, cod, lobster...
Oilskin blisters and boils, called peps
Keen frost, blinding snow
Cold and pitiless as the hand of death
Collisions inevitable with sad loss of life:
Two hundred and fifteen men and boys
Drowned at sea 1909 within sight of home

Eight out of ten they was really rough
He was always
Don't call me bloody boy - I can swear
One dirty night, fifty foot up from the deck 
As a little boy of thirteen
The smack William Boyce 
Driving before the wind with a crew of five hands -
The vessel altogether unmanageable
You could see he was a fisherman
Jolly Bob Adams, lost off a smack

The sea was full of ships, full of them
You had to see them times to believe them

The sea was full of ships, full of them
You had to see them times to believe them

'B' side of Sector 27 single "Total Recall" 1981

I still recall those crazy nights
Days our love was at its height
The madness and the passion that we shared
Waking early in the gloom 
Beside you in that bedsit room
Magazines and letters everywhere

Payphone ringing in the hall
Cheap emulsion on the walls
The smell of winter in the air
With you I feel alive and clean
And happier than I've ever been
When I'm alone it's hard to bear

One day I will lose you and that I know
But sure as hell I'm gonna be yours forever
And till that day I'll still be loving you
The way I do while we're together
Be loving you... still loving you

The day we went back to the place 
You spent your wild unhappy days
The hometown of a teenage refugee
I lay beside you on the grass
As trains to London thundered past
The ghost of who you used to be

One day I will lose you and that I know
But sure as hell I'm gonna be yours forever
And till that day I'll still be loving you
The way I do while we're together
Be loving you... still loving you
 
Silences and sudden strains
Fall between us now again
I know you're always on your guard
But you don't have to be sweet to me
Be what you want to be -
Be rude and brutal if you are

One day I will lose you and that I know
But sure as hell I'm gonna be yours forever
And till that day I'll still be loving you
The way I do while we're together
Be loving you... still loving you

For Special K.
From 1986 album "Still Loving you"

He's offering a piece of the action
Contracts quick on the draw
The largest slice, the smallest price
And tax relief on it all
He's telling us "Fine, if you don't wanna sign
You can find your own way to the door"
Take or leave it... take or leave it

We're billed as a brand new attraction
But  it's business the same as before
You gradually find in a matter of time
What's promised is not meant at all
Come to the pinch he won't give you an inch
You might as well talk to the wall
Take or leave it... take or leave it

	So boys the choice is fair and free - take or leave it
	Just leave the business all to me - take or leave it
	Just leave the business - take or leave it 
	All... to me

If you fancy a life as a lobster
There's plenty of pots in the sea
It might be nice dropping in for a bite
But a little bit harder to leave
Paying your dues you got nothing to lose
But an arm and a leg and you're free
Take or leave it... take or leave it

	So boys the choice is fair and free - take or leave it
	Just leave the business all to me - take or leave it
	Just leave the business - take or leave it
	All... to me

We finally own our own label
Now we're independent as well
Our record's as hot as the image we've got
More committed than everyone else
Find a young band and we'll give them a hand
and let them decide for themselves
Take or leave it... take or leave it

With everything pressed by a major
Your share may appear rather low
But a credible name's your ticket to fame
So leave it to those in the know
Do as we say the alternative way
Remember who's running this show
Take or leave it... take or leave it

	Girls and boys the choice is fair and free - take or leave it
	Just leave the business all to me - take or leave it
	Just leave the business - take or leave it 
	All... to me

Lyric by Jo Burt and TR
From 1980 album "Sector 27"

Telegraph poles keep passing by
Cable looping in a hazy sky
Great North Eastern in the rain
Never thought I'd be back here again
But tonight...
This station with the name I still remember
Is a place I'm passing through

Take me home again... been too long on my own
Take me home again... still living all alone
Take me home again... to the place I used to go
Take me home again... to a face I used to know
When love was just a heartbeat away

Tonight, tonight...
Tonight, tonight...

High wind howling, fallen slate
Scuttle and ashpan in the grate
Wick on the kelly lamp burning bright
Wait till your Daddy gets home tonight
But tonight... 
This station with a name I still remember
Is a place I'm passing through

Take me home again... to the place I still recall
Take me home again... want to walk in through the door
Take me home again... to the place I used to go
Take me home again... to a face I used to know
When love was just a heartbeat away

From 1986 album "Still Loving you"

Here dirty dogs had stuff to hide	(All along the wall)
The place today is occupied		(All along the wall)
If your future is uncertain
Homeless, heading for a Burton
Berlin beckons to you all
To tango all along the wall

Final tango to the band
Darling, let me hold your hand
Every kid in all the land
Sings "I am a Berliner"

Commu-Cap-Apocal-ism		(All along the wall)
Kami-kaze-Pacifism			(All along the wall)
If your future's dead as mutton
Old men's fingers on the button
Berlin beckons to you all
To tango all along the wall

Final tango to the band
Darling, let me hold your hand
Every kid in all the land
Sings "I am a Berliner"

Dance in this volcano's crater		(All along the wall)
Set the warning lights for later	(All along the wall)

Lie right down, protect your eyes
You've gone and won the booby prize
As Berlin beckons to us all
To tango right along the wall

Final tango to the band
Darling, let me hold your hand
I know fuck all about this land
Cos I ain't no Berliner

All the way along the wall
All the way, all the way

N.B. English loses some of the nuances 
and the rhymes get a bit naff - sorry !

Hier machten H nde ihr Gesch
ft 	(immer an der Wand lang)
Heute ist der Platz besetzt		(immer an der Wand lang)
Wessen Zukunft ist verschwommen
Heimatlos und mitgenommen
La't sie nach Berlin herkommen
Und tango and der Wand entlang

Letzte Tango an der Wand
Liebling, gib' mir deine Hand
Jedes Kind im Ganzen Land singt:
"Ich bin ein Berliner"

Kommu-Kapi-Apokal-ismus		(immer an der Wand lang)
Kamikaze Pazifizmus			(immer an der Wand lang)
Wessen Zukunft ist verschwommen
Z
hlen Greise Megatonnen
La't sie nach Berlin herkommen
Und tango and der Wand entlang

Letzte Tango an der Wand
Liebling, gib' mir deine Hand
Jedes Kind im Ganzen Land singt:
"Ich bin ein Berliner"

Stepp' doch mal auf dem Vulkan	(immer an der Wand lang)
Macht die rote Lichter an		(immer an der Wand lang)
Auf dem Boden um zu sonnen
Ihr habt den Blumentopf gewonnen
Braucht nur nach Berlin zu kommen
Und tango an der Wand entlang

Letzte Tango an der Wand
Liebling, gib' mir deine Hand
Ich wei' gar nix von diesem Land, da
Ich bin kein Berliner

Immer an der Wand lang
Immer an der Wand, 
Immer an der Wand entlang

Original German lyric by TR and Horst K?nigstein 
TR solo single on Konkurrenz / Phonogram 1981
Live version with Udo Lindenberg on "Last Tango" album 1988

There's thunder on the Baltic
Radiation on the rain
Uncertainty and mayhem
In the wind again
Ever since I left you
I've been stranded on the tide
Just another hundred miles now
Till I'm by your side

Those happy days we used to spend
Do you remember the time of year... 
It feels like those happy days are here again
Those happy days are here

Now the days are getting colder 
And the nights are drawing in
Floodwater rising
As the waves roll in
Out across the Alster
I can see the lights
Hold out a little longer
I'll be home tonight

Those happy days we used to spend
Do you remember the time of year... 
It feels like those happy days are here again
Those happy days are here

 from "North by Northwest" album 1982

When I met you 
It was midway through the summer
Wearing dungarees 
Like a Dexy's Midnight Runner
We spent three or four weeks together 
And hit the rocks in no time whatsoever

	I've chewed right through the end of my tether
	It looks like we ain't gonna live forever in clover
	Call me arrogant - perhaps I am
	But I ain't a tramp and this little romance 
	Is over... it's all over

Every time there's a break in the conversation
You imagine I'm lost in admiration
You may be cute but you ain't no sensation
And I can do without the aggravation

	Whoever might be my ideal dream
	I know it ain't gonna be some teenage poser
	You still think I wanna get into your pants
	You're crazy baby - this little romance 
	Is over... it's all over

You call me hard and cold
You must be joking
When I get close 
You only put the spoke in
Please don't bother to write or try to phone me
I know you tell your friends how you've outgrown me

	How come you're acting so surprised -
	I keep my ears and both of my eyes wide open
	Why bother giving it one more chance
	The magic's missing - this little romance is over
	I don't give a monkey's, don't give a damn
	I'm happier now this little romance 
	Is over... it's all over

From 1986 album "Still Loving you"

Call me crazy, I don't mind
I'm all shook up but I'm feeling fine
What's been has been, I ain't ashamed
If I had time I'd do it again...
But I've met someone I want so
I need to leave the devil I know
She's a motorcycle rider
I don't know anybody like her
She's a teaser and a fighter
And I've got to get beside her

Tomboy... I want you (I want you so badly)
Tomboy... I want you (I want that Tomboy)

Be my sister, be my brother
Love me like no other lover
She's a demon and a tiger
I don't know anybody like her
She's a teaser and a fighter
And I've got to get beside her

Tomboy... I want you (I want you so badly)
Tomboy... I want you (I want that Tomboy)

Lived all my life with a wandering eye -
Happy to be that way
Never imagined I'd finally find
Here I would stay...

Tomboy... I want you (I want you so badly)
Tomboy... I want you (I want that Tomboy)

Lyric by TR and Dan Hartman 
from 1990 album "We Never Had It So Good"  

Dreamed last night I was dreaming
Somebody answered my prayer
Cried out over my shoulder
Only the devil was there
Hold no hope for the future
Or good times seeing me through

Too good to be true
Too good to be true

Can't find the floor or the wardrobe
Can't find my way to the park
Life in a bedsitter bedlam
Afraid to go home in the dark
All day today just excuse for tomorrow
Tomorrow just something to do

Too good to be true
Too good to be true

I've given up reading the papers
I've given up watching TV
Hope in hell I'm able to tell
Whatever happened to me
Facing a phase in the future
Hope I've got something to lose

Too good to be true
Too good to be true

single taken from TRB's first album
"Power in the Darkness" in 1978

Don't need to carry no identity card
Doesn't take 20-20 vision
To check in seconds on your present address
Or even if you're watching television
Marital status and your date of birth
Middle initial and your place of work
State of payment on the never never never

	Check one more time for the record
	Check in - won't you fill out a form
	Check up - take a seat while you're waiting
	Checking out if you're still overdrawn
	Total recall, total control
	Checking the record is as far as they go

Medical history, your telephone code
Passport and current occupation
Inland revenue, electoral roll
Banks of passive information
One pin sticking in another map
Big Brother watching is a lot of crap
Information is a matter of facts
You're down to a digit in a different kind of board game

	Check one more time for the record
	Check in - won't you fill out a form
	Check up - take a seat while you're waiting
	Checking out where you say you were born
	Total recall - total control
	Memories only know what they're told

Slipped to the city like a vanishing man
Midnight arriving at the station
Casual labour paying cash in the hand
Short-let cheap accommodation
Apply for a license at a fresh address
Give another name, take another test
What you never tell they can never guess
You better not forget to send off the registration

	Left no trace on the records
	And walked right away from the form
	Just a registered temporary patient
	That's gonna be gone by the dawn

	Total recall - total control
	Checking on the record is as far as they go

	Check one more time for the record
	Check in - please fill out a form
	Check up - take a seat while you're waiting
	Checking out you conform to the norm

	Total recall - total control

Lyric by Jo Burt and TR
1981 single taken from "Sector 27"  album

Truce, call a truce
Stop all the firing and the fighting
Christmas morning, 1914
What would the good Lord say ?
Truce, call a truce
Stop all the shelling and the shooting
Fr?hliche Weinacht
Kamerad, Freundschaft
Let's all be friends for a day
In the man made hell
In the putrescent smell
In the mines and mud and trenches
The men from the rhine crossed over the line
For a truce...
With the Tommies and the Frenchies

But the very next day there were hand grenades
There was gunfire, gassing and slaughter
As we blasted the Hun to Kingdome Come
With machine guns, shelling and mortars
It was nice to pretend we could all live as friends
With the Christmas angels calling
But the dream turned sour in a matter of hours
And we made it all up in the morning

Truce, call a truce
Stop all the bitching and backbiting
Who'd leave their lover or send in the bailiffs
This one day of the year ?
Truce, call a truce
Stop all the sackings and the stealing
Who'd rape a schoolgirl or cut off someone's pension
And spoil all this Christmas cheer
There's a couple of days when the bashers of gays
Who oppress, arrest and charge us
All leave us alone to return back home
For a truce... 
With our mothers and our fathers

But the very next day it's back to the fray
And setting our homes in order
Bashing Lesbian mothers and underage lovers
Disowning gay sons and daughters
Well it's quaint to pretend we can love our fellow men
With the Christmas angels calling
But the dream turns sour in a matter of hours
And they make it all up in the morning

from "Cabaret 79" album recorded live in 1979, released 1982
("Glad to be Gay" CD in Germany)

Meeting up in a timewarp
Dreaming pie in the sky
All too soon we change our tune
And don't see eye to eye
Raking over the embers
Trying to fan up a flame
Ten years on the heat has gone
But the sparks start flying again

I hoped we could live and let live
You soon shattered the spell
Looks like love is not enough
We know each other too well

Trust me... trust you
Trust me... trust you

One last chance to start over
A final bite at the cake
We made our stand, played our hand
But it's way too little too late 
Too much suspicion and bitching
Too many wearying games
Time and tide have passed us by
While we drive each other insane 

Same old arrogance on my side
Same old stupid mistakes
Same old jealousy on your side
Same old slap in the face

Trust me... trust you
Trust me... trust you

There's nothing that I could try to be or do
Would make my behaviour seem okay to you

Same old arrogant behaviour
Same old stupid mistakes...
Same old terror and resentment
Same unbelievable waste...

Trust me... trust you
Trust me... trust you

unfinished 1978 TRB song
 originally called "Suits me Suits you"
lyric completed in 1992 - unreleased

Darkhaired dangerous schoolkids
Vicious, suspicious sixteen
Jet-black blazers at the bus stop
Sullen, unhealthy and mean
Teenage guerillas on the tarmac
Fighting in the middle of the road
Supercharged FS1Es on the asphalt
The kids are coming in from the cold

Look out, listen can you hear it
Panic in the County Hall
Look out, listen can you hear it
Whitehall (got us) up against a wall
Up against the wall...

High wire fencing on the playground
High rise housing all around
High rise prices on the high street
High time to pull it all down
White boys kicking in a window
Straight girls watching where they gone
Never trust a copper in a crime car
Just whose side are you on ?

Look out, listen can you hear it
Panic in the County Hall
Look out, listen can you hear it
Whitehall (got us) up against a wall
Up against the wall...

Consternation in Brixton
Rioting in Notting Hill Gate
Fascists marching on the high street
Carving up the welfare state
Operator get me the hotline
Father can you hear me at all?
Telephone kiosk out of order
Spraycan writing on the wall

Look out, listen can you hear it
Panic in the County Hall
Look out, listen can you hear it
Whitehall got us up against a wall
Up against the wall...

single taken from TRB's first album
"Power in the Darkness" in 1978

The country was in turmoil
With new crises by the hour
When one in three were out of work
The Party swept to power;
As life returned to normal
Law and order won the day
While all our rights and liberties
Were voted clean away...

They were cynical and ruthless
They'd manipulate the news
And smear or persecute the few
Who dared to leak the truth
Opponents had their phone tapped
And campaigners felt the heat
With terror suspects accidently
Gunned down in the street

But the radio and papers said
The same thing every day
The government is wonderful
The country's doing great
And if someone else was suffering
They'd got themselves to blame
Don't say if you were in our shoes
You wouldn't do the same 
And say

We didn't know what was going on...
We didn't know what was going on...

From Tel Aviv to Capetown
From Shanghai to East Berlin
From Washington to Panama...
The years have come and been
From Delhi to Sri Lanka
From Whitehall to Coleraine
The times may be a-changing
But the story's still the same

Cos the radio and papers say
The same thing every day
The government is wonderful
The country's doing great;
And if someone else is suffering
They've got themselves to blame
Don't say now you are in our shoes
That you won't do the same
And say

We didn't know what was going on...
We didn't know what was going on...

From TRB's final album "The Winter of 89" released 1992

Only the very young and the very beautiful can be so aloof
Hanging out with the boys, all swagger and poise
I don't even care what other people are there
I just stare and stare and stare

I see your shadow in the swimming pool
I see your face in the shaving mirror
Time and time and time again
I follow your footsteps so quietly up the backstairs
And I hope and I pray you're never going to find me there

Smooth skin and tenderness long ago on a dark night
Wish I could see you once again just to remember it was true
I want to be still beside you - quiet and still beside you
Listening to your breathing and feeling your warmth again

		War baby - you were a
		War baby - this means
		War baby - I'm scared, so scared
		Of whatever it is you keep putting me through

I don't think I could stand another ten years of this fighting
All this stabbing and wounding - only getting my own back
I don't want to batter you to your feet and knees and elbows
When I'm kneeling like a candle at the foot of my own bed

Corresponding disasters every night on the TV
Sickening reality keeps gripping me in its guts
All my friends talk and joke and laugh about Armageddon
But like a nightmare it's still waiting there at the end of every day

		War baby - you were a
		War baby - this means
		War baby - I'm scared, so scared
		Of whatever it is you keep putting me through

I don't think I could stand another ten years of this fighting
All this stabbing and wounding - only getting my own back
But later that same evening we were out in the car talking
When I suddenly wondered who the hell it was we were trying to fool

Co you were the first one that I ever wanted
And it's you I come home to at the end of every day
Like a mother-sucking baby, demanding and so helpless
A little old balding man, all wrinkles and bulging eyes

		War baby - you were a
		War baby - this means
		War baby - I'm scared, so scared
		Of whatever it is you keep putting me through

(ADDITIONAL STANZAS)
So here we all are back in the Old Country
On a cold dark Friday night, forgotten by the world outside
Out in the houses... people finish their dinner and watch TV
Get ready for bed and dream about the weekend
You and me, we're so so alone in the middle of this crowded room
It's gonna be so cold - wonder which way the wind blows
Oh, how much longer...

1983 solo single included on 1984 album "Hope and Glory" - also
at least half a dozen subsequent live albums and compilations...
Original 1983 twelve inch version was really good, though.

If there's one thing that makes me mad
And shed an angry tear
It's teen nostalgia TV ads
For chewing gum and beer
They microwave the distant days
When I was just alive
And serve us up the golden age of 1955

Where all the boys have flat-top hair
And all the girls are slim
They're cute and clean with Levi jeans
And muscles from the gym
They rock and roll to get their kicks
And everyone can drive:
There's no-one old or poor or sick in 1955

We never had it so good
We never had it - no we never had it
We never had it so good
We never had it - we never had it at all

Well I remember early nights
And always making do
The Path  news in black and white
And refugees at school
The whooping cough and polio
The cane to make you cry
With National Service still to go in 1955

We never had it so good
We never had it - no we never had it
We never had it so good
We never had it - we never had it at all

When bubble cars were dream machines
And hair, short back and sides
When sweets were treats and denim jeans
You couldn't steal or buy
American Graffiti, as the servicemen arrived
Was "Go back home to Hollywood" in 1955

Lyric by TR and Jakko Jakszyk
from 1990 album "We Never Had It So Good" 

It was a winter Sunday in the centre of town
In the middle of the advent madness
Fading daylight, gusts of rain
Christmas carols playing on the brain - and on the radio
I could see the other guests arriving 
In their Range Rovers and MG midgets 
Sprayed lime green and vomit orange
Princess Di lookalikes in county twinsets
And down-at-heel Cambridge playboys
Wearing Moss Bros suits and hand-me-down sports jackets
The theatrical profession at prayer... and I felt so out of place.
Heads were turning and the whispering spread
As you stood in the aisle staring straight ahead
Like Lazarus risen up from the dead in a formal morning coat;
Prayers were offered and a lesson was read
As one or two crocodile sniffles were shed
And somebody whispered "Doesn't she just look wonderful"
With a dry crack in the voice.
But I felt like a leper and a traitor too
To everything we once knew was true
You avoided my eye and I knew that you knew
And something in my heart screamed no...

Because it isn't the bride that I wanna kiss
It isn't your friendship I'm gonna miss
And it's not that I wanted a life like this   
But I'm doing fine... I'm doing fine

Still I remembered all the places and people we'd known
All the summers we spent on that disused aerodrome
All the double-edged jokes in our private code
In our very own private language
And if I could still ride my bike home across that windswept runway
Well I'd do it again today...
And now here we were all these years later
Still living in the shadow of a mushroom cloud
As we mumbled the Lord's prayer together
And asked for the peace which passeth all understanding;
And if I sound bitter it's because I'm alone
Under alien colours, in an alien zone
And though I know the language well it isn't my own
And I really don't belong here

Because it isn't the bride that I wanna kiss
And it isn't your friendship I'm gonna miss
And it's not that I wanted a life like this   
But a part of my childhood died
No, it isn't the bride that I wanna kiss
It isn't your friendship I'm gonna miss
It's not that I wanted it to end like this   
With water and wine, water and wine...

Well I guess I'm just paying my respects to you
For the sake of who we used to be...

'B' side of 1986 single "Nothing like the Real Thing"
from album "Still Loving you"

"They're a dismal miserable bunch of fanatics 
Pretending to revel in the way they are
A destructive evil menace to society
Lock 'em all away where they can do no harm
There's been too much toleration
Now we're knee deep in them year by year
It may mean the end of civilisation
We'll all catch something from a glass of beer"

What have I ever done to you
You twist everything that I say and do
Half-truths and total lies
You know you're always out to get me
I don't understand and don't deserve
Your vicious whispers and twisted words
Why this hysteria -
You know you've never even met me

"We see these vile insulting animals
Every other night on our TV sets
Big ones, little ones, harridans, harpies
Catamite sluts that couldn't care less 
These freaks proclaiming their failings 
Corrupt anything and everything they've found
Kids get molested in their minds and bodies
It's high time we stopped pussyfooting around"

What have I ever done to you
You twist everything that I say and do
Half-truths and total lies
You know you're always out to get me
I don't understand and don't deserve
Your vicious whispers and twisted words
Witch hunt hysteria - 
You know you've never even met me

"Shut 'em all away on an offshore island
Let's get rid of these repulsive rats
Put them in a pit, pour quicklime over them
Burning's too good for filth like that"

What have I ever done to you
You twist everything that I say and do
Half-truths and total lies
You know you're always out to get me
I don't understand and don't deserve
Your vicious whispers and twisted words
Why this hysteria -
You know you've never even met me
I clean my teeth and brush my hair
And who I love is my own affair
I can't believe it's true
This can't be really what I'm reading...

With thanks to Terry Sanderson for his help in compiling
mix'n'match lyric from pages of Daily Star, Express, Mail and Sun.
On 1990 album "We Never Had It So Good"  by TR and Jakko Jakszyk

Heard Billy Graham was busted
At West End Central tonight
Necking on Leicester Square Station
With a lover of mine -
Its just a sign of the times

Idi snorting Coca Cola
Wonder why he's getting maligned
Enoch invited him over
For a couple of lines -
It's just a sign of the times

Debt collectors on the railway 
Stealing me blind
I don't worry - why I should mind ?
It's nothing but a sign of the times

Brezhnev's having a party 
Bring your own bottle of wine
Orlov isn't invited
He's fine in the mine
Its just a sign of the...

Time Out offering aspirin
Invitation to dine
Rent boys eating at Eton
They're getting refined -
It's just a sign of the times

Debt collectors on the railway 
Stealing me blind
I don't worry  - why I should mind ?
It's nothing but a sign of the times

Sunday joint on a mortgage
Saturday back to the grind
Some folks feeling redundant
Some just getting resigned - 
It's a sign of the times.

From 1979 album "TRB TWO"

End of the weekend nowhere to go
Nowhere to stay, no money to blow
Wish we could be together alone
But we don't have a car or a place of our own
Dad's in his armchair watching the fight
Look in on my sister and kiss her goodnight
Meet out the back 7.30 tonight
Key in the latch as we switch out the light

	Oh... where can we go tonight
	Where can we be alone tonight
	Oh... oh, where can we go
	Where can we go tonight ?

Eat at the Wimpy or freeze on the street
And hope we don't know anybody we meet
Only takes Sarah to spread it around
And tongues will be wagging all over the town

	Oh... where can we go tonight
	Where can we be alone tonight
	Oh... oh, where can we go
	Where can we go tonight ?

Seven on Sunday still nothing to show
Nothing to do, nowhere we can go
Wish we could be together alone
But we're known at the pub and our folks are at home
Visit my sister and switch out her light
Dad's in the front still watching the fight
Better be back before closing tonight
Key in the latch as we slip out of sight

	Oh... where can we go tonight
	Where can we be alone tonight
	Oh... oh, where can we go
	Where can we go tonight ?

From 1980 album "Sector 27"

All you kids that just sit and whine
You should have been there back in '79
You say we're giving you a real hard time
You boys are really breaking my heart
Spurs beat Arsenal, what a game
The blood was running in the drains
Intercity took the trains
And really took the place apart
That was the year Nan Harris died
And Charlie Jones committed suicide
The world we knew busted open wide
In the winter of '79

I'd been working on and off
A pint of beer was still ten bob
My brand new Bonneville got ripped off
I more or less give up trying
They stopped the Social in the spring
And quite a few communists got run in
And National Service come back in
In the winter of '79
When Marco's caff went up in flames
The Vambo boys took the blame
The SAS come and took our names
In the winter of '79

It was us poor bastards took the chop
When the tubes gone up and the buses stopped
The top people still come out on top
The government never resigned
The Carib Club got petrol bombed
The National Front was getting awful strong
They done in Dave and Dagenham Ron
In the winter of '79
When all the gay geezers got put inside
And coloured kids was getting crucified
A few fought back and a few folks died
In the winter of '79

Yes a few of us fought 
And a few of us died
In the winter of '79

From TRB's first album "Power in the Darkness" 1978

All you kids that just sit and whine
You should have been there back in '89
You say we're giving you a real hard time
You boys are really breaking my heart
Villa beat Arsenal, what a game
The blood was running in the drains
Intercity took the trains
And really took the place apart

That was the year Ceaucescu died
And all his pals committed suicide
The world we knew busted open wide
In the winter of '89

I'd been doing the things I did
A pint of beer was still two quid
As acid parties flipped their lid
Around the M25
They hiked the price of H2O
But nuclear fuels could not be sold
The city slickers just said no
In the winter of '89

The ambulances went on strike
And interest tripled overnight
And Salman Rushdie had to hide
In the winter of '89

The Chinese students in Peking
Demanded freedom without strings  
They died in 1000's in the spring
The government never resigned
But Eastern Europe had a ball
As dominoes began to fall
They opened up the Berlin Wall
In the winter of '89

And that was the end of Egon Krenz
And Western experts on defence
And Noriega's brave defence 
In the winter of '89
Yes that was the end of Egon Krenz
In the winter of '89
And that was the end of all his friends
In the winter of '89

Reworked version of "The Winter of 79"
from TRB's final album "The Winter of 89" released 1992

Three boys working on a slave gang
Chained in the cottage at night
Killed the overseer, broke down the door
Now they gonna shoot us on sight
Night time sticking to the 'B' roads
Hiding from the men with the guns
Hitting the ditches 
Everytime somebody comes

Every single house has been looted
Every single city's been burned
Every can of food has been opened
Every single stone has been turned
Found this Parka on a deadman
Jamie got a couple of knives
Countryside crawling with maniacs
You gotta survive

Carrion crows on the motorway
Old woman dying of the plague
She cried "put me out of my misery"
Charlie had to give her his blade
Streets full of slavers on the rampage
Wild boys running by the score
Weeks without eating
Can't carry on anymore

From TRB's first album "Power in the Darkness" 1978

I was stranded up in Antwerp in the Summer of '54
There were teeming streets full of refugees
And rumours of a new world war
I was waiting at the station when a newcomer arrived
You took your place and fixed me with those crazy hazel eyes
(Your coat was old and worn, the rags around your feet were torn
You pressed right up beside me with your hips
And quite to my surprise I was kind of hypnotised
When you reached and took the cigarette from in between my lips)

The boarding house was crowded where I followed you in fright
You slammed the door behind us and smashed the electric light
You said "why try to fight it?" - I could feel my racing heart
Then you nuzzled up like an animal 
And you kissed me in the dark
We wrecked the bed and went, and never paid a cent
I drank the fare and never made the train
Till I was 25 I was only half alive
And I hardly knew what hit me when you came

And tattooed me... tattooed me
No, I hardly knew what hit me when you came

We shacked up in a basement after breaking down the door
With bedbugs in the blankets, broken bottles on the floor
We were penniless and hungry, having arguments and fights
I was coughing blood all winter but I'd never been more alive
And then one fatal day you volunteered your life away
While I was way too weak to be alarmed
And when I was drunk asleep as you left to join the fleet
You tattooed your name with a needle in my arm

You tattooed me... tattooed me
Tattooed me with a needle in my arm

With the peace talks in Geneva we slowly crawled away
From the brink of the unthinkable and began to breathe each day
There were rumours you'd deserted, then no more letters came
My life was wrecked but I did my best to pick up the bits again
And when I was on the mend I drifted back to Zaventem
And worked unloading cargo from a plane
I began to pay my way on a thousand francs a day
And as time went by I realised we'd never meet again

You tattooed me... tattooed me
And I knew that we would never meet again

From 1986 album "Still Loving you"

Don't get me wrong - I just met you
But you turn me on in one hell of a way
And I just don't don't want to forget you
Love to see your face another day

You turn me on, you turn me on
You just turn me on

To see you again with no showdown
And stand beside your fire is all I want
You got your friend - I got the lowdown
But even talking to you turns me on

You turn me on, you turn me on
You just turn me on

I don't want no heavy situation
Getting high on you is all I need
With some guys it's just infatuation
But I have seen you eyes and I believe

The room is dark, the floor is empty
And you're in a corner on your own
Shall I come on up and say how I'm feeling
Or will I just follow you home ?

You turn me on, you turn me on
You just turn me on.

written for Cafè Society 1975 - last verse by Raphael Doyle
Performed live by TRB in 1978. Unreleased.

Heads up in the clouds, noses in our beers
Sat on a bench outside the Station Inn
Me and my friend JoJo with our good friend Pierre
Drink to the passing of our teens
Jojo thinks he's Jean Genet - Pierre he's Casanova
And me, the most modest of the three
Me, I simply see myself as me
And late at night we'd see the professional classes
Leaving the hotel restaurant
We'd show our good manners and we'd show them our asses
And then we'd chant:

Yuppie scum - smug and dumb
The richer they are, the thicker they get
Yuppie scum - smug and dumb
As they get old they all forget

Heads up in the clouds, noses to the grind
Sat on a bench outside the Station Inn
Me and my friend JoJo with our good friend Pierre
Drink to the way our lives had been
Jean Genet's forgotten his words
And Casanova's on his knees
And me, as for good old modest me
Me, I'm as drunk as only I can be
And late at night we'd see the professional classes
Leaving the hotel restaurant
We'd show them our good manners and we'd show them our asses
And then we'd chant:

Yuppie scum - smug and dumb
The richer they are, the thicker they get
Yuppie scum - smug and dumb
As they get old they all forget

Heads up in the clouds, champagne every night
To celebrate our great success
JoJo he's a broker, Pierre's at the bar
We've all done well I must confess
Jojo still talks of Jean Genet
But Casanova's just a book on the shelf
And me, as for good old modest me
Me, me I talk only of myself
And every night outside the Station Inn, Inspector
Whenever we leave this restaurant
Those little assholes always drop their pants 
And then they chant:

Yuppie scum - smug and dumb
The richer they are, the thicker they get
Yuppie scum - smug and dumb
As they get old they all forget

From 1992 album "Living in a Boom Time"
adapted by TR from Jacques Brel's "Les Bourgeois"