Subhumans

Their entire discography (with the exception of one song it seems) is available on 6 compact discs. The discs are relatively inexpensive (around $10) and you should be able to special order them at your local music store. If not, there's always Amazon.

Subhumans lyrics

(click song name in right column to view lyrics)

33322

(Instrumental)

Adversity

Album - From the Cradle to the Grave LP
Release Date: 1984

I saw the advert on my T.V. screen
Slimline girls and a tea machine
Housewife pround of her shiny floor
As if that's what she was living for
The cat who had his teeth pulled out
That's what the public loves no doubt
A cuddly gimmick to make you smile
That cat won't grin for a very long while
I was the advert on my T.V. screen
Slimline drinks and Tetley tea
Exploit the accent of the flat-cap men
Like hell the north will rise again
The comradeship of drinking ale
The workers' revolution failed
Too pissed on shit to notice it
Never mind wear it if it fits
I was the advert on my T.V. screen
Slimline cars a real machine
It's cheaper than this it's cheaper than that
It's still ten thousand pounds you twat
Do I get a free tart with every one?
Can I drive it off into the sun?
Has it got a big ashtray?
I'm hooked on fourty fags a day
You mustn't smoke you mustn't drink
You mustn't even try to think
Just stay dead the advert said
Eight out of ten people had no brains
Eight out of ten said they enjoyed it
The whole damn country died of boredom

All Gone Dead

Album: The Day the Country Died LP
Release Date: 1983

All is quiet all is dead the city has melted
The sound has penetraated through our heads
The world has ended the gas has gone
It killed the people now the mutants live on

Chorus:
So long the world
That's what they said
It's 1984 and its all gone dead

There is no England anarchy is right
But don't contradict or try to fight
It's always dark there is no light
And 77 had rose to its height

Chorus

They shouldn't have brought back hanging it caused a lot of fuss
No one could trust the government we had the fuckers sussed
There are no banks left they all went bust
And the houses of Parliment is just a pile of dust

Chorus

Its 1984 and there's gonna be a war

Animal

Album: Demolition War EP
Release Date: 1981 December

Ever since they put you away
Things haven't been quite the same
They cut off all your lovely har
And gave you a brand new brain
Set you to university
'Cos that was the next step up
Studying sociology
They gave you a plastic cup

Chorus:
What happened to you with your brand new brain?
What will they do if they get you again?
Animal! Coming to get you
Animal! 'Cos you went insane

Your new brain was working really well
And they were satisfied
They thought they'd done a miracle
But you had something to hide
They left a bit of your old brain
Stuck inside your skull
That bit screwed up your culture
You became an animal

Chorus

One Night you were drinking
In the student bar
Two pints blew your animal mind
Your brain just went too far
The laughter turned to slaughter
You took all you could get
Now you sit alone in a disco
Smoking cigarettes

Chorus

Apathy

Album: Worlds Apart LP
Release Date: 1985

Chorus:
Drink sex cigarettes
Ford Cortina household pets
Bombs? War? Famine? Death?
An apathetic Public Couldn't care less

THe public watches ITV
Reads 'The Sun' drinks cups of tea
Two-star family stay content
Their lives controlled by Parliment
Well daddy's lost his job again
Because he never had no brains
He only lives to watch T.V.
His life controlled by apathy

Chorus

The Russians seem so far away
The government seems to be O.K.
THe Papers never mention war
Cos the people that they cator for have got -

Chorus

The things you never knew were there
Or was it that you didn't care
The biggest problem face to face
An apathetic human race

Chorus

Ashtray Dirt

Album: The Day the Country Died LP
Release Date: 1983

Your lungs have got a dirty stain
All you feel is a cancer pain
Leaves your fingers a sticky yellow colour
Every one fag is less one hour of your life
Don't be a sucker and mess with your life
Smoking them fags from 9 til 5
You might as well eat the dirty dog-ends
You know you're going round the bend
They'll put you away
I dunno why you smoke them No. 6
A packet of fags a packet of tricks
I dunno why you smoke them fucking cigars
You're gonna stay the way you are
...you were but now you're dead with your ashtray dirt

Big Brother

Album: The Day the Country Died LP
Release Date: 1983

Here we are in a new age
Wishing we were dead
There's a T.V. in my front room
And it's screwing up my head
There's a scanner in the toilet
To watch you take a bath
And there's a picture of Hiroshima
To make sure you never laugh

chorus:
And somebody told me 'big brother is watching you'
And somebody else said 'you know it's not true'
Who do you believe?

The police have all gone crazy
You never had it so bad
They take away the dignity
That you never really ahd
They know all about you
They even know what you drink
And if they thought you were worth it
They could suss out what you think

chorus

Well they asked me to prove it
And there was nothing I could say
I said 'watch out for big brother'
And then they put me away
They said I was paranoid
Because I wrote this song
But they didn't need to read it
Cos they knew all along

chorus

Big City

Album: Reason for Existence EP
Release Date: 1982 April

Here we are in the big big city
Plenty of ways to spend your money
Getting ripped off is a way of life
Stick your money on a skinflic-knife

Chorus:
No no no no it's too shitty
I don't want to live in the big big city

Tourist attractions look at that!
Buy me a plastic policeman's hat
But there's a riot uptown they're fighting back
And the boys in blue are wearing black

Chorus
Flying squad what a farce
If pigs could fly they wouldn't need cars
Got control over us all
New Scotland Yard the new Berlin Wall

Chorus

Give me a break Don't tell me
That liar is great in the big city
It's all based on money and greed
Everything you'll never need

Chorus

Black And White

Album: The Day the Country Died LP
Release Date: 1983

Silence - is no reaction
'Violence' - that one-word caption
Can you say it with just one word?
Unspoken - the sins that go unhear

Chorus:
Government... bullshit
Black and white... fight

Look through this broken window
From normality into the ghetto
Broken - through madness hate and boredom
UK - a disunited kingdom

Chorus

Enquiries - but no solutions
Faceless - empty illusions
Reasons - Are always pushed aside
Remember - the day the country died

British Disease

Album: Worlds Apart LP
Release Date: 1985

Hatred in the hearts of the young population
Riots in the streets of the 'civilised' nation
Was it the poverty? Was it the police?
No - it's the British Disease
The inbred snobbery
The patriot law
Violence and robbery
The state declares war
The youth of today with a broken voice
Have got something to say - they ain't got a choice
Racist police - backed by the state
Wipeout the ghetto and build up the hate
All the wrong answers
All the wrong ideas
The riots last a day
But the problem lasts for years
The great British public can't understand
Why should there be riots in this civilised land?
Why is the country being pulled to its knees?
Ignorance is the british disease
Ignorance is the british disease
Ignorance is the british disease
Ignorance is your disease
Ignorance and apathy
Ignorance and bigotry
You found it all so easy to ignore the people who complained and let their anger rise in flames
You thought this country was so great that nobody could ever hate the way the system treated them
And then you wondered why they burnt your buildings down

Businessmen

Album: Worlds LP
Release Date: 1985

Here comes the original businessman
He smiles at you as he shakes your hand
'Listen to me' He's got a lot to say
But you don't understand
No you don't understand
So you say 'O.K.'

Chorus:
They'll do it once they'll do it again
The world is run by businessmen

He takes your money you take his word
He tells you things you've never heard
He says 'sign here on the dotted line'
But you don't understand
No you don't understand
But you think it's alright
He disappears for a month or two
He ripped you off and you dunno what to do
You'd take him to court but you don't know his name
Cos businessmen
Yes businessmen
Are all the same

Can't Hear The Words

Album: Worlds LP
Release Date: 1985

Complicated words are stated
Theories become outdated
The innovation of your crime
Is out of tune and out of time

Chorus:
No! No! I don't like it!
No! No! I don't like it!
What we gonna do about it?
Let's sit down and talk about it

Action speaks louder than silence
But action is more than just violence
The ghouts are too strong to keep down
But you can't hear the words 'cos the music's too loud

Chorus

Political voices
Distortionate noises
The products of our teenage dreams
Is this what entertainment means?
The piercing sound of teenage screams
Talking can't change anything
Someone said 'the boy can't sing'
This entertainment is absurd
You're so busy fighting you can't hear the words
All your violence is in vain
You action men are all the same
Action is more than mindless violence
Look at yourself in paranoid silence

Cancer

Album: Reason for Existence EP
Release Date: 1982 April

Smile - It's impossible
I - I feel disposable
You laugh - and it fucks me up
Fag? - Has he woken up?
Words - Lots of words
Mindless - I an't listening
Life - is it such a drag?
You - don't you wanaa fag?
What's wrong? Do you fee O.K.?
Drink? Or shall we go away?
Speak! Don't just sit there!
Freak! You're going nowhere!
C'mon! Don't you want a fag?
You! Don't you want a fag?
No... I got cancer

Carry On Laughing

Album: Worlds LP
Release Date: 1985

We react
How we feel
So we're told
But who knows for certain these feelings are real?
Like we read
And we see
All around media telling us what to believe
We carry on laughing
In the street
You can see
All the facts
Poverty violence hatred and greed
But it's not
Part of you
Not as long
As you keep believing the six o'clock news
All the dead
All the war
On the film
Making it fiction to make you want more
While we live
In the wake
Of the end
The final decision that one man could make
We carry on blindly
We carn fighting
So much hate
All around
Can't you see
How much blood there is soaking into the ground?
But we say
We React
How we feel
Feeling too scared to face up to the facts
We carry on laughing

Dehumanization

Album: 29:29 Split Vision LP
Release Date: 1985

Dehumanization
They take away your name
Civilization
It's the dead man game

And we are all living this modern life
Television radio disco fights
Get a steady job you were born to work
Well I can't be bothered I'm too much of a jerk

Dehumanization
As you're living on the dole
Or a working class hero
Because you've got a job

And we all like working for the upper class runt
If you're feeling downtrodden you can join the front
National heritage to keep you in line
Abuse your intelligence mess up your mind

Dehumanization
Personality fix
Conformed to the eyeballs
With state politics

And they tell you you're brilliant to keep you quiet
'Only the idiots know how to riot'
Make sure it's not safe to walk the streets
You wanna stay alive you better join the police

Dehumanization
We ain't got a name
But we still got emotions
Now the city's in flames

Drugs Of Youth

Album: Demolition War EP
Release Date: 1981 December

Get away from the window
The D.S. are outside
The little packets in our pockets
Stuff we gotta hide
sitting in a corner of a disco
Mouth stuck in a bag
It's hard to fake the high intake
It turns your brain real bad
Crush a barb pit it in a syringe
Stick it in your arm
Let the feeling crawl to your head
It don't do you no harm
Sniffing sulphate up my nose
Doing it for a 'joke'
It makes the world spin so fast
'Things go better with coke'

Dying World

Album: The Day the Country Died LP
Release Date: 1983

There's a hole in the bottom of the earth
Where the blood pours out at the end of the day
When the usual amount of people have died
Sit back and watch the death and decay
It's a dying world
When you're living in a dying world
Panicing becomes an everyday thing
Buy up the food the power and the guns
Get used to the threat of the final fling
It's a dying world
There's a hole in your mind where nothing exists
Except fear and loathing of the strange but true
Facts that defy your inner intelligence
Like man kills himself for something to do
It's a dying world

Everyday Life

Album: Time Flies... But Aeroplanes Crash EP
Release Date: October 1983

Chorus:
Everyday life everyday life
Something somewhere just ain't right

It's half past 8 and I'm here again
I'd go for a walk but it's pissing down with rain
And if I went for a walk I'd get my head kicked in
Cos looking like a punk is some fucking sin

Chorus

All this boredom all this drink
All the times I've tried to think
So I jump on a bus and go somewhere else
And I sit in a pub and I talk to myself

Chorus

So sod the apathy sod the ideas
I'm only restricted by my fears
Give me a chance and I'll tell you what's wrong
Or give me a pen and I'll write another song

Chorus

Evolution

Album: Evolution EP
Release Date: 1983 May

Out in the garden there's a little white rabbit
Like Revlon torture for your clean little habits
As you wash your hair to keep it clean
You get to wonder why vosene's green
And forget about the silent animal screams
Out in the garden there's a little white dog
Shampoo in your eyes like a burning fog
But its tried and tested so you won't go blind
Animals killed for the good of mankind
For your shining hair so many have died
Out in the garden there's a little white cat
And you're catching cancer as you smoke that fag
'When well they find the cure?' you choke
When enough cats have died of smoke?
And they say that animals go for the throat
And the monkeys in the zoo they look so tame
In the name of science they removed their brains
TO think that man evolved from this beast
Civilized savages down from the trees
The animals who run these laboratories

Ex-Teenage Rebel

Album: Worlds LP
Release Date: 1985

When I asked you to lend me a fiver
You said you were already broke
And when I explained you were living in chains
You assumed it was some sort of joke
You wanted a job and then got one
And learnt jokes about sex Jews and blacks
Got married to help pay the mortgage
Got wound up when you had to pay tax

Chorus:
What happened to you with your ideas?
What happened to all your hopes and fears?
Ex-teenage rebel - same old story

When I asked you what you thought of the arms race
Asking you who's gonna win?
You remembered a man on the telly and said
'I agree with him'
You say everything's alright really
You say that I'm just paranoid
You tell me it's always been the same
And there's some things I cannot avoid

Chorus

So what happened to your old opinions?
The thoughts that you held for so long?
That inspired a thousand rebellions
Against what was and still is so wrong
You tell me you used to be 'crazy'
And 'paranoid' like I am now
You 'soon realized there was no reason why'
So you gave up and soon settled down

Chorus

And I tell you that you are the problem
Which is why you can't see it no more
The strength of us all could demolish the wall
But you chose to walk through the door
Living a life of comprimise
What you're supporting is what you despised
Was all that you said just a useful disguise?
Or was it all just little white lies?
Little white lies
To help you survive
Is there no guilt in your mind?
Is there no guilt in your eyes?

Fade Away

Album: Worlds LP
Release Date: 1985

We live we die
And inbetween we wit and wonder why
WHy must we someday die?
Tried and tested
We live our lives like our dear parents did
Tied down and restricted
Of gods and guns
Do we need to save us from our evil ways
They call it self-decay
We live we die
In fear of gods and guns and never knowing why
Why must we someday die?
So live your life
In fear of no-one
We must have our say
Before we fade away

First Aid

Album: Time Flies... But Aeroplanes Crash EP
Release Date: October 1983

I need first aid can't you see
I'm cut up bad you can't recognize me
Got a coupla bullets in my leg
And your morphine shit going through my head

Chorus:
Gimme first aid that's what you're for
Gimme a shot gotta make sure
GImme first aid hold me down
Something's wrong I can't move around

Knock me out cold with your local anaesthetic
Gimme some pills so I can't even feel it
The doctor's using Zyklon-B
Gonna calm me down gonna send me to sleep

Chorus

So gimme first aid that's what I need
I get all sick whenever I bleed
They caught me bleeding in the street
Kicked me around like some dead meat

Forget

Album: From the Cradle to the Grave LP
Release Date: 1984

So I get up in the morning like most people do
I look in the mirror and I think of you
So I smash it to pieces and go downstairs
I walk down the road and meet someone I knew
It could have been God but I think it was you
So I forget about it I don't really care

Chorus:
I remember the face the place the time
I wrote you a song but it didn't rhyme
But I don't wanna remember
I just wanna forget

An advert on telly for plastic goo
The dummy's so real it could amost be you
But it smiles all the time and it doesn't exist
Crashed out in the gutter covered in spew
Last thing I remember is a picture of you
But I smashed it last week when I was pissed

Chorus

From The Cradle To The Grave

Album: From the Cradle to the Grave LP
Release Date: 1984

Well they took you from your mother's womb and put you in a school
Told you how to run your life by following the rules
Told you not to pick your nose or disrespect the queen
Scrub your teeth three times a day keep your mind and body clean

Save up all your pocket money nothing is for free
And you'd better trust your parents 'cos there's no one else you see
And when they send you off each day remember what you're told
'You may think you don't need teaching but you'll need it when you're old'

And if you're too intelligent they'll cut you down to size
They'll raise you 'til you're happy then they'll fill you full of lies
'Cos intelligence is threatening and genious is sin
If you could ever see through them they know they'd never win

So they channel your ability into the right direction
If you're good enough and rich enough you can be a politician
On the other hand if you're too thick they'll tell you that you're lazy
They'll put you down and wind you up until it drives you crazy

They'll say you ought to learn a trade to help you in your life
Success is written in three parts a job a house a wife
They'll say that school prepares you for the awesome world outside
Well it certainly gives you bigotry and patriotic pride

Racism sexism teacher to class
From school to work remain the same are you white and middle class?

You'll learn that badmen dress in black and goodmen dress in white
And the pamphlets in the blayground say that's right
And that girls were made for housework boys were made to fight
And the naughty pictures on page 3 make everything alright

And so from school to the outside world these morals you will take
And unless you can reject them you'll have your mind at stake

They'll give you a decision when you get to 18, too
The right to vote for someone else who says he cares for you
But the only thing he cares about is getting to the top
By conning you with empty words that promise you a lot
But the end result is slavery to a flase set of ideals
You'll be tempted to believe them 'cos they'll seem so very real
The slavery of attitudes that make you keep in line
Subconsciously devoted to the morals of our time

And when you end up on the dole which you very likely will
They'll offer you a brand new trade learning how to kill

Why don't you join the army? Be a man and not a fool
There's someone else to think for you just like there was at school

They'll promise you absolution fromt he murders you'll commit
In the name of god and country they can get away with it
They fill you full of orders and promise you rewards
Like busting up your family by sending you abroad

A holiday in Germany or Iceland or Hong Kong
Making money being useless well it seems it can't go wrong
But then it's off to Northern Ireland where you'll practice what they preached
You'll shoot to keep yourself alive and kill to keep the peace
And then it won't be much fun as you hear the wounded crying
'Cos before, they couldn't speak English, and you didn't know what they were saying
But when the children call you 'bastard!' it will make you think again
When you cannot tell the difference between animals and men

Animals don't wear uniforms but they kill as much as you
But the army kills for money and animals kill for food
It's the basest degradation in the name of what is right
Become something you never were and regret it 'til you die

'Cos your father will tell you 'sonny you must do as you are told'
And you'll say the same thing to your kids when you're 32 years old
And unless you can react against the brainwash from the start
Your government will rule your mind and your mind will rule your heart
You'll conform to every social law and be the system's slave
From birth to school to work to death from the cradle to the grave

Germ

Album: Evolution EP
Release Date: 1983 May

I am a germ under your skin
I crawl through your veins and I work my way in
I play with your health I destroy all there is
I'm the germ in your mouth when you give her a kiss

Chorus:
And tomorrow they'll put you away
And the doctors all they will say
Is - 'you're gonna die'

I am a germ under your skin
Like a hypodermic needle pushed in
I run in your blood and I screw up your brain
I've got a disease just to send you insane

Chorus

I am a germ under your skin
And I got a feeling I'm gonna win
It's no use believing in the national health
Cos when you are dead I'll destroy someone else

Chorus

Get Out Of My Way

Album: Time Flies... But Aeroplanes Crash EP
Release Date: October 1983

I'm not a machine made of plastic parts
I got a brain but I ain't got a heart
Aiot a name I been dead for years
But now I'm alive with my new ideas

Chorus:
Get out of my way I'll knock you down
My throats on fire with a nihilist sound
We've been too dumb for too long
But now we're alive cos we know what's wrong

Resurreced from apathy
I saw the dark and it saw me
Now my mind is on destroy
When I explode I make a lot of noise

Chorus

We're going forward into nothing at all
No politics no god no rule
There's something inside every one of you
You've seen the lies now you know what to do

Chorus

Get To Work On Time

Album: Worlds Apart LP
Release Date: 1985

Get up in the morning
Alarm clocks clean socks
Brush your teeth look neat
Join the others on the street
Bus ride tube train
Going off to work again
Up to the third floor
Name on the office door
Paper lying on the floor
Pick it up and do some more
Lunch break break down
Valium and alcohol
Nicotine adrenalin
Don't it make your head spin?
Back to the grindstone
Head on the guillotine
Pulling all the stops out
Socs up head down
Doing it good
You're doing it well
Cos you wanna please the boss
But you wish he'd go to he
But the wages in the brown bag
Underneath the name tag
Are keeping you in line
So you do the overtime
And you get the traain late again
Surrouneded by the same lame
People playing your game
No one ven knows your name
Back straight home late
All the food is out of date
Wife has left a note
Saying 'don't forget your coat'
Qk snack head back
Living on the wrong track
Should've tried refusing
But you could've got the sack
It's getting so confusing
Cos you know you're only losing
But the choice of ever choosing
Never seemed to cross your mind
So you get to bed at ten. Thinking 'never again'
But you get up in the morning
Ad you get to work on time

Heads Of State

Album: Worlds Apart LP
Release Date: 1985

Down in the basement in the house with the police outside
There's something secret hidden away
In various crates in a paralysed state
Are the heads for the mood of the day
There's one full of piety and one for anxiety
And one for when we're heading for war
And one for the masses and the privelaged classes
And one that does nothing at all
The replacable heads are for the government leaders
Who always seem to change their politics
Like the head for the nation doesn't deal with immigration
Cos patriots and riots don't mix
And when the head for the day sais 'I'll do it this way'
Remember the replacable head
Cos when they get elected their decisions are rejected
Completely contradicting what they said
So don't trust the politicians
They don't make their own decisions
Cos they haven't even got their heads screwed on
For everything that's said its just another head
And a politician's words can be replaced
But then maybe I am wrong I mean this is just a song
Is it just that politicians are two-faced?

Heroes

Album: 29:29 Split Vision LP
Release Date: 1985

Here comes the hero
At temperature zero
Warming his hands in the crowd
He says 'now that I've changed
I'm exactly the same'
But nobody hears 'cos the cheerings too loud

Hypocrisy on a massive scale
Hero/cult/revolutionary
It's all a show
But now we know
All they want is your money

Chorus:
Hero lost his conscience, yes
But now he's getting serious
'Forget the system, let's have fun'
Hero! Take the money and run!

The heroes are forgotten now
Floundered on their reputation
The old elite
Came off the street
And wound up as an institution

Chorus

The next generation won't produce
The heros and the fashion freaks
There's nothing new
In what we do
Just commitment and beliefs

Chorus

Human Error

Album: Demolition War EP
Release Date: 1981 December

There's a bomb going off in Belfast
There's a war in Vietnam
There's a T.V. documentary
To help you understand
But the other channel is better
'Cos it doesn't tax your mind
Relax in the ignorance of your home
As man destroys mankind
And the rest of the world has gone to sleep
Because they couldn't care less
The world is going so am I
It's such a bloody mess
There's an arms race in America
THe race that no one wins
If somebody pushed the button
The 'accidental sin'
Meanwhile baby wonders
'What's a nuclear war?'
And mummy says 'to tell the truth
I'm really not quite sure'
And the rest of the world was ignorant
Because they weren't told more
The pamphlet said 'Just stay at home
Avoid the threat of war'
The computer pressed the button
THe rain was full of lead
And more bombs dropped on Belfast
And Vietnam went dead
The T.V. documentary
outlined the possible cause
It was just a human error
Because man invented war
And th rest of the world has gone to hell
Because they never cared more
The children cried before they died
So this is nuclear war

I Don't Wanna Die

Album: The Day the Country Died LP
Release Date: 1983

It's getting out of hand they don't understand
They never ever will they never ever can
Don't wanna live if I can't be free
The system kills but won't kill me
I don't wanna die
Can't run away come back someday
Cos it won't change whatever you say
Fear and guilt up to the hilt
They can't escape from the walls they've built
I don't wanna die
They gave me a gun and told me to run
Defend your country from the atom bomb
I said 'why?' they couldn't reply
The system kills but I don't wanna die
I don't wanna die

It's Gonna Get Worse

Album: Religious Wars EP
Release Date: 1982 July

I don't like the way I'm living
No one gives me any choice
You don't like the way I'm singing
But all I got is my fucking voice
I can't get a word in edgeways
Surrounded by so many lies
They just treat us like subhumans
We're the people they despise

Chorus:
I'm telling you it's gonna get worse

Always arising unemployment
Always debates on nuclear war
Do you think that any government

Sometimes you wonder what to do
When you haven't got no cash
Better start thinking what you'll do
When your country turns to ash

Chorus

You can blame the fucking Tories
Every government's the same
They don't believe in the public good
Just in their financial gain
Then the bastards throw you out
And take your furniture away
'Cos you can't afford the rent
Unemployment doensn't pay

Chorus

Joe Public

Album: Rats EP
Release Date: January 1985

Joe Public in an overcoat
A smile on his face and his fingers down your throat
Making you stick with his victory salute
Vs up for England or does he mean fuck you!?
If looks could kill he'd stare you into the ground
The flatulence of greed keeps his money going round
The smell of indigestion he's got cancer on his breath
Before he takes his mind away he'll take your self respect
Idiots and cowards don't vote or fight
Say your parents and the papers so they must be right
The leaders of the country don't do one or the other
They're too busy fighting against one another
Hey Joe! where you going with that census in your hand?
To make us feel important?
I don't think you understand!
You represent a public whose views are out of date
The generation gap caused by the crap you generate

Killing

Album: The Day the Country Died LP
Release Date: 1983

You - you're driving me insane
But you know there's something wrong with my brain
My head is really in a whirl
You look just like a normal girl

Chorus:
But you don't really care
It happens everywhere
You don't give a shit
Forget about it

I was living in a plastic bag
I didn't know what to do
I didn't know she was a slag
Well what would you do?

Chorus

I didn't know I killed her
I was out of my mind
She only wanted my money
But she made me blind

Chorus

Labels

Album: Rats EP
Release Date: January 1985

Call me punk cos I wear a leather jacket
Call me a hippie cos I believe in love and peace
Call me an idealist cos of songs like this one
You can call me what you like I am all and none of these

Chorus:
Fix a label on me to keep illusions happy
Fix a label on me does it make you feel secure?
Fix a label on me to keep me at a distance
And I'll label you as ignorant not wanting to know more

Before we understand ourselves do we have to fight each other?
Before we share opinions must we keep them undercover?
We classify and categorize to keep ourselves divided
We are all individuals not the images provided

Chorus

Labels are a subtle way of keeping us in line
Divided by conformity we waste away our time
We are all individuals divided by their rituals
Think again like I have done--throw away the labels!

Chorus

Love Is...

Album: Religious Wars EP
Release Date: 1982 July

Love is a bastard it tears you apart
Just when you thought you didn't have a heart
Couldn't give a fuck 'cos you didn't know how
And suddenly everything brings you down
Love is a bastard it fucks you up
Make up break up totally messed up
Lipstick stains and little white lies
Can you see the blood running out of my eyes?
Love is a bastard it makes you cry
Do something wrong and you don't know why
Can't remember what you said
Lie on the floor and wish you were dead

Mickey Mouse Is Dead

Album: The Day the Country Died LP
Release Date: 1983

Mickey Mouse is dead
Got kicked in the head
Cos people got too serious
They planned out what they said
They couldn't take the fantasy
They tried to accept reality
Analysed the laughs
Cos pleasure comes in halves
The purity of comedy
They had to take it seriously
Changed the words around
Tried to make it look profound
The comedian is onstage
Pisstaking for a wage
The critics think he's great
But the laughter turns to hate
Mickey mouse is on T.V.
And the kids stare at the screen
But the pictures are all black and white
And the words don't mean a thing
Cos mummy's got no money
And daddy is in jail
He couldn't afford the license
She can't afford the bail
The kids out in the road
Their minds have all gone cold
Cos mickey mouse is dead
They shot him through the head
With ignorance and scorn
They believed in something new
They read the papers watched the films
And thought they know the truth
But reality decives
Whatever you believe
There's always another idea
And theirs is based on fear
The fear of being sussed
For what you really are
The fear of being laughed at
When you go too far
They call it paranoia
You can't laugh it away
Until you come to realise
That everyone's the same
People hide their problems
Under faces of contempt
They hide them 'til it kills them
And no one is exempt not even you
Look what you done to mickey mouse

Minority

Album: The Day the Country Died LP
Release Date: 1983

Don't ask the people what the people think
They've got no opinions but they still think we stink
The great British public the great majority
The safe foundation of our society

Chorus:
But we're the minority and we're OK
We're the minority won't go away
We're the minority and we're OK
We're the minority got something to say

Yeah we're the minority the ones with the brains
Putting the country on a nervous strain
They can't stand the truth - the truth never lies
The great British public got bricks in their eyes

Chorus

New Age

Album: The Day the Country Died LP
Release Date: 1983

So you're living in a fast world
See the ple you've already killed
See what you done with that machine of yours
You can't justify it you ain't got a cause

Chorus:
It's only cos we're living in a new age
You don't know what you're like when you're in a rage
They're gonna put you away in a cage
You better start to act your age

Victims running they are screaming
Living nightmares they're not dreaming
They're too scared to walk the streets
The one with a gun they're afraid to meet

Chorus

You know you're killing off the race
THey'll lock you away and change your face
Hatred of the new age turned your mind
Can't bear to live with the rest of mankind

Chorus

New Boy

Album: 29:29 Split Vision LP
Release Date: 1985

In the lounge of class distinction
Rank and number neatly sprawled
In the luxury of income
Sat the new boy feeling cold

Sat there thinking "where's the toilet?"
Dropped his cigarrettes and coughed
Waiting for a chance to pick them up -
That's when the lights went off

Sat there thinking it was funny
Fears subsiding with the lighting
"Turn the lights on" someone shouted
Found himself alone and smiling

Shattered by his own deception
He looked round for helpful clues
Men in suits and glaring glasses
Calmly watched him look confused

Carpet silence stifled whispers
When did something mean so much?
Just the emptiness of silence
Just the feeling, not the touch

Nervous words of introduction
To the instant silent stares
Felt as if he wasn't wanted
And finally he wasn't there

Then he wished that he was back
To somehow make the silence crack
Concluded, like we all have done
Some people make you feel no one

No

Album: The Day the Country Died LP
Release Date: 1983

No I don't believe in Jus christ
My mother died of cancer when I was five
No I don't believe in religion
I was forced to go to church and I wasn't told why
No I don't believe in the police force
Police brutality isn't a dream
No I don't believe in the system
Cos nothing it does makes sense to me
Don't worry you'll get over it
You'll grow up you'll calm down
Another fashion
You'll get over it you'll calm down
You don't really mean what you say
You've had too much to drink
Don't be so full of hatred
It's not as bad as you think
No! I don't believe in what you say
You're just part of what I despise
Yes you're part of the fucking system
I ain't blind I can see your lies
Cos the system thrives on ignorance
What the public don't know they can't reject
In the face of you call I stand defiant
The rest of the people they want to forget

No More Gigs

Album: The Day the Country Died LP
Release Date: 1983

In a smoke filled room
'How's it going then?'
'It's not going at all
We got no more gigs'
You always knew it could be better
But you neverought it would end
It only happens cos of other people
All the money that they spend on David Bowie LPs
When I told her we were finished
She smoked a cigarette and sighed
'One last fag before we go home'
She said she loved me then she died
It doesn't happen like this
So you always get what you pay for
But the end result is all the same
You lose everything you always wanted
Because you couldn't afford to pay
All the smoke-filled room contains
Is dejected people with no aims
A bottle of gin a packet of cigs
Sing, brother, sing, we get no more gigs

No Thanks

Album: Wessex '82 (compilation)
Release Date: 1982

You sat on the bus and wondered
What future is there in this?
Working all week to get money
Cos money gets you pissed
So you thought "I wanna be famous"
And recorded a demo tape
Sent it to all the companies

And all they had to say was:

No thanks sonny
We´ve heard it all before
Turning punk into money
Doesn´t work anymore

So you kept working for money
And put out your own EP
They put you in the papers
And worked out your family tree
The companies sat up and took notice
And offered you money and fame
The faces all change but the ideas the same
So you thought you´d do it your own way

And you said:

No thanks sonny
I can do it on my own
I don´t need your money
Just leave me alone

The record never got anywhere
You ended up on the dole
Finally got a job
With less money than before
So now you´re sitting on a bus
Wondering where did it all go wrong?
There´s nothing else to do
Except write another song

And it goes:

No thanks sonny
We´ve heard it all before
No thanks sonny
You´re no use anymore

Nothing I Can Do

Album: The Day the Country Died LP
Release Date: 1983

Oh my god it's raining again
And a seven-year-old anarchist is blowing up Berlin
My subs L.P. is still brand new
But what does it matter? There's nothing I can do!
THere's a great big hole in my back door
And everyone expects a nuclear war
I've been on the beer - I think I'm gonna spew
But what does it matter? There's nothing I can do!
The dust in the road gets in my eyes
And the system tells such fucking lies
Why should I believe what they say is true?
But what does it matter? There's nothing I can do!
There's nothing I can do
I wouldn't do it for you
But then you wouldn't do it for me
Well that's the facts you see
My ten-year old sister's on the pill
Ronnie Biggs got a fllat in Brazil
The third generation ain't got a clue
But what does it matter? There's nothing I can do

Not Me

Album: Evolution EP
Release Date: 1983 May

Who's gonna fight?
Who thinks it's right?
'The threat of war is a passing phrase'
Try telling that to a waiting grave
They say the bunkers will be safe
They're not big enough for the human race
So who's gonna fight?
Who's having fun?
Gonna carry a gun?
I got to fight I got no choice
They'll never hear my fucking voice
Deafened in the deathly noise
Created by their brand new toys
So who's gonna fight?
Who's gonna die?
I'll tellyou why
I won't do whatever they say
Even if it means getting put away
That's what I think - OK?
You got to react it's the only way
So who's gonna fight?
Who's gonna fight the system?
You? Me? Or fucking no-one?

Parasites

Album: Demolition War EP
Release Date: 1981 December

The Government are real good to us
They crowd in their shelters and let us die
The nuclear holocaust won't last long
White turns to Black in the sky

Chorus:
You Build Your Demolition War
What the hell are you fighting for?

You keep your peace with starving countries
The Cambodians have to be fed
But can't you see we've got our problems
You're taxing us to buy tons of lead

Chorus

Labour can take the business over
Because they've got the 'workers rights'
A Choice of three for democracy
And they're all parisites

Chorus

Parasites - Taking over the Country
Parasites - Taking over your home
Parasites - Taking over your mind

People Are Scared

Album: Time Flies... But Aeroplanes Crash EP
Release Date: October 1983

Nobody says anything on buses
And its not the noise the engine makes
You can watch them all staring nervous
Sit at the back its the safest place
People are scared to say hello
The flick of the fag the shifting eyes
Stare in amusement then look away
The conscious battle of who to despise
Self-restriction and paranoia
Self-belief and the silent laugh
The inner conflict between one another
When you're all the same it seems so daft
Nobody says anything on buses
And that's why peope kill themselves
Desperation against the world
Can't find a way to express themselves
Society breeds hate and derision
But society is only a mass of people
Striving to be god at the expense of others
Striving to be better than their next door neighbour
People are scared underneath their silence
People are getting more afraid
They turn to their leaders for help and guidance
And then the system wins again
And will carry on winning til god knows when
Til people start to talk to each other
Everyone just like a brother
Til the morals and fear that divides us all
Is no longer the exuse for the system's rule

Peroxide

Album: Reason for Existence EP
Release Date: 1982 April

Peroxide girl with a false ID
Lost and lonely she can't see
Peroxide hair and burnt-out eyes
Blinded by so many lies

Chorus:
Peroxide! Peroxide!
Because no body cares?
What do you do?
You dye your hair

Her hair was just a boring mess
She had never known success
Saw the punks they didn't care
Walked around with peroxide har

Chorus

Now she's out of trouble 'cos her hair is white
And the punks all think 'she's alright'
But she is blind her face is red
Peroxide soaked into her head

Chorus

Pigman

Album: Worlds Apart LP
Release Date: 1985

Guilty conscience stews away in the kitchen
A knock at the door its the next door neighbour
Farming is a living killing is a crime
Where do the meatmen draw the line?

Chorus:
Revenge for the timeless market slaughter
The pigman's coming lock up your daughter

General conversation turns to food
Is it good for me if it's good for you?
Is it good for the animals? Turn up the heat
The pigman's coming for his Sunday treat

Chorus

Guilty conditioning eats in the silence
A knock at the door it's the pigman's hatred
Burning holes in your head with his grim reality
Its the family butcher - lock up your family!

Chorus

Powergames

Album: Worlds Apart LP
Release Date: 1985

A passing stranger dressed in black
With slogans painted on his back
Turned and stared and laughed and carried on
Another came and did the same
At first they made you feel ashamed
But then I realized what I had done
WIthout asking I had broke the rules
Without knowing I had made them fools
By merely looking different
To those who knew the game
The unity was there to see
A mass of non-conformity
There's something wrong, or is it me?
But they all look just the same
They hung around in silent pairs
And gave out their derisive stares
To anyone who envied or ignored
A leaflet saying 'smash the state
work in love and not in hate'
Got snatched and ripped and ground into the floor
Without asking, it had caught them out
Without knowing what it was all about
They assumed it was a wind-up or a con
Making sure with nervous glance
They re-affirmed each other's stance
And smiled and then forgot and carried on
The passing strangers stayed that way
And rolled away in their own decay
Convinced they'd got it right, the rest were wrong
By deriding them to gain respect
They tied a noose around their neck
And fell when something different came along
Without asking, they were soon put down
WIthout knowing why they looked around
And found a new dictatorship in power
Acting just as they had done
But on the other end it's not much fun
ANd all their sweet delusions soon turned sour
One man's hand is another man's fist
And so the powergames still exist
And one idea is right, the rest are wrong
While such ideas as this are here
We'll never live without the fear
Of feeling that we somehow don't belong

Rain

Album: From the Cradle to the Grave LP
Release Date: 1984

Well it's dark outside
And it's raining
And the atmosphere
Is like it always has been
Thoughts of revolution
How and why
Just pass on by
Gloom and depression
Faked depravation
'Well I got no money'

Chorus:
Are you depressive? Or depressing?
Obsessive? Obsessed?
Someone or no one?
Are you alive or dead?

Do you take your ideas
From other people?
Surrounded by boredom
You get boring
And then you start to enjoy it
Take all the plugs out
And sit in darkness
Its dark in your head
You're not alive anymore
And it's raining

Chorus

Rats

Album: Rats EP
Release Date: January 1985

A sense of enterprise is here
The attitudes that conquer fear
Stability togetherness
The feeling cannot be suppressed
Hand in hand we had our say
United we stand but so did they
Hands in handcuffs dragged away
To cheers of hate and victory!

Chorus:
We fought the city but no-one cared
They passed it off as just a game
The city won't stop till attitudes change
Rats in the cellars of the stock exchange

Co-ordination was not so good
But everyone did just what they could
Unarmed with inexperience
We had to use our common sense
"If you act like rats you get treated like this"
Said a policeman like we didn't exist
When the force of law has lost it's head
The law of force is what you get

Chorus

We fought their calculations
Money gained from third world nations
All that money spent on war
Could be used to feed their poor
The papers played the whole thing down
Said there was nothing to worry about
The rats have all gone underground
But we'll be back again next time round

Reality Is Waiting For A Bus

Album: From the Cradle to the Grave LP
Release Date: 1984

Reality isn't easy to define
Like turning water into wine
It's a dream of fact based on fiction
Everything you do has its restrictions
Everyone has their own definition
The record shops got plastic nutrition
Cos music is the food of love
But reality is waiting for a bus

Chorus:
And there's an anarchy sign on the bus-stop wall
But it's very hard to relate
The bus to work to keep in line
So who's gonna smash the state?

It's too easy to get cynical
And make the problem clinical
But in which direction do you turn?
Do you preach or do you burn?
Pamphlets blowing in the breeze
A mother on her weeping knees
'Reality' is on the news at ten
But the bus to work is late again

Chorus

So your reality is getting pissed
Avoiding a world that shouldn't exist
A world within your own sour mind
Where everything can be re-defined
'This is wrong'
'I don't agree'
'I can't accept the reality'
So why raise your life on simple trust?
Is reality
Waiting for a bus?

Reason For Existence

Album: Reason for Existence EP
Release Date: 1982 April

What's your reason for existence?
Do you believe in anything?
Or does your lifestyle contradict
The words you write the songs you sing?
Are you happy in your work
As you protest about the unemployed?
You dont' wanna work but you need the money
The reality you can't avoid
But do you wanna work for the money?
Do you wanna work for the system?
Are you happy as you vote
To keep the parasites alive
You don't want to vote but you think you should
They said it was right and you never asked why
But do you want to vote for you conscience?
Doyou want to vote for the system?
Are you happy signing up
In the army just to get some pay?
Fighting a war without a cause
Can you manage to ignore your self-Decay?
But do you want to fight for you country?
Do you want to fight for the system?
You're their reason for existence
They use you to finance their state
The words you should with such convictions
Is it the only way to express your hate?

Religious Wars

Album: Religious Wars EP
Release Date: 1982 July

Do you believe in the afterlife?
Termination with a rusty knife
Religious wars no reason why
What a glorious way to die

Chorus:
In the name of god they left you to die
Religious wars there's no reason why
They left you to die

The ultimate excuse is here
Die for a cause religion is fear
Fear of the threat of something unreal
Abdicate the way you really feel
Chorus

In the darkness of death
There's no light in your eyes
Across in your grave
Your time has arrived

So Much Money

Album: Evolution EP
Release Date: 1983 May

Chorus:
So much money where does it all come from?
We're paying for democracy never mind the bombs
So much money what does it do?
It puts them in power where they shit on you

You don't care about the social disease
You got so much money you can do as you please
Too many people voted for you
Now you're telling us what to do
Money is power and you're so rich
You married for money to a classy bitch
Use the cash to build up a regime
The silent man behind the killing machine

Chorus

Political war is an easy game
Ysing the people to support your aim
State your idea of your ideal state
And after they've voted it'll be too late
And when the country's in a fucking mess
They want to know the secret of your success
You never used weapons you never used tools
But money is power and people are fools

Chorus

Society

Album: Demolition War EP
Release Date: 1981 December

Our society what a drag
Another nervous breakdown another fag
You can't get to sleep cos you lost your pills
And the protien tablets make you ill

Chorus:

Our society - what a drag!

Drive around in a smashed-up car
Sometimes you wonder who you ar
You look depressed as you walk upstairs
'cos you lost your job and no one cares

Chorus

See the police men running round
Driving culture underground
They get paid to put you away
'Cos that's how the system works these days

Chorus

Join the people on the dole
They lost interest years ago
What hope is there for you and me
If this is our society

Somebody's Mother

Album: 29:29 Split Vision LP
Release Date: 1985

She sits there drinking
What does the fiction represent?
The T.V. scandal
Can make her break out in sweat
She watches it to mak her feel part
of something she never was
She sings a song
That her father whistled while he worked

It helps her relax
A mild depressant keeps her down
And she keeps smiling
The radio bleeds that happy sound
The music nullifies all her fears
with words to that effect
Shes happy now, she thinks
That really nothing could go wrong

All this waiting all for nothing
Routine living - rooms to live in
Routine living - merely wasting away

This life she's living
Is an extension of our guilt
The four-walled conscience
Imposed by those who never felt
The pane the tedious drudgery
Boredom (relax!) - it's lonely
And it's not right
That this way of life should go on

Someone Is Lying

Album: Worlds LP
Release Date: 1985

Flowers that decay on the graves that are fresh
The problem got burried alongside the flesh
The contamination of body and soul
By nuclear waste dumped a long time ago
When father was thirty he worked for the state
Producing the weapons to keep a stalemate
Deterence by inference no-one could win
Balancing power but the knife-edge was thin
Father was paid so he didn't complain
But felt it was rather a dangerous game
Producing a toy to destroy, was it wrong?
But problems came up so he had to stay on
The production of waste was the problem to solve
It wouldn't evaporate rot or dissolve
They used metal coffins to bury at sea
The nuclear radioactivity
They said it was safe for a very long time
And paid off the papers to say that was fine
And nobody worried about that anymore
They were too busy worrying about the next war...
The wastage seeped out and diseases were found
In the lungs of the men who worked underground
'It's coaldust, it's cancer, it's normal' they said
'Til somebody shouted 'these people are dying
Someone is lying'
- and father is dead

Straightline Thinking

Album: Worlds LP
Release Date: 1985
We are all controlled by reinforcement of rules passed by those who are merely the tools of a system where achievement is based on deciet of the masses by someone in whom they believe

We are all controlled by the straightline thinking of straightline thinkers who gave up drinking and smoking to avoid being lower then their aspirations would allow them to go

We are all controlled by fear of the unknown because we're not told all there is to know about things we consider as normal existence so we accept exploitation and show now resistance

We are all controlled in our thoughts and actions by things we were told by past generations of parents who used to rebel just the same as we do now so who gets the blame?

We are the rebels like the rebels before us pre-destined to scream in an out-of-tune chorus of voices repeating the words of the past that diffuse in the process of ageing too fast

Deep in the soul if there is one it tells you to do as you feel not as someone outside you dictates through their own misguided conception of what part you must play in the game of deception

Subvert City

Album: The Day the Country Died LP
Release Date: 1983

And it al went quiet in the city
And the wind blew down the road
Someone cried out 'subvert'!
And the people all went cold
Meanwhile back in subvert city
Someone's writing on the wall
'fuck the government' spraypaint here
Someone wants the state to fall
Religious dogma crucified
Ritual slaughter no one lied
Living standards were dying morals
A state controlled mass suicide
The dying breed of subvert city
Crept into the underground
The state police just left them there
Blocked the holes and gassed them down
Ten years later they emerged
Mutated minds so full of hate
Tried again to change the system
This time round it was too late
There was no system left to change
The people ran the entire land
The subverts became politicians
And finally got the upper hand
Meanwhile back in subvert city
Someone's writing ont he wall
'fuck the government' spray-paint hero
But in subvert city - it's subvert rule

Susan

Album: Time Flies... But Aeroplanes Crash EP
Release Date: October 1983

Susan finished school at 16
Wants to be a secretary
2 years later she's got nowhere
Ends up in a factory
Making matches it's so boring
She gets sad and so depressed
Hears her doctor smugly tell her
"Take these pills and get some rest"
But she takes it one step further
Parents rescue her in time
Smile and tell her "When you're married
Everything will be just fine"
She recovers and gets married further shuts the closing door
Though he says "I really love you"
She feels worse off than before
9 months later she's a mother
It's a bouncing baby boy
"Oh how super!" say her parents But for her there is no joy
Words like mummy don't mean nothing
It's all she hears from 9 to 5
All alone at number 19
Every single day she dies
19 years of hollow clichés
Now she wants to end it all
Bored to death from doing nothing
Family drives her up the wall
Swinging Susan hanged herself
She couldn't live her pointless life
He comes home to see through tears
The rigid corpse that was his wife
The life and times of Susan Strange
Ended in that tragic way
With the money from insurance
The family went on holiday
Nothing left but rotting flowers
On an unattended grave
The epitaph has faded badly
No-one reads it anyway

Chorus

Think For Yourself

Album: 29:29 Split Vision LP

Release Date: 1985
A combination of work and rest
Keeps your head in a total mess
Just like we're all supposed to be
A part of this sick society
Where they give you a rest three weeks a year
To fill yourself with drugs and beer
The rest of the time it's time for work
The junkie turns into a jerk

The government don't really give a toss
Unemployment isn't such a loss
Keep the dole proles on the poverty line
Or stick 'em in the army to kill the time
The majority of people are treated like shit
Only the minority realize it
Conformist doctrine, ethical lies
Have you ever seen anyone slowly die?

There's so much crap you can reject
By giving yourself some self-respect
Don't believe what you're told is true
Find out for yourself 'cos there's only you
Take to pieces your inbred thoughts
Examine the morals that you've been taught
Don't believe it, it's all a con -
Everything you think is wrong!

Don't believe it!
- But don't take my word for it

Til The Pigs Come Round

Album: The Day the Country Died LP
Release Date: 1983

Oh what a great experience
My house is full of deviants
My dad is going mad downstairs
My brother has just dyed his hair

Chorus:
We got punks and drunks and thrills and pills
And lots of things to make your head go round
It's fun fun fun fun fun til the pigs come round

Someone's banging on a drum
Smoke and drink well this is fun
The neighbours are smashing in the walls
Myum is making telephone calls

Chorus

Pigs outside but no one cares
Heavy jackbootsp the stairs
It's the D.S. what a joke!
'Hey maan doya want some smoke?'

Chorus

Time Flies

Album: 29:29 Split Vision LP
Release Date: 1985

Can you hear the sound of people laughing
Because they think they know it all?
WHere they've been and where they're going
As if they themselves had writing on the wall
The assuredness that power and money give them
Their fate decided by their parents' cash
The crank that gives them temporary laughter
By saying "Time flies but aeroplanes crash"

They can laugh off anything they can't relate to
Until the day before the day they die
When suddenly they long for past existence
And claim the right to forever stay alive
But all things in the present are outdated
And everything must someday fade away
Our actions are all transient and faded
And tomorrow isn't just another day

Can you hear the sounds of people crying
Because once they thought they knew it all?
And now their self-assurances are dying
As time erodes the writing on the wall

Don't take everything for granted
Exist as if the moment was your last
Don't wait complacently for your future
DOn't live in memories of things gone past
Live in awareness fo the fact you're alive
Enjoy it while you got it as the time goes by

Us Fish Must Swim Together

Album: From the Cradle to the Grave LP
Release Date: 1984

OK let's tart at the beginning
When fishes roamed the sea
They swam around before anything else
In ten million years b.c.
When one day they decided
To evolve into vertibrates
And a few cam out of the water
And got drunk to celebrate
Soon, well when I say 'soon', I mean
A coupla million years
They evolved into various quadrupeds
With legs and things and ears
And about a trillion aeons later
They went all civilized
And built lots of bombs and council flats
That reached into the skies
The moral of this tale, you see
We are descended from the fish
And if we progress much further
We'll put our lives at risk
We're starting to destroy ourselves
With pollution war and greed
When food and sex and water
Is all we really need
When 'sink or swim' is the choice you get
You cannot swim forever
You need suppor to keep you alive
Us fish must swim together!

Wake Up Screaming

Album: From the Cradle to the Grave LP
Release Date: 1984

I don't think what I was before
I never watched anyone die before
I wish I'd never left home
I wish I'd left it alone
Temptation is a disease
You can never do as you please
Your body takes over and your mind don't care
Never think what might happen out there
Go straight in for the ultimate sin
And nobody else ever seems to care
So I took what I thought was mine
And waited for a very long time
And I thought I knew what happened to you
Cos you told me exactly what to do
So I did it right stayed up all night
Felt like killing myself for you
I don't think I think like I did before
I never watched anyone die before
I felt like I died as well
The look the words the smell
The way you looked at me
As if I'd never before
I remember the words like a favourite song
Cos I forget the way things went wrong
Faked a picture of perfect health
Then I realized I was killing myself
I don't think I am what I was before
I never watched anyone die before
I dream in slow motion and I wake up screaming

Walls Of Silence

Album: 29:29 Split Vision LP
Release Date: 1985

Sick of all these dumb solutions
Why not tell me something new?
I've been hearing so much bullshit
It's impossible to tell the truth
How can they preach all their morals
When they're worse than we'll ever be?
We're a useless threat to their walls of silence
But there's no solution to convince me

Chorus:
You can scream - shout - fight the system
But it won't fight back...
Safe behind their walls of silence

The system stinks and we all know it
But the mass protesters get nowhere
A wall of arms against a wall of silence
They just pretend that we're not there
And there's nothing we can do about it
Fighting each other all day long
Divide ourselves by petty ritual
Then we wonder what went wrong

Chorus

Waste Of Breath

Album: From the Cradle to the Grave LP
Release Date: 1984

You paint your leather jacket but it comes off in the rain
And the more you cut your hair the more it grows again
The badges you put on yourself fall off or start to rust
And the more they take the piss the less people you can trust

Chorus:
It's the story of your life
And the end of it's your death
And every word that's inbetween
Is just a weast of breath

You don't know who you might have been or who you now should be
Or what you ought to write on walls or why you wanna be free
And then you start to panic cos the inspiration's there
But you're not sure how to use it and anyway non-one seems to care

Chorus

You're the classic all-round failure who never seems to win
You'd like to write a book but your not sure how to begin
It's the story of your life and the end of it's your death
And every word that's inbetween is jsut a wast of berath

Chorus

When The Bomb Drops

Album: Rats EP
Release Date: January 1985

When the bomb drops I'll be a bank holiday
Everybody happy in their tents and caravans
Everybody happy in their ignorance and apathy
Nobody realizes until their television breaks down
The voices of the people are going unheard
They got nothing to say cos they're deaf and dumb
Too concerned with money luxury adultery
Complacency and politics and apathy will never mix
When the bomb drops they'll be a 4 minute warning
Three minutes of anarchy and one of blind futility
No-one left alive and no chances to survive
You've heard it all before-but I'm telling you once more
To forget is to forgive but there's nothing to forget
I ain't forgotten how to live and it hasn't happened [yet]
They'll drop the bomb for something to do can't remember what it's for
But I ain't forgot Hiroshima
I ain't forgot the war

Where's The Freedom?

Album: From the Cradle to the Grave LP
Release Date: 1984

We're going backwards
Into the sin of self-neglect
What do we stand for?
It's very easy to forget
The protest marches
Is it the done thing to object?
So where's the freedom?
Your conscience hangs around your neck
Where's the freedom?
We're going crazy
WIth paranoia fear and greed
Accepting standards
Believing what we hear and read
nd then we think we've
Sussed out a new reality
But is this freedom
Just another hand from which we feed?
Where's the freedom?
We're going nowhere
In vicious circles we gyrate
The new subculture
With cliches painted on their face
We cannot see past
The elite barriers we crate
We reject the system
But put another in its place
Where's the freedom?

Who's Gonna Fight In The Third World War?

Album: Demolition War EP
Release Date: 1981 December

The government talk about conscription
Another self-imposed restriction
Their excuse is no conviction
Patriotism it's all fiction

Chorus:

There ain't no patriots no more
Who's gonna fight in the third world war?

Everyone knows it just ain't right
Don't we get the chance to live or die?
They give us hardship all our life
And when we refuse they wonder why

Chorus

Well I won't fight for my country
'Cos the government wouldn't fight for me
They can't afford the dole money
So they'll put the unemployed in the army

Chorus

Word Factory

Album: Time Flies... But Aeroplanes Crash EP
Release Date: October 1983

In the silence of a grave
In the words of someone's hero
A blue television screen
Words don't mean anything
In this word factory
Replacement parts are free
Pictures of failed ideas
Only took me fifteen years
All your words cannot describe
The attitudes that lie inside
Subculture killed at birth
Got bored and slowly died
In the silence of a graveyard
Someone's talking to himself
Oh! What a letdown!
Oh! What a boring letdown!
Such a perfect face
Words are such a waste
Let me paint a pictuer of you
And hang it in this empty place
Can I quote from your ideas
Hand your excuses on the wall
Devaluated words
Blown up to mean sod all
Oh! What a letdown!
Oh! What a boring letdown
Did you just say somethin
It must have blown away
Got bored and slowly died
Forget what you have to say
Who wrote this anyway?

Work Experience

Album: Religious Wars EP
Release Date: 1982 July

Working for money and the system too
THought the dole queue made you 'worthless'
Now you're slaved to a public machine
Getting somewhere is this what they mean?
Worthless...not enough money!

Chorus:
I'd rather work for money
Than just for 'something to do'
But then why bother working at all?
Do you want to stay totally normal?

You wanted more and what did they say?
'You'll never sell yourself to anyone
Come back and try in six months time
Don't you know there's a social decline?'
Politics - Don't it make you mad?

Chorus

You said you'd look for another job
'Well try it sonny you won't get far
Do as you're told and stop complaining'
Being conned is part of the training
Crash course - learning how to lose

Chorus

Work - Rest - Play - Die

Album: Time Flies... But Aeroplanes Crash EP
Release Date: October 1983

When the people of the country have forgotten how do disagree
And the national economy is said to be O.K.
And the wages that you get will help you to forget
Will you keep your ideologies or throw them all away?
When the system has you beaten
Even though you haven't eaten
Cos you can't afford to eat and drink to keep your brain alive
You blame the system for the weather but carry on as ever
You got to work at half past 8 and come back home after 5
You can go blue in the face talking about the human race
How they got to outer space but it never stopped the wars
And how the whole of this humanity is based on greed and vanity
The ones who make decisions are the ones who make the laws
You're still in this society so what's your main priority?
Remain in the majority who never really cared?
Or cultivate the hate to annihilate the state
Are you prepared to die for your beliefs or just to dye your hair?
The anarchist the nihilist but can you prove that you exist
To a population who just insist that you're just a bunch of fakes?
You can not change the system until you change your own restrictions
Communication and conviction got to kick until it breaks

Worlds Apart

Album: 29:29 Split Vision LP

Release Date: 1985
Ignorance and innocence go together
Peace and harmony flowers and trees
Your peace of mind only comes in pints
There are other worlds apart from these

A world where war and poverty
Exist as a reality

Back in the public factory
So cliched and disorderly
They wash down fears with crocodile beers
False illusions and big man jeers:

"Well I didn't know about Afganistan
'cos I'm a homeloving working man
And I know I'd resist if Ihad to fight
I know I'd resist - exist - with a fist"

Voilence, no! That is no answer
Two wrongs don't make a right
But a thousand wrongs make the human race
Conditioned so they fight

Hence the reason hence the shouting
From the start it seemed so real
Anti-war and bombs and fighting
Telling someone what we feel

A world of strength and clarity
The alternative reality
But creating a new lifestyle
Could never come to much
Everyone had the ideas
But no one had the guts

Then they dropped their goddamn bomb
Just like we'd predicted
Just like we wrote the songs about
Just like the words we'd stand and shout

We don't know half
Of anything real
We don't even know
How we should feel
When questioned or cornered
We back off and squeal

So where is this solution?
This evasive dream conclusion?
Where's the end to this pollution?
Or is peace just an illusion?
After all we're only human

("We're only human" is our excuse to say
We're not in control of our actions
Preferring to blame some "Natural
Process" for our own self-indulgence
In personal gain)

You can point your finger
And re-direct the blame
But just as you're blaming someone else
They're doing just the same

So think before you drink your life away
Think about what you may have to say
React! - convincingly -
To that with which you disagree

Zyklon-B-Movie

Album: The Day the Country Died LP
Release Date: 1983

There's a film at the cinema
People go in pairs
They show it at night
And some people get scared
And once you're inside
They lock all the doors
And the sets are all empty
And there's blood on the floor

Chorus:
It's a Zyklon-B-Movie
Straight out of the past
It's a Zyklon-B-Movie
And it could be your last

And there's a nine-year-old girl
Who came for a scream
And she's screaming all right
ANd it isn't a dream
This is just the support film
To get youw armed up. But it's quite the reverse
Because it freezes your blood

Chorus

And the gas rises up
From under the chairs
This film is so lifelike
It feels like you're there
It's a Zyklon-B-Movie
Certificate X
If this was the first film
Then what could come next?
It's a Zyklon-B-Movie
Certivicate Z
The Z is for Zyklon
And the people are dead