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Outside View
Our first single and a song I wrote most of the lyrics to at school
whilst bored during a lesson. It is, as the title suggests, about
feeling like an outsider, alienated from what we're told is
'reality'. I still feel the same way.
Thinking of the USA
This is about the boredom of living in a suburban town in the 1970's
and how, compared to the USA, England seemed such a dull, small
place to be...three channels on TV that stop broadcasting by
midnight, postcodes instead of snazzy sounding 'zip codes', pubs
instead of all night bars, Diana Dors instead of Marilyn Monroe,
etc. I've changed my mind about a lot of my complaints now though
and I'd fucking hate to live in America....Senator Arnie, Prez Bush,
Rumsfeld, TV preachers, Redneck mentality...please just fuck off and
die!
Michael's Monetary System
I used to write a lot of short stories, actually still do, this was
one of them that we decided to set to music for a laugh. The idea of
the story was based on a schoolfriend called Michael Farley who,
whilst we were out one night, made the proclamation that he didn't
have any money to buy any chips with but he did have a few buttons
that had been pulled of his shirt in his pocket. I thought it would
be a nice idea if shops accepted buttons instead of coins. The music
was Ian's idea, like a piss-take of Pink Floyd 'Money'.
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You
About a girl called Lisa Mell (who also gets name checked in various
other eater songs). Brian and I loved her and desperately wanted to
shag her, she was gorgeous! I thought if I wrote a song about her it
might increase my chances...it didn't. It has a line that goes 'I
just gotta find a way to get into your hood' - this was way before
rappers went on about 'the 'hood' and I'm not entirely sure what I
meant by that! She's probably a bloated fishwife now. |
Public Toys
Ah, the pressures of fame! Please, God help us!! Dream on!!
Room For One
Brian wrote most of these words. It was supposed to be about a
prostitute he would have liked to win the affections of although I'm
certain he'd had no experience of such a thing at fourteen years
old!
Lock It Up
I ripped off most of these lyrics from a Gershwin lyric that was in
a book my Mum gave me for my 16th birthday. She was probably trying
to steer me away from writing songs called 'Get Raped'!. I think it
was called 'Pleny Of Nuthin'' or something like that. I liked it's
sentiment about people with too much money getting paranoid about it
and having to lock it all away. So I stole it!!
Fifteen
Alice Cooper's '18' changed to suit our ages as suggested by Jonh
Ingham.
I Don't Need It
I wrote this after school one day after being advised that I wasn't
to bunk off anymore or my Mum'd be fined and me sent to a 'special'
school.
Anne
All about the joys of having sex with a dead girl and then burying
her in the back garden when you've finished with her!
Get Raped
Dee wrote most of these lyrics with a little help from me. It's
about a girl we knew..a 'shagrat' as we'd nicknamed her who'd pissed
Dee off for some reason. This was the worst fuck-off-insult he could
come up with. The backlash was bad, we had womens groups and all
sorts coming after us. It was very difficult finding a printer who
was prepared to include the lyrics on our album.
Space Dreaming
Basically it's about day-dreaming. Y'know, if something in life is
irritating you, just switch off and dream about something you like.
When I discovered that drink and drugs were far more effective in
achieving this than 'space dreaming' I never looked back! These days
I'd prefer to use my mind.
My Business
A rather limp attempt to defend one's right to do what you want to
do. For some reason Chairman Mao get's a name check!
No More
'No More Bedroom Fits' was the original title. 'fits' meaning
boredom. As a teenager, your safe haven is your bedroom. I wrote
this whilst drinking cider, smoking fags , listening to Lou Reed and
The Ramones on the stereo and feeling invincible for a little
while.
No Brains
A song about dumb people doing dumb things 'coz they think it's
'grown up'.
Debutantes Ball
I wrote this after reading Diana Barrymore's auto-biog 'Too Much Too
Soon', which was also the title of a NY Dolls album - that's why I
read it. It was a great book tho' and inspired me to write about
her. She was a rich kid, a debutante who had it all but fucked it
all up. In our song I had to spin out the syllables in 'Debutante's'
to make it scan so it end up sounding; 'deb -u-tarnt-ays ball'.
Brian's solo on this is the funniest thing in the world. It makes
Pete Shelley's 'Boredom' riff sound like Jimi Fucking Hendrix!
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Holland
I thought, after touring The Netherlands, that I'd better widen my
lyrical topics so I wrote a song about Holland. A country so
un-interesting that it's entire population has been on drugs for the
past hundred years.
What She Wants She Needs
A song about an ex-girlfriend called Beverly. A very strange girl
that used to attend my Dad's school for maladjusted kids in
Manchester. Soon after this came out a chain of fashion stores
opened called...'What She Wants'....there's a bit of trivia for you.
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Reach For The Sky
This is about Douglas Bader the famous no-legged pilot. I used to be
really into WW2 mythology for some reason. Would you get on a plane
if you knew the pilot had no legs? They should have squeezed him
into a tank and told him to shut the fuck up moaning!
She's Wearing Green
A girl, hassled by her parents demands for her to conform to the
colours they wear on their sleeves picks green as her flag of
convenience. Green being neutral. A cack handed socio-political
comment.
Notebook
Journalists suck, they always get it wrong. Is it punk this week? Is
it New wave? Is it Power Pop? A comment on the music press of the
time. One of the last Eater songs ever written. Ian's sub metal
songs were starting to wear a bit thin with me. New boy, Gary
Steadman's riffs didn't help.
Point Of View
Naive view of individualism, written with the first clutch of songs
at school around 1974/5.
Typewriter Babes
There used to be a great late night programme called 'Night gallery'
on TV, like the Twilight Zone...y'know, weird short stories, my all
time favourite show (anyone with copies, I'd do anything for you!!).
One of them was about these characters from a story an author was
writing about for his book, but they thought they were real and
wouldn't accept that they were just 'made up' along with their 'made
up' life and that they could be killed off as and when the writer
wanted to do so. The actual title is 'Typewriter Babies', as in 'the
typewriter's given birth'...somehow it got changed to 'babes'. A lot
of people assumed it was about fancying secretaries!!
Write to Andy; roxyclub77@yahoo.com
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