There's a cone in the river and a Safeways trolley overturned | By the pre-postmodern business centre someone forgot to burn down | The town was where we met but it could all have been so different | Well I'd been here for ever - sixteen years that felt like more | And you'd think it was clever not to venture far from your front door round here | Wait for the afterlife, sing up in church and drown out all the voices that say | "I'm ok and how d'you do and what was it I meant to do, well what are you supposed to do but give the kids something to do but hang around" | She was there in the fun bar - no-one goes expecting fun | Don't recall why I went there - no-one goes for just the one round here | They put a brave face on, commiserate, reflect on their bad choices and say | "I'm ok and how d'you do and what was it I meant to do, well what are you supposed to do but give the kids something to do but hang around"

All I have is words, words that don't obtain | And I feel I'm a stain on your horizon | So I stay away - it's easier that way | And there won't be no-one I need to rely on | Is it him, is it me | Or is there something only I can see | How did I get here, why do we blow around like straw dogs on the breeze | I'm a special one - what they used to say | But I've to stay on, finish levels-A | You don't need exams when you've read John Gray | But you look like you know the way to stop these colours turning into grey | All my brilliant friends stuck in shitty jobs | All the lizard men inheriting the earth | Nature's gonna get you, nature's gonna get you | We don't have much time | They can't hear you Sarah, I can't see you now sir | Here comes wintertime, comedown in our prime | Just as you get started, everyone you trusted ready for the new wave | Ready for the new wave

Sometimes you've got to get away | If I had a car I'd drive it | To a place where they don't know my face | Change my clothes, my shoes, my hair and my name | But I'll stay next to you | Not sure what happens when we get there | We're just in love with going somewhere | And it's easy to grab fifteen seconds of fame | But the last nine or ten get so hard to sustain | I'll stay next to you | So long to princess mourners | Farewell you fuel protesters | And future generations will not appreciate your miniscule improvements to the living standards index that you earned at the expense of all their lives and all their children | Oh, we're not getting any younger | No, it's not getting any better | And if life's like a road full of hazards and bends why do we act surprised when it comes to an end | I'll stay next to you | So we leave the car and take the train and set off in the pouring rain | Travel light, standard class | Half the legroom, twice as fast | Look at the world that flashes by | The countryside, the power lines that seem to race along with you | Well it's near the end of the school day so I send a text back home to say | Sorry mum and dad and bro, I couldn't stay, I had to go | To London with someone | Before I come undone | Cos where I'm from's a humdrum town and I don't want to die | We're gonna work our way into the centre of the crowd | And I for one will be appalled if I'm not shocked at what's allowed | Disculture, so jammin' | No need to examine no magazine or tv screen to know what's going on

You can see the future | Just stop and look around yer | Oh, this impossible world was never meant to be | And maybe we get what we deserve | I've seen the evidence | Packaged experience, things I want but know I'll never need | No way, no way | The fame economy | Doll choreography the culture of complaint won't seek to understand | The daisies in the sun mutate but still stay beautiful | Always looking forward to a time when you'll look back on this and smile | No way, no way | City comedown | Same as our town | With this ring I see through every ocean rising, advertising they won't stop until it's all in bits upon the ground | Screensave faces, Chinese walls divide | Monitors flicker but I only saw the light behind your eyes | We're part of a problem with no solution | Everywhere you go, everything so cheap | Someone's gonna pay | From the daily rail to the NME, sing the same old song | "They build you up they knock you down. Fifteen minutes counting down. Changes like the weather. You built me up you won't knock me down - I'm keeping both feet on the ground. And it's getting better!" | Too much time's gone past | It's winter, summer, spring | Short sleeves in March | Wake up, forage, eat, sleep and make it better | A little better | Always better | And then some more | Solemnly we piss away the peace before the war that always comes | What if I could take you back to yesterday again | Away from Kajadoodoo clerks and crazy frogs and optimists making poverty history | And was there anything else? | Back in 1980s | First thing you see | Where are all the dandies | And you shouldn't trust your memory | So banal and real and like it never went away | Banned from the bookies - "Hey, mister, we got lucky!" | "Two for The Smiths, please. And a can of Quatro." | Starring in a film no-one will ever see | But you can see the future

Careless memories always lie | Times and places you can't buy from years ago | Boys and girls that you once knew all grown up and over you won't let you go | Photographs are bittersweet | Future plans are in retreat before too long | Don't look back | There's danger in the past | Don't go back | You knew it couldn't last | Life moves pretty fast | But there's danger | Danger in the past | Hearts once broken never mend, stay infected to the end | They never heal | Souvenirs that you can feel won't give up what they reveal | They never will | Everything that you pursue one more step ahead of you| Don't look back | There's danger in the past | Don't go back | You knew it couldn't last | Life moves pretty fast | But there's danger | Danger in the past | So sad to tell you that you won't belong | You can't turn back the clock and see the world anew | Did everybody change but you | Careless memories always lie | Scentless traces you can't hide | The years ago | Boys and girls that you once knew all grown up and over you won't let you go | Everything that you pursue one more step ahead of you | But you don't know | Don't look back | There's danger in the past | Don't go back | You knew it couldn't last | Life moves pretty fast | But there's danger | Danger in the past

Someone's gone and I'm unbelieving | Dreaming, thought I still heard you breathing | Then, when I wake, it's just the rain | '85, a beautiful morning | Read the note I should have seen coming | Knew what I must do | I understand you had to go | There's nowhere here that feels like home | Nothing compares to now | It all feels wrong somehow | One last look around and I'm leaving | Back to when we were just beginning | We'll make it work in the now and here | We could have a car and a family | Live off all my almanac gambling | Do just as we please | When I got back something had changed | I wandered staring | Like an accident survivor | But couldn't find her | I just want to let you know how very much I miss you | My travelling companion, there's so much I meant to say

Pennies on the pavement for Jim and Wayne and Rose | Tattered flyers beg our help in tracing some of those lost and lonely fractured souls who vanished long ago | Where you find them, sad to say, it's true God only knows | You linger late in cafes, look back on future days when your dreams were like miracles | Now you can only pray | For the laugh you heard last night | For the face that was there the week before | The tears you shed when she walked out the door | You know | She's been there before | You know she's walked out a thousand other doors | You've never needed no-one, no-one's ever needed you | But you've lived the life and played the game, what more can people do | You wake in the early hours | Do you think you'll find her there | She packed her bags late one night | Skipped out without a care | Now you seize on certain gestures | Scraps of sentence overheard | But the memory that stays longest is how she left without a word | Oh the laugh you heard last night | The face you saw the week before | Tthe tears you shed when she walked out that door | You know, she's been there before | You know she's walked out a thousand other doors | Pennies on the pavement, for Jim and Wayne and Rose | For those who know which way the wind blows | Which way the river flows

It's thirty years since '85 | Robbie's dead but Pete's alive | Or so the weblogs say | But no-one's reading them | Today my past caught up with me | And you were standing over there | You asked me what's the time | You asked me what's the year and smiled the saddest smile I'd ever seen | I heard the same, can it be true | The bad die old, the good pass through | Or so the people say | But look where they got us | The cars lie all around | The city's useless now | We took on the world and lost | But everyone's a loser now | But you | I never thought you'd end up here | With all that you were running from | But when the chips are down | I only wish I'd been around | As if you needed me at all | I couldn't stay, just had to go | I waited years for you to show | But that's all in the past | It happened oh so fast | The cars lie all around | The city's useless now | We took on the world and lost | But everyone's a loser now | Thinking what I should have done | There are things you shouldn't touch | And so much you can't control | I didn't find myself back there | But I lost myself in you | And it felt so... | It doesn't have to end this way | Cos you can always start again | It's just a possible world | The cars lie all around | The city's useless now | We took on the world and lost | But everyone's a loser now | But you | You saw it coming, didn't you

Look at the stars | They don't care about you or anything we do | They burn so bright | So turn away next time they say | Here's something new you'll never see, could never do | When you read the news remember | If you fall for this you'll fall for anything | You got the job so go back to school where everything you do just kills dead time | The useless deeds the business needs | And never stops to wonder what's the reason why | On your way to work remember | If you fall for this you'll fall for anything that passes by you | If you fall for this you'll fall for anything