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SOUTHEND Dusk lingers on the promenade, lights spring up on the far shoreline. Customised Fords with booming systems and neon blue undercarriages lead us along to the Esplanade where we have a gig, a benefit for rape crisis. We love playing here it’s a great audience, quite mad and appreciative, most certainly up for it. Return a few days later and check into the almost derelict hotel that sits battered on the cliff top overlooking the rides and the pier below. The objective is to write a play or a short novel, a break from the music, but somehow get involved with a Polish couple and things get a bit complicated and wayward and don’t quite go to plan, not particularly a bad scene but certainly eye opening. Come back with lots of words for songs thinking fuck that was some spooked chancer hotel, a south coast Burroughsian thing going on, a different clientele these days sadly, though the town retains total charm. I believe in the beat life still, I believe in punk and soul still, but I will never stop wanting to hear the new sounds too, and looking for a decaying hotel to try and scratch a few words out, anyway… . A night in the Railway anyone?

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CAMDEN Dawn light seeping through the curtains as the noise of traffic begins to make its presence felt in incremental fits and starts. I should probably put the guitar I’ve been scratching away at down and try and sleep a few hours before taking the French film with Charlotte Gainsbourg in back to the VHS store. Look at the empty cans of lager crushed and discarded on the floor, Red Stripe but certain mythical reverence towards the Purple Tin, the folk who helped me drink the contents have gone now, the room isn’t too much of a mess considering.  Little Annie’s song Thinking Of You is played a lot. Go to see her perform at Sean Mcluskey’s Love Ranch in Leicester Square and her DAT tape stalls as she sashays down the catwalk, still she carries on regardless, a proper star, and then the acid kicks in, for us not her, it’s just about wearing off now. Chevignon, Diesel, Chipie, though a more general Laurence Corner hippy bohemian style prevails. These are great days, loads of good and interesting people around me, why the fuck do I feel so sad, confused, detached, work through it, come on, get over it.

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PALE LIGHT ON FAR SHORE / SOUTHEND ESPLANADE 91 /92 WELL YOU’VE MET THIS BOY RAGMAN EVENING WORLD HOLIDAY SHOW BREAK THE SPELL TRACKSUIT VENDETTA THE PATIENCE OF A SAINT A FINE TIME TO BE ALIVE MARVIN IN OSTENDE LET’S TALK ABOUT THE WEATHERMEN INSTEAD THE BOY SAILOR WHAT THE MOON SAW HOT LITTLE HOPES KILLY CAR THIEVES CASUALS SOULSTRESS CLAUDIA DREAMS

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[bandofholyjoy-blog]

DARKER BY DEGREE 1 YOUR BOYFRIEND IS ON REMAND MY TIME IS ALL WRONGED SINCE YOU WENT TO JAIL ELIZABETH SMART DARKER BY DEGREE 2 DISTINCTLY UNTHRILLED OUT ON THE PERIPHERY EASTER VIGNETTE DESIRE AND CHANCE AND THE CRAZY, CRAZY LIFE BETWEEN MY SAD HOPES AND YOUR WILD SCHEMES DARKER BY DEGREE 3

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DARKER BY DEGREE 1 4.A.M. Something I can’t quite put my finger on I picked up on a slither of something somebody close to me said Which didn’t quite ring correct Since then the balance has been upset And my mind it can’t stop racing There are issues I should be facing I should not be self abasing But the ghosts of past demons Are all present and they are chasing me to the dark side… again

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YOUR BOYFRIEND IS ON REMAND The floor is littered with bodies You haven’t slept for days Ever since you started dealing Life’s been a haze If you knew any different You’d say, things were out of hand It’s a toe-rags convention You’re boyfriends on remand Just this morning the police Were knocking at your door But you answer to no one Not anymore You go down to the all night garage to get some cigarettes Your best friend pulls out a gun the cashier hits the deck Than back at your bash, you’re counting out the cash A thousand pound smarter we’re stoned you have to laugh This enterprise culture you begin to understand It’s just a fucking pity you’re boyfriends on remand A stolen camcorder whiled some time away You slapping that security guard who was being such a pain He was filing charges against your boyfriend on remand But we answer to no one that’s the thing they don’t understand

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MY TIME IS ALL WRONGED SINCE YOU WENT TO JAIL My time is all wronged, since you went to jail The days are now nights, my nights the bleakest of tales The hours pass so slow, and yet the end of the world Seems to speed right towards me, I feel lost without you, I can’t play the old game My dreams are of hell, since you went to jail The injustice is a sin; you should not serve this time, though I know what you did I was there in the room, you chibbed that monster for me To defend our honour, and prove our selves could be self-determining and worthy and free You’re in that prison cell I’m in this stinking hotel Looking down on the freedom of the shore I can’t take the sunshine of Southend no more

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ELIZABETH SMART I am the last Pregnant woman In a desolated world The bed is cold The bed is cold And jealousy Is as cruel as the grave I remain I am I shall never Cease to be You will forget You will fade out I can-not be undone

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DARKER BY DEGREE 2 4.30.A.M. I’m thinking maybe that it’s not all fragile thoughts A feeling of not quite dried concrete cladding in my heart and mind That people I’d invested good faith in Are quite practically working against me And it’s encroaching on my general sense of well-being The thing is to extricate myself Nicely and discreetly from the situation Which will be harder than hard Because pragmatic and sensitive diplomacy is not my forte And I can’t quite grasp the mettle of these shadowy machinations So slip slippy slippery and snake snakily slithering around me

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EVERSHOLT STREET DECEMBER 1992 Another stupid song Plays on my radio The late night phone in now More useless tips on living That leaves me nowhere at all Another night of utter nothingness I’m giving up this time Well, maybe next time For there is time to be killed And this life leaves me feeling so chilled I’m distinctly unthrilled Another dumb party I’ve had more than I can stand I’m thinking should I go I might miss something I don’t know That leaves me nowhere at all Another night of utter nothingness I’m giving up this time Well, maybe next time For there is time to be killed And this life leaves me feeling so chilled I’m distinctly unthrilled To fall asleep in the snow A death that’s numb and sweet and slow

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OUT ON THE PERIPHERY Grafting the weekend rush hour Stepping in-between the cars Selling roses from the verge Hustling for a pittance Working the outskirts of your birthplace sprawl Motorway service station All cold and deserted In the dead of night And still in the early hours Don’t you know I’m stuck here I’m waiting for a ride And as these dirty tributaries Push their virulent cells Out into broken arteries I pick you up under a hall of stars Straight into an oncoming car To take you out tonight To take you out tonight To take you out tonight is all

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EASTER VIGNETTE And then my best friend died In a fire at a party on the coast Well by the Father the Son the Holy Ghost What do we do? What can we do? When this world isn’t what we’d like it to be And things are never like the things you see You stole a forklift truck Drove it through the window of a jewellery store Laughed as sirens cut the evening air You broke a spell then I said a prayer That I would find the strength to always be there And you would turn around one day and say you cared When my best friend was alive How you and me fought all of the time And now my best friend has died I can’t get you out of my mind And my best friend was your brother I don’t care if you’re seeing some other You know I’d hire Red Square for a year and a day If your walls tumbled down and you came my way I feel rebirth in the air

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DESIRE AND CHANCE AND THE CRAZY LIFE Design and organisation I walked out of my dwelling house Down on to Eversholt Street Made my way to the centre Rode up the escalator I know The telephones are monitored by CCTV So I’m giving them a wave As I’m losing all my change And I’m begging you to meet me At a quarter to sometime On the corner of somewhere and nowhere it’s true Desire and chance I run into you at last These are happy times Tinges of hope and doubt That our wild game won’t start Not that you care about that You say you’re set to leave this city And change the world for true Today is going to be Today is going to be Today is going to be another one of those days

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BETWEEN MY SAD HOPES AND YOUR WILD SCHEMES And this night I’ve aged a thousand years For a moment I forgot you were there My heart lies at the bottom Of all your squandered dreams So here I stand at the intersection Of my sad hopes and your wild schemes Great expectations You’ve kept me waiting I’m bored waiting It’s way beyond time And when my mind needed fixing Sure you’d give me the boosters Supply is short you’d say So of course the price is high You’d barely ever meet my needs Whilst stripping my greatest prize My heart lies at the bottom Of all your squandered dreams For yourself you always had plenty to say But when it came to me and you no way For all the things you didn’t say And the bitter sly way You didn’t say them And this night I’ve aged a thousand years For a moment I forgot you were there You come out of the shadows You declare your intentions But I see the intersection And I’m bored with playing games