Gareth Liddiard - Strange Tourist 1. Blondin Makes An Omelette 2. Highplains Mailman 3. Strange Tourist 4. You Sure Ain't Mine Now 5. The Collaborator 6. Did She Scare All Your Friends Away 7. She's My Favourite 8. The Radicalisation Of D 1. Blondin Makes An Omelette It seems we're all in for a treat Staring up, out of the street And you can tell that Joe is really glad he came Though downwind of him trails A fog of alcohol He fails To do his best to be indifferent All the same 'Cause there ain't no shaking the smell Like there ain't no shaking the spell As Blondin, Wirewalker Braves the screams Well, Joe is Obvious impressed Though he has something to confess Above the sound of ten thousand creaking Necks all craned Joe says, "Alone amongst the beasts and freaks I dreamed of tightrope walking While I tended Blondin's Percherons and trailers I'd see him Training in the evening There was no point trying to speak You see, I doubted that he'd have Time for the strangers Who'd be there hoisting his big tents Who'd be spying him from their naves Staring down at them Like batshit in a cave Well, we hardly even met, but see I worked for him, I thought I'd Fill the space he left But no, I was naive Just another sideshow slow, I thought He knew something I don't But it would seem, all these Wirewalkers have Is just the means to make you feel so bad Man, no one Cared for him at all Until he crossed Niagara Falls So you'd all feel A little lower down the scale And then his fame shot straight and fast Right through a gloomy, narrow pass He chanced through darkness, lightning storms And into day But I ain't here because he's tall I'm only here to see him fall If I get on the wagon now It'll only be to run him down" It seems we're All in for a treat Staring up out of the street And you can smell that Joe's been drinking On his breath And then the clouds part overhead And I make out a silhouette As though I'm staring up through a trapdoor And I'm waiting to be fed. (back to top) 2. Highplains Mailman And when it's dark he makes the highplains On his quarter horse, with a canvas sack And the stars they bleed together like the flames inside a forge The Earth is molten, time is stretching on a rack Yet he labours like a shadow across the meadows of the moon A diver far beneath the breakers on the rocks There are more bodies in the snow Than there are things that you can know But he knows you don't have to die to walk the netherworld It is a cinch to reach if you can climb a rock Then when the air's too rare to tell and the chill's clear as a bell He lights a fire and he settles down to read He pulls a letter from the sack, makes a pillow of his pack Then hears a wild dog somewhere yanking on a rabbit trap Going crazy as it dawns on it It's beat And the mailman reads, "Oh baby take a moment just to think about me You leave me living like a spinster while you're bachelor free You're even more of a burden when you ain't here at home Please, you can't leave me here on my own I won't find my way Please, you can't leave me here on my own." The mailman laughs under his breath And scrutinises the address Who's the poor drunk that knocked up the Baroness? Is it the youth that never talks, 'Cept out of earshot with his horse When no one cares less what he thinks or what he says Or the old drover by the fire Who quite enjoys the peace and quiet He's drifting off somewhere beyond the flames Is it the stockman grinding beef Between his horseshoe iron teeth Until the wild dog in the rabbit trap falls quiet He takes the rifle leaning up against a tree And the mailman reads, "I had to frighten off your girlfriend with a rock-salt gun Ain't it enough that I adore you? do you prefer them young? Is she a schoolgirl or an ostrich? she's all eyelashes and bones Please, you can't leave me here on my own I won't find my way Please, you can't leave me here on my own." In all his years lugging dispatches from the brides of overlanders There's been no Dear Johns above 7000 feet But now here comes a welcome change He starts to relish the exchange Until a far-off shot rings brightly through the sleet Then through the valleys down below, through where No-one ever goes Spreading thin across the lowlands before vanishing at sea And now a subatomic silence settles fog-like Across the highlands It's too cold here now and it's too quiet to sleep And the mailman reads, "I know now why you languish in your doghouse of stone To leave me withered so by loneliness I welcome you home And how could any poor boy leave his Mother in the cold? Please, you can't leave me here on my own I won't find my way Please, you can't leave me here on my own." (back to top) 3. Strange Tourist It was all falling down and a long way from cheap So tell me why did we live where we lived? Above the old fish shop where they served up slop And all the alley cats talked in their sleep I spent a year there with B After I quit the Mitsubishi, Dragged my mattress up some stairs by the sea Then watched the old van rust in the gusts of the coast Ending its knightly expeditions for beer B went psychotic in the navy and he wouldn't mend Something about a sunk junk and speed Well he couldn't shake the illness or endure the cure And there was no point switching treatments in the Timor Sea I have never known someone who needed to talk so much Or even fool himself disguising a guess I just steered his bullshit through its next diversion Never bothering with reality checks Bowerbird, you'd turn a birdbath black What the hell could be the matter with you? Where did you come from and why'd you go collecting Anything that turns the colour blue? B took his refuge in the open where it stings You think you'd seen him but he's gone in a blink Once those Stilnox hit their target don't trust nothing, No one And don't go believing anything that you think He'd say, "I'm half way through But I don't know what I'm doing I ain't feeling much of nothing at all But it's my first time too, if that's a valid excuse I'm going to wait here for the engines to stall I've seen the tracks of some giant, the smoke of some fire Fuse like hot sands in a bottleneck Does all of beauty lie in being dead and gone Or is all history made of chickens and their unhatched eggs I've seen the spectre of a frigate on a dry rock face A stone axe held together with an old bootlace Anything betraying the drift of dead headway You can shake it but it won't let go All that so men can live like girls to keep their might pert Digging music made by millionaires for car adverts Save the whales, invade Iraq and have a hamburger I can't distinguish between the nightmare and the joke I was in Tokyo once without any cash Koda Kumi sang a coda pink as sarin gas I took a trip to Nagasaki in a rented Mitsubishi Then went camping in the Jukai under Mount Fuji" Bowerbird, you'd turn a birdbath black What the hell could be the matter with you? Where did you come from and why'd you go collecting Anything that turns the colour blue? But when his pension got suspended, Well that spelled the end And I joined his life of leisure in flight It's too hard to row a boat using a periscope Sometimes you gotta do wrong to do right He got in trouble years back, I haven't seen him since In a men's room in a night club in Madrid He sold some dexedrine or something to a plain clothes D Then raised a stink so bad they ended up deporting him Then last I heard he was as free as a bird or into Scientology Or into Heaven's Gate or Sharon Tate Or in the Legionnaires Or gone to Georgia with the Mujahideen And someone else was walking eggshells in his birdcage Someone else shared his unending lease on hamstrung rage He was someone else's problem, and that made me glad They can indulge him 'till he's ironclad Bowerbird, you'd turn a birdbath black What the hell could be the matter with you? Where did you come from and why'd you go collecting Anything that turns the colour blue? I wound up working in a hospital Renting TV's to the bored and the blind Seems the DSS got sick of my BS And had my unemployment privatised They made a date with me, some agency And I went down there like a fool in love They made a few phone calls, found a real cure-all Like I wasn't miserable enough I was working night shift when he got there The first time I'd seen a coma on the ward The sister said he won't be needing TV now Probably won't be needing nothing at all He was in Tokyo for a while until he stabilised They flew him back here and the story unfolded They found him frozen in a hollow in Aokigahara forest Where those harakiri weirdoes go He died a little later, and was wheeled away I'd blame his morbid fascination for it all And his doubtless, groundless faith In his outdoorsmanship He didn't kill himself, he didn't have the balls Hope dies last in a hospital But has a habit of doing it next to you While you shit kick around with your eyes to the ground Like a bowerbird appropriating anything The colour blue. (back to top) 4. You Sure Ain't Mine Now Hey - There's a light gone out Hey - Nothing to get excited about Hey - There's that one dream that's always the same Hey - Terrain on terrain on terrain Oh but where'd all of the fury go Once it's gone you don't get it back you know Where did all the fury go? When she held me like I was her son You can't lay no claims upon nothing that strayed Into a path you chanced upon She didn't break any promises Though she was right on the brink And if you ever see her she'll tell you what she thinks If she's still in the mountains I don't know where she lives I'm looking out my window Through a thundering arch I'm looking through my window To all the heavens that lie in the past Where did all the fury go? Did it lie did it lie did it lie And I love you, I love you I love you anyhow You weren't mine to begin with And you sure ain't mine now Hey - How do you feel Hey - Since the wounds you loved the taste of have healed Hey - You're lovely and you're young Hey - One day you'll have nothing and no one Oh but where'd all of the fury go Once it goes you don't get it back you know She broke my ribs and the bones never knit It's an honour to even exist It wasn't the first time she'd pulled one on me I see her drying her hair in the sun On a roof in Birmingham While the cold made me numb No shoes, no coat, no cares, she don't succumb No matter how sharp the wind blows Or how gently it hums I'm looking out my window Like I've been shut out by glass I'm looking out my window Like there is somebody coming at last Where did all the fury go? Without the decency of saying goodbye And I love you, I love you I love you anyhow You weren't mine to begin with And you sure ain't mine now Hey - There's a light gone out Hey - Nothing to get excited about Hey - I can't quit and I can't drop Hey - You turn on a pin then next minute you stop Oh but where'd all of the fury go Once it goes you don't get it back you know She left me before But has come back again In embers, in hailstones, in time I don't really care for her that much but then She makes for an interesting ride The jet streams will dry out Planks lean off their sheds But it's the vanishing part that I Can't get out of my head Let life be your mistress That's all that she said. (back to top) 5. The Collaborator Well here's a simple question Were it 1941 An army came, changed all the names And finished all your fun Who'd collaborate? Is it an easy thing to do And if fate was just a choice Who'd be on the side to lose? Swearing they did not know I swear I did not know Hindsight can be cruel sometimes I swear I did not know I was waiting in a restaurant Where officers would eat And my wife ran the hotel upstairs And she changed their dirty sheets They'd treat us good, at least as well As you'd expect to be We just did what we were told to do And then go home and sleep I swear we did not know I swear we did not know We did not have a crystal ball And had to bear a load Then came the deliverance The officers were gone The tables were left empty The hotel foreclosed on We found no love in our city We had nothing and no one We lived on food stamps Until I found work Selling soap in Avignon I swear we did not know I swear we did not know You lay with dogs, you catch their fleas Much later down the road So be careful who you're sleeping with 'Cause times have changed a bit The borders are more porous now They breach the walls with tricks You could be one of them yourself To someone, somewhere else Don't mark your hands with blindness Before all the cards are dealt 'Cause a change will always come. (back to top) 6. Did She Scare All Your Friends Away And Anna was a beauty in her youth She had long black hair and looked a lot more like you Than you think you do I knew her mother well Her lead light eyes were lovely coal smoke blue as well But I knew her father too And I viewed life like a bedroom Through a keyhole on a door While he saw it like a pantry through a window on a wall We never got on well, were never friends at all And I was just the barnacle that clung on through it all He was a small time politician, Or a tele-prompter's charge trying to Bury a misdeed from way back when, And so he lined all of the Hacks up on the grass, Called them gentlemen and friends, Gave his dog whistle a blast And every face there was a mask, What is anybody doing who ain't pretending? What is anybody doing, Why would he frighten off his friends With something useless as the truth? Anna was a beauty in her youth Did she scare all your friends away? Did she frighten all your friends away? Did she scare all of your friends away? And Anna was a beauty in her youth She had some fine boys on her trail, like the tailor's son Who scaled the ranks of Suits and all he touched turned into loot I knew his kind very well And when the doric columns cracked It tore the shirt right off his back So they sold him down the river before pocketing the cash He weren't so lucky then But it didn't bother Anna, She had boys on tap And Jack was a probono defence lawyer At a firm called Young and Black, He'd been made a junior partner And shown how to work a rort Making charitable donations to Salvation Army Corps and Veterans Without Wheelchairs And the Widows Of The Wars He was a Liberating Angel with a Clothes peg on his nose, But he swooped a little low one time And crashed into some locals who Beat seven shades of shame through him Then levied heavy taxes of their own And said necessity is nine tenths of the surgery He owed his face's health, And to watch them very carefully 'Cause this is where the equal Distribution of his wealth is going to Anna was a beauty in her youth Did she scare all your friends away? Did she frighten all your friends away? Did she scare all of your friends away? And Anna was a beauty in her youth It was at the garden party Where we first were introduced By her father who'd retired Into a well of sweet vermouth But I knew what was coming next While he'd been winning plaudits for his ornithology I'd been selling Winnebagos to less heeled retirees It had not been going well I moved RV's on hire-purchase When I knew I should have leased And my investors all went bankrupt So I couldn't resupply And I could not meet repayments Even if demand increased, I wished they'd pay me what they owed me Then all fuck off like good pensioners And die and have a holiday at least Then he said "money won't bring happiness" And I very nearly cried But he didn't venture further, no one saying that ever tries, I took a hard slug on my drink And Anna watched me while I melted Like an ice cube in the desert of her shade And if she smiled at you there'd be nothing you Wouldn't do cause women made like Anna Are born coasting on The admiration, which Anna made the most of, She turned one against the other, all friends At one time or other yet they Set upon themselves And cleared the way from me to her You and I were happy then And happy's no defence But if it's any consolation I expected someone else That would be her masterstroke And I am standing here today as proof Anna was a beauty in her youth Did she scare all your friends away? Did she frighten all your friends away? Did she scare all of your friends away? (back to top) 7. She's My Favourite She's dreaming up a holiday Falling asleep All the little miseries of Monday morning Saying come back won't you please Downstream into a quiet blue night Sheltered from the stormy skies Skipping over fields with ease Won't be back until you need me She sees a poacher cut a barbed wire fence And the creatures flee the foothills in fear And if a mountain is a monument to Nothing then Ain't we a pack of sorry mutineers But she's my favourite Where she's bound Honey, who can tell She's my favourite Where I went wrong Honey, I can't tell High over the smoking vents of sawmill towns South into the Darling Downs Down over the border where the rivers crawl Before they're flushing out the bloodless sounds That flow below the city skyline Like a pipe organ that's choking on its tongue all tied Harder on your ear than a Chinese new year And louder than a sun if you could hear one once Over the fruit bats heaving higher in the soup Screaming, "why you coming here in just your birthday suit? You make a Sodom then defend yourselves You little demons like to love your Hell" But she's my favourite Where she's bound Honey, who can tell She's my favourite Where I went wrong Honey, I can't tell She takes the Moon in hand and powders her nose The stars are shimmering like the cymbals at a Broadway show Meet me by the seawall before the high tides rise She's going everywhere she's been with every boy She's ever tried Sands of Mercury make her black eyeliner The seas of Neptune leave her eyelids blue A kiss from Mars will turn her lips blood red And a black hole makes a purse she drops a world into She goes dancing by the waterfront To every dance I never took her to With all the boys who made her happy for a moment Then abandoned her to being blue But she's my favourite Where she's bound Honey, who can tell She's my favourite Where I went wrong Honey, I can't tell She sinks home low over the countryside Drawing in her wings before the sun gets high Down into my pockmark on that big old wheel As earthbound as she left me She's my hunted little favourite For miles around they know her face Rugged up in her winter coat Sleeping by the fireplace. (back to top) 8. The Radicalisation Of D A young boy busts his dad's Hills Hoist, using it as a swing Kills a magpie in the backyard with a homemade ging Steals chlorine from the neighbour's swimming pool Puts it in a coffee jar and pours brake fluid in Makes a pipe bomb using match heads, and it fizzles when he runs Tries again using the powder from the shells of his Old man's shotgun It hisses like a feral cat he's seen, slithers like the snake he killed Leaves a scorch mark on the pavement, And he's badly beaten for it Finds a playboy on the way to school, Tries remembering his Mum Throws rocks at a girl he likes, and he's sent Home before lunch Finds a King Kong doll beneath a bush, Probably some rich kid's But it roars ants when he shakes it, So he drops it in a bin Later on dinner time comes, He puts tinned beans on white Tip Top Halves it with his fingers, Shares it with the dog Jumps a cyclone fence to the sound Of his old man fucking through the evening Finds a severed kangaroo hind leg Just laying in a clearing There's a tendon or a tapeworm That retracts after a kick Finds a new stink nearly makes him puke When he pokes it with a stick Meets a friend near there, They go to see his house just down the road The sister lets them in, Then goes back upstairs in a bathrobe He sees a Phillishave full of hair clippings, In a bathroom, near a bra They find some car keys, Go outside and search a V8 car And there's a Beta tape in a paper bag, Hid under a seat, Hit play on the VCR machine And start to hear flute music Now there's two girls on a farm somewhere, Playing with a labrador Which rolls onto its back, like it has Been through this before and It's the last time D hears flute music, The last time he thinks about girls He sneaks home about 10 o'clock, Gets inside using the dog door Channel 7 gets the scoop again, There's a man gone crazy He stole an APC from the army base And closed down half the city D's been expelled from school and he's quite happy Staying in bed He keeps track of all the updates, Surfing networks instead This tank arrives at police HQ about 8am It makes pancakes out of 5 or 6 patrol cars and then Runs out of diesel near a Castrol service station And there's a standoff, Then he's teargassed and Not heard of again D's father dies of cancer the next Christmas day He's so hopped up on the morphine that he Can't get straight He says "be proud of me my boy, Well I am finally off the fags Since they caught me upstairs Smoking on the helipad" They cut the tumour off his liver But he died without it Seems like no one gets to choose What they can't live without It don't matter about money, When there ain't no way around You are living in a nightmare And you can't bribe your way out D finds a one room flat That overlooks an underpass He works part time as a labourer and it's ok Though it's hard Then some black kid steals his concession card And beats him 'round the head Next time D sees an army surplus store he steals a bayonet Then one day the bus to work Knocks down the kid that held him up He dies laying in the street, The driver don't make too much fuss He smokes a ciggie with the cops, The ambulance is running late And something inside D finds all this very, very strange Soon after that the work dries up And D starts drinking hard Starts drinking cheap cask wine with old black fellas Living in the park One has a tattoo of a swastika made with a candle, Soap and spoons Says he's half caste and that full bloods prefer Petrol over goon Says he was brought up on a mission, Then became a Viet Vet Ain't got a single tooth to chew So D gives him his bayonet He has white scars between his knuckles, Or what's left of them and says "See I'm white too, I just cannot drink inside the way you like to" Five years later D meets Werner at a rifle range Werner's granddad was SS, So now he goes by the nickname Werner the Jew Burner and young D become so tight They start going bush in his Landcruiser, Living on roos they shoot spotlighting They get a years lease on a duplex, Werner finds D some work as An unlicensed forklift driver in a fish market for cash He's got pictures of Adolf Hitler, Antique copies of Mein Kampf But D thinks Hitler's obsolete And Werner's practice too relaxed But Werner finished high school And then studied engineering D never did finish school And Werner breaks the news that evening The RAAF say they accept his application To be trained to work on Hercules' 2000 miles away He leaves tomorrow for NSW And throws a party Late that night They get to drinking and they're talking Then they argue then they fight D comes to bleeding in his bedroom Begging Werner not to go But Werner's full weight's on his back now And he's face down in a pillow D wakes up late next afternoon, But Werner is long gone D goes to find his .22, But there ain't no shells at all He finds 5 valiums in a Winfield pack In a duffel bag in the hall Then sits in front of the TV screen, washes it all down with a bottle Cliff has a beautiful wife He's insured for his life It is autumn here in Brooklyn, In obstetrics, labour pain And though his roots here are in slavery Cliff is dressed himself by slaves Credits rise like you're collapsing, so bewilderingly fast Seems the Cosbys of the world all go to bed 11 sharp The rest of you have a choice of late night news And more commercials Yeah Just Do It, Have a Break, yes Life Is Good, Because Your Worthless Maybe She Was Born With It, And maybe you were too Seems that one way or the other, There is nothing you can do 'Cause you can only go as far as denying You haven't come anywhere Forget Charles Darwin's namesake Is surrounded with black hair You are depressed now but need only take this pill To ban despair If East Timor can't be middle class, It can't really be there You are driving the Jeep Cherokee, TOURIST Burning Arabs for fuel But you are driving the Jeep Cherokee, And that's good enough for you You are living among Taxpayers Who welcome brown folks with a moat Conducting policy with the one free hand While the other's round their throats You are living in a land besieged By what the world might think or know But with its head so deep in Turkish sand This can't really be so You are living in a nightmare, Let them Balkanize the East No one says a word these days, They turn the other cheek You are living in a nightmare You can't trust a ceasefire bid And any wall they build around Gaza Will be begging for a lid You are living in a nightmare You can't bribe a want of doubt You are living in a nightmare You can't bribe your way out of But now we interrupt this broadcast To bring you breaking news There is a building in Manhattan And it's burning. (back to top)