Pere Ubu Lyrics
Raygun Suitcase
(1995)

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Folly Of Youth

I want to be your suitcase
I want to hang around inside your Greyhound terminal.

I want to be your ray gun
I want to light the way across your starless lonely nights.

I aim to be a suitcase
I want to ride the baggage car of your own mystery train.

Writers: Thomas - Jones - Temple - Wheeler
©1995 Ubu Projex.

Electricity

A city is the stones
The people aren't important
Whoever said they were?
That's a modern idea
People breed and die
They come and they go faithless.

The stones are true
They don't die
They won't betray our fathers
The stones speak the language of our fathers
Hopes and fears we don't understand
like poetry.

Nobody understands
All the words that we've cherished
for so long
fall on deaf ears
Children hear our hopes and fears
Hope and fear.

In awful solitude
the stones speak
only to themselves
Whispering in the dark
Strange talk.

The sun sets People flee
In the surrounding hills they huddle against the empty darkness
around their suburban campfires
Above in the sky the stars come undone
Below in the city there's nothing but strange talk
that feels like all the faded hopes that never were.

Writers: Thomas - Jones - Temple - Wheeler
©1995 Ubu Projex.

Beach Boys

Somehow I must love the pain
The hollow earth
On it the sound of rain
Burn my home
Burn my shoes
Burn down the glorified Home of the Blues.

Wake up Don't be slow
Drunken sailors are blocking up the main road
They're up in arms
They're reeling on their feet
Milling round
they're marching on the Home of the Blues.

Say my name low and sweet
Then you'll go away
We'll never meet
In awhile I'll be there too
In the rain
Marching on the Home of the Blues.

Nobody can feel
All the things that we feel
Nobody knows how it is
always leaving and never to go
Marching on the Home of the Blues
Marching on the Home of the Blues.

Writers: Thomas - Jones - Temple - Krauss - Yellin
©1995 Ubu Projex.

Turquoise Fins

Can't we stop along the way?
We just passed by a place
called Elvis Is Alive
Museum and a shop
where
we can get souvenirs and a postcard or two.

Jack says Man it's awful hard
to be the one that everyone
was waiting for.
It's lonely in the dark
when
media priests of the Big Lie own all of the words.

Did you ever wonder
why
your Elvis fans were so
much nicer people than
the people who laugh at
them?

Turquoise fins in Pomona
Turquoise fins in Winona
Turquoise fins in Corona
Turquoise fins in Oceana
Turquoise fins in Alcona
Turquoise fins in Alatoona
Turquoise fins in West Molina
Turquoise fins Altadena
Turquoise fins downtown Medina
Turquoise fins Issaquanah
Turquoise fins West Issaquanah
Albany.

Writers: Thomas - Jones - Temple - Wheeler
©1995 Ubu Projex.

Vacuum In My Head

I've got a vacuum cleaner in my head
It sucks up everything I know
I'm not tongue-tied
but I've got a vacuum cleaner in my head.

Writers: Thomas - Jones - Temple - Wheeler
©1995 Ubu Projex,

Memphis

In the ghost town inside of my heart
all your downtown is parking lots
At the drug store at 9th & Payne
they stock the Bitter Pill
They say Will we see you again next Tuesday?
What more can we do for you Mr Johnson sir?

Pass the word around them Golden Pools
I've been elected King of the Fools.

At the barber shop they never close
They'll cut your hair
They'll shine your suit
You look fine mister
You look sharp
We can tell how well you play the part.

In the rain the streets are on fire.

At the city hall
the mayor gives away the key
He says Look around
Make yourself at home
Everything we do for you
is our pleasure.

Writers: Thomas - Jones - Temple - Krauss - Yellin
©1995 Ubu Projex.

Three Things

I've checked in and now I can't check out
I guess my life is in transition
from one kind of a life to another
but from what kind of a life to what other?

I find myself living in Heartbreak Efficiencies
at the corner of Governor & West 114th Street
Six units and no doorbells
What do I need a doorbell for anyway?

All of the men and their women in the neighborhood
choose to shout at each other in the streets
Every Saturday Early Sunday I tune in
They won't tune out.

The man in Number 2 hanged himself last month
I think I know why he chose the laundry room
I wonder what became of his two little girls
and who it was that came to take them away.

Writers: Thomas - Jones - Temple - Wheeler
©1995 Ubu Projex.

Don't Worry

Here she comes
Like the rain
Like the wind
Like the wild wild wind
Tearing the roof off of somebody's heart.

In a way I hoped that we might continue as friends.

Writers: Thomas - Jones - Temple - Wheeler
©1995 Ubu Projex.

Ray Gun Suitcase

I want to be a suitcase
I want to hang around in your Greyhound terminal.

I want to be a suitcase
I want to ride in your baggage car.

I want to be a ray gun
shrinkwrapped from a ray gun factory
I want to be the torch for your starless lonely nights.
Writers: Thomas - Jones - Temple - Wheeler
©1995 Ubu Projex.

Red Sky

In Texas there is a bayou
Cross that bayou there is a highway
Down that highway there is a town called Houston
On Mars there is a red sky
Beneath it there are no blue eyes.

Below me there is a table
That table is cold as ice
My elbows on the table are as cold as ice
Through the screen door there is a bug light
On the wireless there is a ballgame.

While on Mars there are no women
As well there are no gray skies.

At NASA they build the rockets
They need a new place to go
While I know that someone once lived here
Someone like you
I cannot recall who.

Mars has no women.

Writers: Thomas - Jones - Temple - Wheeler
©1995 Ubu Projex.

Montana

In the state of Montana
in the Year of the Ford Nineteen Hundred and Fifty-Four
People are leaving
They're driving all night
Women are crying
They're frozen in light
And we roll on the river.

Our river is black
The river is deep
Headlights and moonlight
A space full of grief
Secrets and heartache must carry the load
The heart of the thing is the thing we don't know
And we roll out the barrel.

Lo and behold the night is too long
Anchored in heartache afraid of the dawn
Nobody changes
The truth is all gone
Bosses say everybody must go
And we roll on the ribbons
The ribbons of our dreams.

Writers: Thomas - Jones - Temple - Krauss - Yellin
©1995 Ubu Projex.

My Friend Is A Stooge

My friend's a stooge for the media priests
He does the weather map for Channel 3
He smiles alot when I take him home
Stares at the rug if I leave him alone
Lays around the house in misery
He toes the line for the company.

He's living life like a Hollow Man
Hiding out in a Hollow Land.

My friend's a stooge for the media priests
In the morning with his hand on his heart
He keeps the world safe from falling apart
Pledge allegiance to the Land of Thrills
No one there's born to pay their bills
My friend's a stooge for the media priests.

Writers: Thomas - Jones - Temple - Hamann
©1995 Ubu Projex.

Down By The River II

Down by the river
Corn is creeping
Cry for my lover
Lover's sleeping
Bad as it gets
Getting worse
I want to run
Had to learn to crawl.

The house on fire
The treaty's broken
I call for the law
The law's a token
Bad as it gets
Gotten worse
I want to run
Had to learn to crawl.

Trip is the worst
I don't mean maybe
Call for the captain
She cries like a baby
As bad as it gets
It's getting worse
I want to run
Had to learn to crawl first.

Bye-bye
Bye-bye baby my friend
She cries and she cries
And she... and then she...

Might've not known
Might've not guessed
Might've been fine
If she had never confessed
As bad as it gets
Getting worse
Want to run
Had to learn to crawl first.

Bye-bye
Bye-bye baby my friend
It's time to leave
And I don't know when.

Writers: Thomas - Jones - Temple - Krauss - Yellin
©1995 Ubu Projex.


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