The missing lyrics for the Box Set

[Alex]

What do you guys think about getting the lyrics together for the Box Set?


So far we have collected the lyrics to
- NW3 *
- Do You Believe In Magic?
- Hot Asphalt
- Maggie May
- The Travelling People
- Eve Of Destruction *
- Danny Boy
- Haunted
- North Sea Holes
- Garbo (aka In And Out)
- Afro-Cuban Be-Bop
- Pinned Down / I'm Alone In The Wilderness *
- Johnny Was *
- Miss Otis Regrets/Just One Of Those Things
- All The Tears That I Cried
- The One And Only
- Call My Name
- Got A Lot Of Livin' To Do
- Johnny Come Lately
- Boat Train (demo) *
- Night Train To Lorca (demo)
- Black Dogs Ditch (haha)
- The Rocky Road To Dublin
- Something Wild
- The Mistlethrush *
- Murder *
- FONY (demo) *
- Driving Through the City *
- The Last Of McGee *

* = needs some editing


Still missing:
- Nicaraqua Libré
- Who Said Romance Is Dead
- Sound Of The City Night

[Alex]

NW3
(1987, previously unreleased) (d)
[S. MacGowan]

It was 1962
I was two years out of school
When I got on board a boat
that was bound for Liverpool
The day I went away
I remember it so well
Said goodbye to the North Wall
And bid a fond farewell

When I got down to the smoke
It was 1963
I got a job doing meals on wheels
Round NW3
I was terrorising grannies
For ten lousy bob a week
I was smashed and blacked
And drunk and young in NW3

In the filth and piss they lived in
They would sometimes hum an air
Or talk in tongues of madness
Keeping time upon the chair
And for their wrists a numbered tab
In Westminster morgue
On a cold hard slab
When I was still a young man
In NW3

Now spent of love and rage
I'm going home again
Never did nobody wrong
Never turned a decent wage
So thanks for sweet fuck all
whilst i look at the north wall <OR> once more back to the north wall
Said goodbye to all of that
And bid a fond farewell

At the top of the Pentonville Road
I watched the sun setting
The town spread out before me
Looked beautiful to me
Away from all the sighing
The suffering and the dying
I dreamed of the future
Of the young and the free

But the years they went by quickly
Now I swear I won't return here
Where each day just bring me closer
To the final misery
My kids will never scrape shit round here
And I won't die crying in a pint of beer
Or eat their stinking meals on wheels
In NW3.


Maybe you can help to fill in the gaps!

Edit: corrections from de burca & Firehazard added

[Alex]

Do You Believe In Magic?
[Sebastian / Yanovsky]

Do you believe in magic in a young girl's heart
How the music can free her, whenever it starts
And it's magic, if the music is groovy
It makes you feel happy like an old-time movie
I'll tell you about the magic, and it'll free your soul
But it's like trying to tell a stranger 'bout rock and roll

Yeah - do you believe in magic - believe
Yeah - do you believe in magic

If you believe in magic don't bother to choose
If it's jug band music or rhythm and blues
Just go and listen it'll start with a smile
It won't wipe off your face no matter how hard you try
Your feet start tapping and you can't seem to find
How you got there, so just blow your mind

If you believe in magic, come along with me
We'll dance until morning when there's just you and me
And maybe, if the music is right
I'll meet you tomorrow, sort of late at night
And we'll go dancing, baby, then you'll see
How the magic's in the music and the music's in me

Yeah - do you believe in magic - believe
Yeah - do you believe in magic

Believe in magic of a young girl's soul
Believe in the magic of rock and roll
Believe in the magic that can set you free
Yeah, talking 'bout magic

Do you believe in magic - believe
Yeah - do you believe in magic - believe
Yeah - do you believe in magic - believe
Yeah - do you believe in magic - believe
Yeah - do you believe in magic - believe
Yeah - do you believe in magic - believe

[firehazard]

Great idea, Alex. And you've done a great job on NW3 too.

In verse 2 of NW3, I've got it as:

"I was terrorising grannies
For ten lousy bob a week
I was smashed and blacked
And drunk and young in NW3"

["bob" meaning "shillings" in British pre-decimal currency]

And in verse 5, it's:

"Away from all the sighing
The suffering and the dying"

Verse 4 needs a bit more of a listen yet...

[Alex]

Hot Asphalt
(1992, previously unreleased)
[E. MacColl]

You can talk about the concrete, and the boys who work the train
The fellas in the hoppers, in the sun, and wind, and rain
The boys who lay the blacktop, you ought to see them belt
Workin' on the highway, laying hot asphalt

There were boys from Connemara, County Mayo, and Kildare
The Sligo pincher kiddies, sure all Ireland was there.
We were working all around the clock, you should have seen his belt
As we were racing up the highway, laying hot asphalt


Chorus:
We laid it in the hollows, and we laid it in the flats
And if it doesn't last forever, then I swear I'll eat me hat
I've traveled up and down the world, and sure I never felt
Any surface that was equal, to the hot asphalt


We spread in the summer, and we laid it nice hot
Two million yards or more of it, we had to roll the lot
The sun was blazing down; until I thought me back would melt
Working on the Motor highway, laying hot asphalt

Chorus

When you're speeding in your motor car and tearing through the shires
And the only thing you're hearing is the humming of your tires
You'll be riding soft and easy, with a road as smooth as felt
Then don't forget the boys, who lay the hot asphalt

Chorus

[Alex]

Maggie May
(1987, previously unreleased)
[R. Stewart / M. Quittenton]

Wake up Maggie I think I got something to say to you
It's late september and I really should be back at school
I know I keep you amused but I love I feel I'm being used
Oh Maggie I could not tried any more
You lured me away from home just to save you from being alone
You stole my heart and thats what really hurts

The morning sun when its in your face really shows your age
But that don't worry me none in my eyes you're everything
I laughed at all of your jokes my love you didnt need to coax
Oh, maggie I couldn't have tried any more
You lured me away from home, just to save you from being alone
You stole my heart and that's what really hurts.

I suppose I could collect my books and get on back to school
Or steal my daddys cue and make a living out of playing pool
Or find myself a rock and roll band I need a helpin hand
Oh maggie I wish I'd never seen your face
You made a first-class fool out of me
But I'm as blind as a fool can be
You stole my heart and that's what really hurts.

Maggie I wish I'd never seen your face
Huh-Huh
I'll get on back one of these days
Huh-Huh
Gotta go back soon as I can

[Alex]

The Travelling People
(c.1991, rehearsal recording, previously unreleased)
[E. MacColl]


I'm a freeborn man of the travelling people
Got no fixed abode with nomads we're mastered
Country lanes and bye ways were always my ways
I never fancied being lumbered

In the open fields you could stop and linger
And the small birds sang when winter time was over
Then we'd pack our load and be on the roads
They were good old times for the rover

And sometimes you'd meet up with other people
Hear the news or else swop family information
At the country fairs we'd be meeting there
All the peoples of the travelling nation

I made willow creels and the heather besom??
And I've even done some begging and some hawkin'
And I've lain there spent rapped up in my tent
And I've listened to the old folks talking

All you freeborn men of the travelling people
Every tinker rolling stone and gypsy rover
Winds of change are blowing old ways are going
Your travelling days will soon be over

I'm a freeborn man of the travelling people
Got no fixed abode and no man is my master
Country lanes and bye ways were always my ways
I never fancied going faster.

[Alex]

Eve Of Destruction
(1990, outtake from the Hell's Ditch album sessions, previously unreleased)
[P. F. Sloan]

The Eastern world, it is explodin',
Violence flarin', bullets loadin'.
You're old enough to kill, not for votin',
You don't believe in war -- but what's that gun you're totin'?
An' even the Jordan river has bodies floatin'.
But you tell me, over and over and over again, my friend,
you don't believe we're on the eve of destruction.

Don't you understand what I'm tryin' to say,
And don't you feel the fears I'm feelin' today?
The button is pushed, there's no runnin' away,
There'll be no one to save, will the world in a grave.
Take a look around you, boy, it's bound to scare you, boy.
An' you tell me, over and over and over again, my friend,
you don't believe we're on the eve of destruction.

So mad like coagulatin',
I'm sittin' here just contemplatin'.
I can't twist the truth, it knows no regulation,
Handful of senators don't pass legislation,
An' marches alone can't bring integration
When human respect is disintegratin',
And 'cross the world is too frustratin'.
An' you tell me, over and over and over again, my friend,
you don't believe we're on the eve of destruction.

Think of all the hate there is in Red China,
Then take a look around to Selma, Alabama.
Ah, you may leave here for four days in space,
But when you return it's the same ol' place,
The poundin' of the drums, ??
[Don't let us all in], but don't leave a trace.
Next-door neighbor, but don't forget to say grace,
An' tell me, over and over and over again, my friend,
You don't believe we're on the eve of destruction,
you don't believe we're on the eve of destruction.

[firehazard]

Nice work again, Alex.

I reckon that in the second line of the first and last verses of "Travelling People" Shane sings:
"Got no fixed abode and no man is my master"

(which is actually a bit different from other versions of the song I've heard, which go "...with nomads I am numbered". In fact Shane's lyrics are a bit different in various places from some other people's versions.)

To try to fill in the gaps...
Verse 2 opens:
"In the open fields you could stop and linger
And the small birds sang..."

Verse 4's first line is:
"I made willow creels and the heather besom..."

[philipchevron]

Way to go, Alex and Firehazard, and whoever else joins in.

[de burca]

here is my atempt at the missing lines in NW3

now spent of love and rage
im going home again
never did nobody wrong
never turned a decent wage
s0 ????/ and say fuck all
whilst i look at the north wall
said goodbye to all of that
and bid a fond farewell

[meowhouse]

I think NW3 is in the Poguetry book. If I can find it I'll post the missing parts.

Edit: Although it's possible what's in the book is not what is sung.

Edit again: the book is slightly different in spots (mostly the metering of the lines), and that whole verse that isn't filled in in the OP is missing.

[Alex]

Danny Boy
(BBC John Peel Show, December 4, 1984, previously unreleased)
[F. Wetherley / arr. MacGowan, Finer, Fearnley, Stacy, Ranken, O'Riordan]

Oh Danny Boy, the pipes, the pipes are calling
From glen to glen, and down the mountainside.
The summer's gone, and all the leaves are falling.
'Tis you must leave, 'tis you must leave and I must bide.

But come ye back when summer's in the meadow
Or when the valley's hushed and white with snow
'Tis I'll be there in sunshine or in shadow
Oh Danny boy, oh Danny boy, I love you so.

And if you come, when all the leaves are dying
If I am dead, as dead I might well may be
You'll come and find the place where I am lying
And kneel and say an "Ave" there for me.

And I will hear, those soft you tread above me
And on my grave will warmer, sweeter be
If you will bend and tell me that you love me
And I will sleep in peace until you come to me.

[Alex]

Haunted
(1986, from the movie and soundtrack album Sid And Nancy, also released as a 7" and 12" single)
[S. MacGowan]

Do you remember that sunny day?
Somewhere in London
there was nearly no way
I didn't have nothing to do that day
Didn't wanna do nothing anyway

You got a way of walking
You got a way of talking
And there's something about you
And now I know I never ever
Want to be without you

[Chorus:]
I want to be haunted by the ghost
I want to be haunted by the ghost
I want to be haunted by the ghost
I want to be haunted by the ghost
Of your precious love
Of your precious love

The first time I saw you,
Standing in the street
You were so cool,
You could have put out Vietnam
My girlfriends ask me, "What's he like?"
I say, "He's kind of shy,
But that's the kind of girl I am,
He's my kind of guy"

[Chorus]

I'll build my world around you
I'll bless the day that I found you
I'll stand beside you, I'll never leave
Or tell you all those lies
you'd never believe

[Chorus]

[Alex]

North Sea Holes
(1992, previously unreleased)
[E. MacColl]

Well come you gallant fishermen that plough the stormy seas,
The whole year round on the fishing grounds
On the Northern Minch and the Norway Deeps,
On the banks and knolls of the North Sea Holes
Where the herring shoals are found.

It's there you'll find the Norfolk boys and the lads from Peterhead,
There's Buckie chiels and men from Shields,
On the Northern Minch and the Norway Deeps,
On the banks and knolls of the North Sea Holes
Where the herring shoals are found.

From Fraserborough and Aberdeen, from Whitby, Yarmouth Town,
The fleet's away at the break of day
To the Northern Minch and the Norway Deeps,
To the banks and knolls of the North Sea Holes
Where the herring shoals are found.

It's off with a boiler full of steam and your engine spic and span
To fish the grounds the North Sea round
And try your luck at the North Sea Holes
And try your luck at the North Shields Gut.
With a catch of a hundred cran.

No need to wait for the wind and tide, you're the master of the sea,
Come calm or squall, just shoot and haul
And fill the hold with the fish to be sold
And steam ahead for the curing shed
on the Yarmouth quay.

Well come all you gallant fishermen that plough the stormy sea,
The whole year round on the fishing grounds
On the Northern Minch and the Norway Deeps,
On the banks and knolls of the North Sea Holes
Where the herring shoals are found.

Edit: Correction by firehazard added! Thanks!!