LOS CAMPESINOS
HOLD ON NOW, YOUNGSTER...
Death to Los Campesinos!/Broken Heartbeats Sound Like Breakbeats/Dont Tell Me to D You Spell/HAHAHA, We Destroyed the Hopes and Dreams of a Generation of Faux-Roman Our Eyes in Unison /Sweet Dreams, Sweet Cheeks/2007: The Year Punk Broke (My Hear
Do the Math(s)/ Drop it Doe Eyes My Year in Lists/Knee Deep at ATP/This Is How ntics/We Are All Accelerated Readers/You! Me! Dancing!/...And We Exhale and Roll rt)
DEATH TO LOS CAMPESINOS! You’ve been broken down I go (War economy) Father führer, don’t be mad at me Peasant child, you’re into botany Splitting necks and calling the dichotomy “BEWARE” the sign on the door suggests I’m better off with artificial intelligence I invented you (I invented you) AND I WILL DESTROY YOU. If you catch me with my hands in the till I promise, sugar, I wasn’t trying to steal
I’m just swimming in copper To smell and pretend Like a robot! Well, if a leopard doesn’t change it’s spots You can’t change my perceptions just from dots to dots I swap the bruising for a bumping sensation I’ll be ctrl-alt-deleting your face with no reservations I will stop flighting once your circuit board’s igniting Singing, “I’m NOT FINISHED, I’m NOT FINISHED! No!” Mistaking cables for veins can be quite misleading, Friction sparks the metal made it look like bleeding
BROKEN
HEART BEATS
SOUND LIKE
BREAKBEATS One! Two! Three! Four! One! Two! Three! Four! Any more tears for the birthing pool? Bear this child directly into misery Kiss him in the face with no lips and no tongue But with your little, middle, index and ring fingers Singing ‘I see songs in shapes and colours Not nuclear physics or pottery ovens Fluid lines that soar like towers Patterns reformed just like child actors Plunge your hand, rip out my spine
Replace it with a UV light So I can be the beacon of hope that you’d always expected These constant broken heartbeats sound like breakbeats Looping round and round to me You know he’s so much more like Spiderman than you will ever, ever be So stick with your instincts Stick with the imprints With the hieroglyphics that the fan club sent us And roll with the toppers The slow steady choppers Bat with your eyelids And lose it with your stutter Go b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b honeeeeey! I’m taking far too many chances On these less than idealistic romances
DON’T TELL ME TO DO THE MATH(S) We know that we could sell your magazines If only you would give your life to literature just Don’t read Jane Eyre! Work on your algebra And stand out in the rain And give yourself to simple pleasures but Never play card games! Meanwhile, back at home Not in communist Russia Well only on my headphones We plot our march onto the town hall And if we’d take prisoners Or simply simper at those fools Please don’t tell me to do the math Please don’t tell me to do the math Tonight we’re gonna smash this place up And then we’re gonna deck it out with fairy lights till
We are content! And then we’ll maybe drown in Dewey decimals But leave our shoes off at the door ‘cause That was the point! Of us at home with the moon Pouring through the curtains Working on our attitude Towards the second hand book shop employees Reading the inscriptions That were never meant for their eyes I’m stitching up each one of your pockets So when we are together you’ll maybe look a little less bored I’m sticking your fingers into sockets To kick-start your little heart and maybe sleep a tiny bit more Oh maybe we should read more into the books that we adore “I WILL THROW YOU HIGH FIVES IF YOU KEEP YOUR OWN SECRETS!!”
DROP IT DOE EYES You expected my war diaries, but time ran out and I, I let you down A small thanks note written in French is no shorthand for “this thing gave me writer’s cramp” Another dream about shapeshifting Well we move with such elegance, with such grace With all our dignity just in place Deer die with their eyes wide open, eyes wide open, eyes wide open Deer die with their eyes wide open Drawing tiny little pictures of skeletons to get across the sense of impending doom And the leaves like the artwork to major leagues look like dead foxes on the hard shoulder And for some reason I think that I attributed this story to the bypass of the town I hadn’t visited, so goes the backing track of all the sighs we’d ever sighed
Deer die with their eyes wide open, eyes wide open, eyes wide open Deer die with their eyes wide open Drawing tiny little pictures of skeletons to get across the sense of impending doom and I am 17 pages through this notebook now and there are little more than pictures of how I see you in an X-ray machine That’s more like a television screen And you’re in a rut, and I know that you know what I mean And then the realisation hits that not even two gospel choirs could save us now Turn up on your doorstep Feeling like roadkill Tasting like postage stamps And when I touch you You fold up like an envelope With everything I ever wrote Pouring out of your mouth.
MY YEAR IN LISTS You said “send me stationary to make me horny” So I always write you letters in multicolours Decorating envelopes for foreplay Damn extended metaphors, I get carried away On the back of a natural disaster, fixed with parcel tape and with kids sticking plasters Nothing says “I miss you” quite like war poetry you carved in your door with a Stanley knife My year in lists Stomping on your fingers as you’re clinging on to the abyss So put on every winter coat that you’ve owned since ‘98 And every midnight sees the countdown to another awful day I cherish with fondness the day (before) I met you I cherish with fondness the day (before) I met you I cherish with fondness the day (before) I met you
On your request, I compile a list Of my top five resolutions for this year (one!) I declined ‘cause I decided that I (two!) Do not believe in the new year anymore (three!) And you must confess that at times like these Hopefulness is tantamount to hopelessness (four!) And I accept that it’s time for a change but not in Places like this with people like these (five! five! five! five! five!) My year in lists Stomping on your fingers as you’re clinging on to the abyss So put on every winter coat that you’ve owned since ‘98 And every midnight sees the countdown to another awful day
KNEE DEEP AT ATP And every sentence that I spoke began and ended in ellipsis Each of eight fingers gripping what he wrote, clung on tightly, like parenthesis And for each correctly used apostrophe, I could feel my heart sink inside my chest in front of me So, maybe the lining of a winter’s coat mightn’t be the best place to hide a summer secret Said every photo that you took that festival got lost in your camera in an insurance scam And though underexposed, i could see from the quality, his K Records t-shirt and you holding his hand And I know he took you to the beach, I can tell from how you bite on your cheek, every time the sand falls from your insoles And when our eyes meet, all that I can read, is
“you’re the b-side”. They said “it’s not what you like, it’s what you’re like as a person”, Well, I need new hobbies, that’s one thing for certain Not what you like, but what you’re like as a person, Well, I need new hobbies, that’s one thing for certain.
THIS IS HOW YOU SPELL “HAHAHA I’VE DESTROYED THE HOPES, AND THE DREAMS, OF A GENERATION OF FAUXROMANTICS” I hate the stench of coffee on your breath And I hate to feel it’s warmth against my neck And what right do you have to have nightmares about me When all I wanted was to sleep? We have to take the car ‘cause the bike’s on fire We cannot trust your friends ‘cause they were born liars And ifyou don’t exist with hearts the size of a house brick Cease, and desist! I left your shallow skin and a note on your kitchen sideboard It read “I have left you, please never try to find me” This is no existential crisis, just turn your pain into piety And then set your alarm clock for 4am the next morning This is how you spell ‘HAHAHA, I’ve destroyed the hopes and the dreams of a generation of
faux-romantics”. And I’m pleased, I’m pleased. You walk in from your mother’s balcony Panda-eyed and freezing cold You bury yourself in my chest to warm I notice the goosebumps on your arms, millions And whether it’s because of the numbers of hours spent laid facedown on my bed listening to white noise, or, well, obviously it’s not, I somehow manage to translate them from braille The trails on your skin spoke more to me than the reams and reams of half finished novels you’d leave lying all over the place And every quotation that’d dribble from your mouth like a final, fatal livejournal entry I know I am wrong I am sorry
WE ARE ALL ACCELERATED READERS I was sick in my mouth because of the fear of the scent of an ex-girlfriend And no more conversations about what Breakfast Club character you’d be I’d be the one that dies (no one dies) Well then what’s the point?
You should have built have a statue, and so I did of you And you were ungrateful, and slightly offended at the dimensions of it You said you looked less like the Venus de Milo, and more like your mother in a straightjacket I think it’s great that you’re doing fine now, but enough is enough And I’ve had enough Since we became accelerated readers, we never leave the house
You should have built a wall You should have built a wall And I’m not Bonnie Tyler, and I’m not Toni Braxton And this song is not gonna save your relationship Oh no... shit! And this sentimental movie marathon has taught us one thing It’s the opposite of true love is as follows: Reality! You should have built a wall, not a bridge (Since we became accelerated readers, we never leave the house) You should have built a wall, not a bridge Since we became accelerated readers, we never leave the house Since we became accelerated readers, we never leave the house.
YOU! ME! DANCING! The beats, yeah, they were coming out the speakers And were winding up straight in your sneakers. And I’m dancing like every song he spins is bis or like Like all my dance heroes would if they existed. And it’s sad that you think that they’re all just scenesters (And even if we were it’s not the scene you’re thinking of) To taking props from like these boy band fashions All crop tops and testosterone passion. If there’s one thing that I could never confess, It’s that I can’t dance a single step. It’s you! It’s me! And there’s dancing! Not sure if you mind if I dance with you,
But I don’t think right now that you care about anything at all. And oh, if only there were clothes on the floor, I’d feel for certain I was bedroom dancing. And it’s all flailing limbs at the front line. Every single one of us is twisted by design And dispatches from the back of my mind Say as long as we’re here everything is alright. If there’s one thing that I could never confess, It’s that I can’t dance a single step. It’s you! It’s me! And there’s dancing!
...AND WHE EXHALE AND ROLL OUR EYES IN UNISON It’s bad enough you ever used the word as an adjective But to suggest we do it in heels is really quite crass And frankly, we’re reasonably practical And we know the benefits of always doing these things in flats And I spent the last seven years perched on the edge of my bed Scratching ‘I am incredibly sincere’ into my forearm You should know better
A fifteen year old’s a notorious lazy innuendo (The last man standing is a girl) Four sweaty boys with guitars tell me nothing about my life And the earth’s air pressure gets far greater when I hear you You should try harder It takes an educated guess to see I like you a little at best And if you’ve come here for the faces then you leave under duress And you still treat it like a novelty This pop concert by virtue And we exhale, and roll our eyes in unison And we exhale And we roll our eyes And we do these things in unison And woe is me And woe is you And woe is us, together
SWEET DREAMS, SWEET CHEEKS When the smaller picture is the same as the bigger picture you know that you’re fucked And you’re trading paper cuts for splinters you’re out of luck Like sharks don’t sleep and I don’t take my eyes off you The architecture’s shit and my cheeks are all ready and bruised And it hurts as hard as a blow to the head or a smash to the skull or a knee to your chest And sweet dreams sweet cheeks
o tomorrow o tomorrow All these mercy killings have got my conscience spinning over (taking advantage) And the buildings or neighborhood is lacking in soul character (Psychology montage) We’re burning five story buildings laying man traps at the fire exits Playing feedback over tan oi systems You look Desperate! You Look Pathetic! One blink for yes Two blinks for no. Sweet Dreams sweet cheeks we leave alone x10
2007: THE YEAR PUNK BROKE (MY HEART) Me, in your back garden With my Walkman tucked inside my forearm, And I’m waiting, waiting for C90 In the summer of 2007, The summer that punk rock broke my heart.