Paradise Lost (You're the Reason Why) [Cammel Laird Social Club]

Well you say you only watch documentaries
And that bad cold you’ve got that’s the flu
And the book that you foisted upon me
I’ll never read it will you

Did you play in the Garden of Eden
Were the goal keeper’s gloves to you tossed?
Coz it seems to me you’re the reason
You’re the reason why paradise lost

Was it you who invented the school run
At the Laboratoire Garnier goal [????]
And is it you who’s to stone for the motorway cone
Barry Venison and Davina McCall?

Did you play in the Garden of Eden
Were the goalkeeper’s gloves to you tossed?
Coz it seems to me you’re the reason
You’re the reason why paradise lost

Oh regain it for me Rodney

Well we’ve all seen you personalised reg plates
And it’s not the worst crime I agree
But we both know full well that it really should spell
“T” “W” “A” “T”, “O” “N” “E”

Did you play in the Garden of Eden
Were the goalkeeper’s gloves to you tossed?
Coz it seems to me you’re the reason
You’re the reason why paradise lost (x3)

And now the notes taken from www.hmhb.co.uk

Paradise Lost poem about Adam and Eve by John Milton - basically a long-winded version of Genesis (the first book of the Old Testament, rather than the band, who were long-winded enough as they were).
Laboratoire Garnier Laurent Garnier's beauty product empire.
Barry Venison ex-Sunderland, Liverpool, Newcastle and Southampton left back, now an ITV soccer pundit.
Davina McCall stated off as an MTV presenter, now seems to on the box even when it's switched off (Big Brother, Don't Try This At Home, The Vault, Streetmate, Sam's Game and now bloody Popstars).
"Regain it for me, Rodney" a reference to Milton's bestselling sequel, Paradise Regained

Stavanger Toestub [Cammel Laird Social Club]

Bastard doorstep sockless stupid
Kill your laughter pain is brutal
Can’t walk properly for a fortnight
Deus Deus
Norway Reds in Bluecoat Chambers
The pain oh Momma the pain worse even than when I cut open
My kneecap on the freshly gritted slope and our village doctor
Cleaned out the wound with a wire brush
So now bang bang bang goes my plan (plan plan) to woo the peg lady
Colossal drag
Teach me to go barefoot

And now the notes taken from www.hmhb.co.uk

Bending of the stubs of anodes in aluminium smelters is known as the "toe-in" effect. There's a few smelters in Norway, around Stavanger. Interesting, but nowt to do with clobbering your toe.

Monkey Man adds:

Just prior to this album and a few years before Abramovich bankrolled them, Chelsea played in Europe and lost 4-2, pathetically, to a lowly Norwegian team by the name of Viking Stavanger. As the lyrics are muffled swear-words I always assumed it was an attempt to capture the mood of the Chelsea team on their long flight home. But then the above lyrics appear inside the cd cover and blow my theory out of the water although these words aren’t heard on the actual track

Breaking News [Cammel Laird Social Club]

We’re just receiving a report of an incident at a farm in Sussex

Where a number of people have been arrested in connection with annoying the nation

It is believed the owner of the farm, a Mr Hibbert, has been co-operating with police and government officials in a plot code named operation “Less Pricks” and kindly granted permission for the use of his 17^th century tithe-barn as a temporary holding place for those arrested

Although not confirmed we are led to understand that those already charged include

• Bus drivers who don’t wait for people to sit down before pulling away from the bus stop

• Taxi drivers who use their horns instead of knocking on the door
• People who moan at the council about the streets being full of litter not stopping to think that it is people who drop litter not the council
• A room full of drama teachers listening to Bjork
• Grown men with replica shirts worn over their jumpers who stand up and stretch out their arms when the opposing team fail to hit the target
• An assortment of scriptwriters, novelists and playwrights who own agas but don’t know how to use them
• A musical equipment reviewer responsible for an article titled “microphone of the month”
• A woman who described herself as, “a little bit Bridget, a little bit Ally, a little bit Sex in the City”, and chose to call her baby boy Fred as a childishly rebellious attempt at a clever reaction to those that might have expected her to call him Julian or Rupert. Bit of advice, call him Rupert. It fits and besides it’s a good name. Don’t be calling him Fred or Archie with all its cheeky but loveable scamp working class connotations unless you do really have plans for him to spend his life in William Hill’s waiting for them to weigh in at Newton-Abbott
• Also being held is a whole wall full of teenagers spitting needlessly
• An amateur thug in camouflage trousers whose Japanese fighting dog had run amok on a Swindon council estate
• A man from the record company who said that George Michael continues to challenge social taboos through his music
• Lisa Riley
• Continuity announcers introducing comedy shows
• A pub band that get uppity when everyone goes to the bar during a song they’ve written themselves
• A group of football fans referred to as “commodores” as in once, twice, three times a season, who feed sugar-lumps to police horses at cup finals
• An artist who said his next album will be more song based
• A man who informs people that he gets up at 6am every morning and seemed to want a medal
• People who say they speak as they find and are somehow proud of it
• Journalists who try and spell an interviewees laugh
• An organisation that declared and awareness week for awareness weeks
• And a council worker who dropped litter

We’ll bring you more details as they emerge

And now for the notes taken from www.hmhb.co.uk

Aga cooker, developed by Dr. Gustaf Dalen, world renowned Swedish physicist and Nobel Prize Winner after he was blinded by one of his experiments in 1922. Also (possibly) a reference to the 'Aga saga' novels from the likes of Joanna Trollope, the sort of story set in middle England, populated by the middle classes of the type that typically own Aga cookers.
Bridget Jones, 32, single, who I believe kept a diary and liked the odd glass of Chardonnay.
Ally McBeal, about 32, single, lawyer.
Sex In The City Carrie Bradshaw and co, around 32, single, gossip columnist. Think you're getting the idea.
William Hill Bookies.
Newton Abbot Racecourse in Devon.
Lisa Riley Mandy Dingle in Emmerdale, now annoying host of You've Been Framed.
Three Times A Lady was a hit for the Commodores in 1978.

Tyrolean Knockabout [Cammel Laird Social Club]

I’ve been strolling down my favourite lane
And I’ve been bowling my left-arm occasionals again
Life gets sweeter the more that I understand
The flora and the fauna and the hedgerows
Abound in this land

Monday morning the field paths are calling my name
No storm warning is going to stop me setting out again
You could join me
My flask is full to the brim
And let’s face it it beats skulking round the 7” import section with him

I’m keeping my feet above the mulch of the bottom with song
A drink and a four-handed reel as I ramble along
Let’s hear it for the brakeman without him I would have to find more words
Yodal-leyheeeee

I’ve been goading D-list Paul Ross for a laugh
By unloading outside what he would call his “gaff”
Old fridge-freezers doors all removed like we’re told
His face at the window on waking a sight to behold

I’m keeping my feet above the mulch….Etc

And now the notes taken from www.hmhb.co.uk

Tyrol Region of Austria, Innsbruck, skiing and the like.
"keeping my feet above the mulch of the barton" First sentence of Phase the Third, Chapter 2 of Tess of the d'Urbervilles (Thomas Hardy) reads, "The dairymaids and men had flocked down from their cottages and out of the dairy-house with the arrival of the cows from the meads; the maids walking in pattens, not on account of the weather, but to keep their shoes above the mulch of the barton.".
Four-handed reel Morris dance.
Brakeman Jimmie Rodgers was "The Singing Brakeman" - he'd obviously put a few words in with the yodelling as well.
Paul Ross Jonathon's brother, seems to present a variety of inane quiz shows on the telly as well as the Talk Radio Weekend Breakfast show.

Them's the Vagaries [Cammel Laird Social Club]

Them's The Vagaries

You may have to rescue me from limestone quarries frequently
Those corporate stunt shows you attend you’ll never get us back again
Say!

Hello spinal curvature
Get used to the mirthless furniture
Now we’ve kissed I’ve written this list
I thought you ought to know

Them’s the vagaries

Well I’ll not sit backwards on the train
I can’t say I’ll always flush the chain
And what I call pleasure you may call pain
I’m talking five day tests

Prepare to lose you dignity
As I ride to victory
Down the aisles at Tesco
Wearing nothing much at all

Ancient pack-horse bridges we’ll avoid
Marijuana bores must be destroyed

Bin men thin men lexicographers
Squid yes not so octopus
Egg sandwiches on coach trips in June
I simply won’t be there

No way joke shop excrement
Don’t say the light show’s excellent
It makes you smell like a laboratory instead of a
Fan of the band

Them’s the vagaries

Oh Brit Pop turquoise chips with apricot
Sheepskin nose-bands kids in Aldershot
You point to cages in my yard and you ask:
What are them things there?

Them’s the aviaries [x several]

And I’ve been saving these
Things just for you

And now the notes taken from www.hmhb.co.uk

Five day Tests international cricket matches which these days finish on the fourth afternoon (especially when Australia are one of the participants).

When the Evening Sun Goes Down [Cammel Laird Social Club]

When The Evening Sun Goes Down

I shout all my obscenities from steeples but please don’t label me a madman
I'm off to see the Bootleg Beatles as the bootleg Mark Chapman
Cafe bars idiots and pigeons
There’s far too many in this town
So me and the ombudsman are gonna do what we can
When the evening sun goes down

Yes some of my pullovers are roll-necked it kind of breaks up the ennui
But your experimental side project must have put 10 years on me
Opposite the Bannister and Shamrock
Which used to be the Rose and Crown
I like to play Pat Boone,
On the county bassoon
When the evening sun goes down
When the evening sun goes down

When the evening sun
When the evening sun
When the evening sun goes down

When the evening sun
When the evening sun
When the evening sun goes down

There are questions in corners of my mind that lurk
(When the evening sun goes down)
Like how do the road gritters get to work
(When the evening sun goes down)
Answer me that and you could win a cruise
(When the evening sun goes down)
And here’s Judy Tsuke to take us up to the news
(When the evening sun goes down)

Are these my ultimate Pyjamas
Is this my final dressing gown
I'm sending on this rhyme deep in injury time
When the evening sun goes down
When the evening sun goes down
When the evening sun goes down

And now the notes taken from www.hmhb.co.uk

Bootleg Beatles Beatles tribute band.
Mark Chapman shot John Lennon in 1980.
Pat Boone popular singer of the 50's, with 'clean-cut' versions of rock-n-roll songs, etc.
County Bassoon the Boone County Bassoon band really exist - from Boone County, Kentucky, but have absolutely nothing to do with Pat.
Judy Tzuke UK rock singer/songwriter, greatest popularity in the late 70's-early 80's.

The Light at the End of the Tunnel [Cammel Laird Social Club]

She stayed with me until she moved to Notting Hill
She said it was the place she needs to be
Where the cocaine is fair-trade and frequently displayed
Is the Buena Vista Social Club CD

I thought you'd be back in three weeks and we'd go wandering in the peaks
Sojourn in my uncle Joe's ashram
And when you're in Matlock Bath you dont need Sylvia Plath
Not while we've got Mrs. Gibsons’ jam

Alas I'm brooding along by the runnel
While she’s in Capri with her swain
And the light at the end of the tunnel
Is the light of an oncoming train

Well we both grew up in Eyam and strange as it may seem
Neither of us thought we'd ever leave
But the beak in Leek is weak
And she's moved it so to speak
With featureless TV producer Steve

And now it's all Eva Cassidy and aphids in Picardy
And so I can only ascertain
That the light at the end of the tunnel
Is the light of an oncoming train

No frills handy for the hills that's the way you spell New Mills
Brooding along by the runnel
While she’s in Capri with her swain
And the light at the end of the tunnel
Is the light of an oncoming train
Is the light of an oncoming train
Is the light of an oncoming

Gimme that old time religion [x3]

It's good enough for me.

And now the notes taken from www.hmhb.co.uk:

The Light At The End Of The Tunnel supposedly appears when crossing the threshold from life to death.
Notting Hill is in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, London, between Shepherd's Bush and Paddington, famous for the Carnival and the Hugh Grant/Julia Roberts film. Dwellings are a bit out of my price range.
Buena Vista Social Club see above.
Peaks Peak District, roughly between Manchester and Sheffield.
Ashram A religious/spiritual retreat, derived from the Sanskrit word 'asrama'.
Matlock Bath on the south edge of the Peak District, where HMHB played a gig in 2000 and again the following year.
Sylvia Plath American writer born of German immigrant parents in 1932, whose best-known poems are noted for their personal imagery and intense focus. Tried to kill herself with sleeping pills after a mental breakdown in 1953, and later documented this period of her life in The Bell Jar. After recovery, she won a Fulbright scholarship to study at Cambridge (England) in 1955; the following year she married Ted Hughes, with whom she had two children. Her first book of poems, The Colossus (1960), demonstrated her precocious talent, but was far more conventional than the work that followed. Her marriage to Ted Hughes fell apart, and by 1963, she was living in a London flat, ill with flu and low on money. The hardness of her life seemed to increase her need to write, sometimes finishing a poem a day, the theme of death and psychic pain prevalent. On February 11, she killed herself with cooking gas. Only after her death was her reputation as a major poet formed, on the publishing of these last works (Ariel, Crossing the Water, and Winter Trees).
Runnel A small stream.
Capri The Blue Island, to the South of the Bay of Naples in Italy. Hotels not cheap.
Swain literally a country lad, these days more the male lover.
Eyam is the famous 'plague village', which went into voluntary quarantine when the plague was imported from London in 1665.
Beak cocaine.
Leek busy little market town in Staffordshire.
Eva Cassidy American singer who died of skin cancer in 1996, and has since found posthumous international fame, initially from her rendition of Over The Rainbow.
Aphids in Picardy is merely a dig at middle-class liberal food snobs, rather than anything to do with Justine/Ruth Picardie. "Picardy is a vista of peaceful open spaces, reaching to the Belgian border in the north, the Paris basin in the south, turning west towards England and Normandy in the Baie de Somme and adjoining Champagne and the Ardennes in the east. Its landscape gently unfolds, offering an amazing diversity: vast plains, sand and dune beaches, green valleys, bocage and large expanses of forest". Guess the insects love it. Just as a coincidence, the aphid's favourite food is the rose... 'Roses of Picardy' was a famous WWI tune, up there with 'Long way to Tipperary', etc., but has passed into obscurity...
"No frills, handy for the hills..." a play on Dillinger's Cokane in my Brain - 'A knife, a fork, a bottle and a cork, that's the way you spell New York'.
No Frills is the low cost home brand of Kwik Save - possible the only product range that has a branding identity resembling prison supplies. Whether this is relevant or not is another matter...
New Mills is in Derbyshire, close to the Peak District but not actually in it. The Plain English Campaign is based there...
"Gimme that old time religion, it's good enough for me" is from a traditional folk song, adopted by Woody Guthrie. It also appears on Captain Beefheart's Mooonlight on Vermont, on Trout Mask Replica.}