Lyrics: Frank Turner
Sorry I've been kind of AWOL recently; my internet's been on the fritz. We've got someone coming on Monday to (hopefully) fix it.
Anyway, since I've had no internet, I decided to put together a collection of some of my favourite lyrics penned by Frank Turner.
I know I'm not the one who is habitually optimistic
But I'm the one who's got the microphone here, so just remember this
Life is about love, last minutes and lost evenings
About fire in our bellies and about furtive little feelings
[I KNEW PRUFROCK BEFORE HE GOT FAMOUS]
You're not designed to be alone
[REASONS NOT TO BE AN IDIOT]
I won't sit down and I won't shut up
And most of all I will not grow up
Maturity's a wrapped up package deal, or so it seems
And ditching teenage fantasy means ditching all your dreams
All your friends and peers and family solemnly tell you you will
Have to grow up, be an adult, be bored and unfulfilled
But no one's yet explained to me exactly what's so great
About slaving fifty years away on something that you hate
About meekly shuffling down the path of mediocrity
If that's your road then take it, but it's not the road for me
If all you ever do with your life is just photosynthesise
Then you deserve every hour of your sleepless nights
That you waste wondering when you're gonna die
[PHOTOSYNTHESIS]
If music was the food of love
Then I'd be a fat romantic slob
Oh, what I would give, not to stumble
But to really fall in love
[SUBSTITUTE]
It was bad enough, the feeling, the first time it hit
When you realised your parents had let the world all go to shit
And that the values and ideals for which many had fought and died
Had been killed off in the committees and left to die by the wayside
But it was worse when we turned to the kids on the left
And got let down again by some poor excuse for protest
By idiot fucking hippies in fifty different factions
Who were locked inside some kind of sixties battle reenactment
Let's be heroes, let's be martyrs, let's be radical thinkers
Who never have to test drive the least of their dreams
Let's divide up the world into the damned and the saved
And then ride to the valley like the old Light Brigade
And straighten our backs and we won't be afraid
And they'll celebrate our deaths with a national parade
So come on, let's be young, let's be crass enough to care
Let's refuse to live and learn, let's make all our mistakes again
And then darling, just for one day, we can fight and we can win
And if only for a little while, we can insist on the impossible
[LOVE, IRE AND SONG]
You'll live to dance another day
It's just now you'll have to dance for the two of us
[LONG LIVE THE QUEEN]
I guess you never know loss till you have something to lose
Choice till you have something to choose
[A LOVE WORTH KEEPING]
On the phone you always ask if I'm OK
It's not the same as being happy
Airports make me sad
I'm sure they shouldn't all be the same
Distance kills the best of intentions
I never intended to be this way
[JET LAG]
I'm gonna live fast and I'm gonna die old
We can never sell out because we never bought in
It won't last, so be bold
Live fast, die old
Choose your path, it's your soul
Live fast, die old
[LIVE FAST, DIE OLD]
Let's inherit the Earth, 'cause no one else is taking it
Let's stop waiting around for someone to patronise us
Let's hammer out a sound that speaks of where we've been
There's no such thing as rockstars
There's just people who play music
And some of them are just like us
And some of them are dicks
[TRY THIS AT HOME]
Me and all my friends are poets of the deed
We're exactly what this country needs
We scratch until we're drunk, we drink until we bleed
We are what we believe
Before we get bored, let's be inspired
Let's ignore the applause and set the theatre on fire
Let's grab life by the throat and then live it to pieces
Life is too short to live without poetry
If you've got soul, darling, now come on and show it me
Life is too long to just sing the one song
So we'll burn like a beacon, and then we'll be gone
[POETRY OF THE DEED]
The world has changed, worse or better's hard to tell
[ISABEL]
Getting half of what you wished for isn't so rare
Darling, oh my darling, you know that everywhere that I go
I'm just trying to find the fastest way back home
[THE FASTEST WAY BACK HOME]
When they raise their hands up our lives to possess
To know our souls, to drag us down, we'll resist
Stand up, sons of liberty, and fight for what you own
Stand up, sons of liberty, and fight, fight for your homes
So if ever a man should ask you for your business or your name
Tell him to go and fuck himself, tell his friends to do the same
'Cause a man who'd trade his liberty for a safe and dreamless sleep
Doesn't deserve the both of them, and neither shall he keep
[SONS OF LIBERTY]
I've driven across deserts, driven by the irony
That only being shackled to the road could ever I be free
You won't find your precious answers now
By staying in one place
I face the horizon everywhere I go
I face the horizon, the horizon is my home
[THE ROAD]
What would any of us do if all the dreams that we had came true?
What would there be left to dream about?
[FAITHFUL SON]
Tomorrow morning can wait its turn
[SUNDAY NIGHTS]
I could've played safe
But in the end, the journeys brought joys that outweighed the pain
Paupers and kings, princes and thieves
Singers of songs, righters of wrongs
Be what you believe
Saddle your horse, shoulder your load
Burst at the seams, be what you dream
And then take to the road
[JOURNEY OF THE MAGI]
I'm young enough to be all pissed off
But I'm old enough to be jaded
I'm of the age where I want things to change
But with age my hopes have faded
I'm young and bored of being young and bored
If I was old I could say I've seen it all before
In short, I'm tired of giving a shit
I've got friends who are bankers
And it's an easy rhyme to call them wankers
If politics is helping other people
Then my political career is pretty fucked
Because the truth is, I don't like people all that much
The times, they aren't a-changing
England's still shit and it's still raining
If the revolution doesn't want me, I don't give a shit
[ONCE WE WERE ANARCHISTS]
The musicians who lack the friends to form a band are singer-songwriters
Pretty soon we'll all be old
And no one left alive will really care
About our glory days when we sold our souls
But if you're all about the destination
Then take a fucking flight
We're going nowhere slowly but we're seeing all the sights
And we're definitely going to hell
But we'll have all the best stories to tell
[THE BALLAD OF ME AND MY FRIENDS]
Anyway, since I've had no internet, I decided to put together a collection of some of my favourite lyrics penned by Frank Turner.
I know I'm not the one who is habitually optimistic
But I'm the one who's got the microphone here, so just remember this
Life is about love, last minutes and lost evenings
About fire in our bellies and about furtive little feelings
[I KNEW PRUFROCK BEFORE HE GOT FAMOUS]
You're not designed to be alone
[REASONS NOT TO BE AN IDIOT]
I won't sit down and I won't shut up
And most of all I will not grow up
Maturity's a wrapped up package deal, or so it seems
And ditching teenage fantasy means ditching all your dreams
All your friends and peers and family solemnly tell you you will
Have to grow up, be an adult, be bored and unfulfilled
But no one's yet explained to me exactly what's so great
About slaving fifty years away on something that you hate
About meekly shuffling down the path of mediocrity
If that's your road then take it, but it's not the road for me
If all you ever do with your life is just photosynthesise
Then you deserve every hour of your sleepless nights
That you waste wondering when you're gonna die
[PHOTOSYNTHESIS]
If music was the food of love
Then I'd be a fat romantic slob
Oh, what I would give, not to stumble
But to really fall in love
[SUBSTITUTE]
It was bad enough, the feeling, the first time it hit
When you realised your parents had let the world all go to shit
And that the values and ideals for which many had fought and died
Had been killed off in the committees and left to die by the wayside
But it was worse when we turned to the kids on the left
And got let down again by some poor excuse for protest
By idiot fucking hippies in fifty different factions
Who were locked inside some kind of sixties battle reenactment
Let's be heroes, let's be martyrs, let's be radical thinkers
Who never have to test drive the least of their dreams
Let's divide up the world into the damned and the saved
And then ride to the valley like the old Light Brigade
And straighten our backs and we won't be afraid
And they'll celebrate our deaths with a national parade
So come on, let's be young, let's be crass enough to care
Let's refuse to live and learn, let's make all our mistakes again
And then darling, just for one day, we can fight and we can win
And if only for a little while, we can insist on the impossible
[LOVE, IRE AND SONG]
You'll live to dance another day
It's just now you'll have to dance for the two of us
[LONG LIVE THE QUEEN]
I guess you never know loss till you have something to lose
Choice till you have something to choose
[A LOVE WORTH KEEPING]
On the phone you always ask if I'm OK
It's not the same as being happy
Airports make me sad
I'm sure they shouldn't all be the same
Distance kills the best of intentions
I never intended to be this way
[JET LAG]
I'm gonna live fast and I'm gonna die old
We can never sell out because we never bought in
It won't last, so be bold
Live fast, die old
Choose your path, it's your soul
Live fast, die old
[LIVE FAST, DIE OLD]
Let's inherit the Earth, 'cause no one else is taking it
Let's stop waiting around for someone to patronise us
Let's hammer out a sound that speaks of where we've been
There's no such thing as rockstars
There's just people who play music
And some of them are just like us
And some of them are dicks
[TRY THIS AT HOME]
Me and all my friends are poets of the deed
We're exactly what this country needs
We scratch until we're drunk, we drink until we bleed
We are what we believe
Before we get bored, let's be inspired
Let's ignore the applause and set the theatre on fire
Let's grab life by the throat and then live it to pieces
Life is too short to live without poetry
If you've got soul, darling, now come on and show it me
Life is too long to just sing the one song
So we'll burn like a beacon, and then we'll be gone
[POETRY OF THE DEED]
The world has changed, worse or better's hard to tell
[ISABEL]
Getting half of what you wished for isn't so rare
Darling, oh my darling, you know that everywhere that I go
I'm just trying to find the fastest way back home
[THE FASTEST WAY BACK HOME]
When they raise their hands up our lives to possess
To know our souls, to drag us down, we'll resist
Stand up, sons of liberty, and fight for what you own
Stand up, sons of liberty, and fight, fight for your homes
So if ever a man should ask you for your business or your name
Tell him to go and fuck himself, tell his friends to do the same
'Cause a man who'd trade his liberty for a safe and dreamless sleep
Doesn't deserve the both of them, and neither shall he keep
[SONS OF LIBERTY]
I've driven across deserts, driven by the irony
That only being shackled to the road could ever I be free
You won't find your precious answers now
By staying in one place
I face the horizon everywhere I go
I face the horizon, the horizon is my home
[THE ROAD]
What would any of us do if all the dreams that we had came true?
What would there be left to dream about?
[FAITHFUL SON]
Tomorrow morning can wait its turn
[SUNDAY NIGHTS]
I could've played safe
But in the end, the journeys brought joys that outweighed the pain
Paupers and kings, princes and thieves
Singers of songs, righters of wrongs
Be what you believe
Saddle your horse, shoulder your load
Burst at the seams, be what you dream
And then take to the road
[JOURNEY OF THE MAGI]
I'm young enough to be all pissed off
But I'm old enough to be jaded
I'm of the age where I want things to change
But with age my hopes have faded
I'm young and bored of being young and bored
If I was old I could say I've seen it all before
In short, I'm tired of giving a shit
I've got friends who are bankers
And it's an easy rhyme to call them wankers
If politics is helping other people
Then my political career is pretty fucked
Because the truth is, I don't like people all that much
The times, they aren't a-changing
England's still shit and it's still raining
If the revolution doesn't want me, I don't give a shit
[ONCE WE WERE ANARCHISTS]
The musicians who lack the friends to form a band are singer-songwriters
Pretty soon we'll all be old
And no one left alive will really care
About our glory days when we sold our souls
But if you're all about the destination
Then take a fucking flight
We're going nowhere slowly but we're seeing all the sights
And we're definitely going to hell
But we'll have all the best stories to tell
[THE BALLAD OF ME AND MY FRIENDS]