Supercar

Faces in the wrong crowd 

Driving with the lights out

Looking to get lost tonight

Bathing in the moon shine

Shifting like a star sign 

Everything that’s yours is mine

Feeling  like a bad boy 

Get me like a new toy 

Have I seen you on TV

If you pick the cards right 

You could play my A-side

Spinning till we’re out of sight

So here and now

While time is tight

No feelings feel right

Underneath the amber glow

No turning back

That would never do

The point of no return

Is here for me and you

You get what you came for 

Everyone could use more

Don’t you think they owe you that?

Sliding down the S-curve

Trying to control the urge

We all need encouragement

So take the risk

And see it through

The night is young

The prizes all to play for

You bring your skills

My winning smile

And by the weekend

We can skate the royal mile

Now you’re a superstar

Driving in your supercar

Everybody stops to stare

You don’t remember

It was only last December

Racing through the cold night air

Now you have gone

It’s all too straight

The plan went wrong

So now it’s all too late

We can’t commit 

And here we wait

The sun comes up upon

This everlasting night

I had already got this guitar pattern for the verse which sounded kind of stagey, like an end-of-the pier, puppet show lick. I expected it to be a second theme and was waiting for the main part of the music to appear. Instead a chorus came along,  descending chords with an ostinato bass part which sounded quite heroic in a Venus De Milo way. The lyrics had to be striving, aspirational, yearning  I thought. But striving for what? I have to actually start writing lyrics before I know what the song is “about”. There never just about one thing. Every line can be about a different thing. Or more likely, every line might refer to some different thought process which underscores the way I write each line. I might have two good couplets out of 8, and just whack a few fillers in, then once it all scans go back and change and change it. There was an idea about films like Gone In 60 Seconds or Drive, with cool drapery decorating heroic failed romance. Musically I was trying for Lulu fronting the Spiders From Mars. Then I added in a lick from Rebel Rebel. We were all set. Then I revisited the narrative and realised we were getting close to A Star Is Born in reverse. It was all so American the last change I put in was the line “skate the Royal Mile” as a metaphor for “we’ll be really making it”. But of course what goes up must come down.