“THE DAY YOU STOPPED DANCING”
By Ian Bell, BMI 2011
The day you stopped dancing
I stole the keys to the hall
Swapped the bees wax for petrol
Turned on the mirror ball
Dowsed down the floor like the tide was coming in
Hit the lights, struck the match
And watched the flames, dancing
Chorus
We used to glide crossed the floor
You should have seen us
Now the flames leap so high
Just like ballerinas
Padlocked and chained the emergency door
And the timbers they crack just for applause
Tonight I dance alone; tonight I’m on my own
The day you stopped dancing
You threw your shoes away
Piled your dresses in the garden,
and burnt them that day
Shut off your ears
until the music disappeared
This day was coming
I always feared
Chorus
We used to glide crossed the floor
You should have seen us
Now the flames leap so high
Just like ballerinas
Padlocked and chained the emergency door
And the timbers they crack just for applause
Tonight I dance alone, tonight I’m on my own
“If this is what you get?”
Ian Bell BMI 2011
There’s 24 now but there will be eight
The memo fly’s around the room creased into a paper plane
Falls in your tied worn hands, the clock ticks at an astonishing rate
There’s swing shifts, middle shifts, and double shifts
Early lates, nocturnal night shift for you to take
Just to keep this roof above our heads
Because they say it will rain again
Up to the wire, and there dropping like flies
Getting crushed in to the worn brown carpet tiles
Pressures on and the sweats inhuman
As the results of the last eight fly in
My Fathers a smart man he gets through
Raises his hands triumphantly to the florescent tubes
Pressures on not to cause an alarm
There’s a pain in his heart chasing down his left arm
Sweat pours from your face, they said it would rain
Pale as the corridors there pushing you in
And the wheels of the bed spin round
In an agonizing sound
There 24 now but there will be eight
24 now but there will be eight
The memo fly’s around the room
Creased in to a plane
Chorus
It’s a long way from home
When you might not have one
And you fall as sleep in your mother’s warm arms
And the company’s broken your father in two
And your mother says son, run, go get the glue
Well stick him back together like he used to be
While he sleeps like a baby on the settee
If this is what you get
After all that you gave
“A Long Ways Away”
Ian Bell BMI 2011
Rumor has it you made a rod for your own back
Sweated the small stuff, it rusted then cracked
Bled through your shirt and that traveling coat
That never had seen further than the end of the road
Invisible shackles,
These distances planned
I could hear the chains a clinking
In your conversation
Maps plastered round your walls to keep you sain
But you only ever traveled to work then home again
Everything procured and accounted for
Laid out on a rug that covered eighty percent of the floor
A traveling bag one hundred pockets or more but no room for a return ticket I’m sure
Mentioned your plans once too often they say
How you would hoist up the calico and sail away
Fell on deaf ears but I did hear them say how the job for life will kill you before the wind blows you away
Your landlord he used his skeleton key
Pushed the door open so everybody could see
There’s an empty chair in a vacant room seen
As barren as the deserts that hes now walking in
Chorus
And all this time you dreamt like a king
Ran your fingers around the counties
Pushed the colored pins in
Muttering under your breath you know I will be there soon
I’ll leave an empty chair in a vacant room
And you’ll be a long ways away
You’ll be a long ways away
You’ll be a long ways away
And come and look at his face disappearing without a trace
Without a trace
“Shrink To Fit”
Ian Bell BMI 2011
I do what you do, and I do what you say
And I ride what you ride
And I eat what you waste
See me smile
There is a list
Am I on, am I off
Blind folded drunk up against the firing squad
See me smile
Here is the rope, so where is the knot
The faster I fell the tighter it got
See me smile
Fickle you tie your fickle shoes
With the pied piper everybody follows you
See me smile
There is the smoke, so where is the spark
Rub two people together, the fire starts
See me smile
I did what you did
I did what you said
And look at me now three thousand miles away
Chorus
But I will give you the shirt off of my back
But not the skin of these bones
The emperor’s old clothes were too tight
Deaf and illiterate, label said shrink to fit
I see a fine line
I see a chalk line
When it rains it washes the rules away
I see a fine line
I see a chalk line
When it rains, it washes the rules away
You got to shrink to fit
You got to shrink to fit
You got to shrink to fit
“Springs”
Ian Bell BMI 2011
Well they handed him to you at five and twenty minutes past two, January, two years shy of the Nineteen seventy’s .
You held him up into the light while they administered stitches in to your wife, she had been in the near room to death in a National Health Hospital.
Oh but I won the bet, I got a son and heir head to wet, the cigars are in the car, those boys are waiting on me,
Oh but when I return I’ll have a list as long as my arm for everything I did not achieve in life but he will now for me.
I can show you the mold I can show you the mold.
And at the age of Five he was a happy healthy child he played with his Sisters toys loved flowers in vases.
Father wasn’t happy with that but his Mother said hell out grow it, Just like any mother, she just loved her boy.
Double his age to ten he was back at the Doctors for a check up again, he said Doctor, there’s something not right with my boys mind, the Doctor said Mr. G, he seems like a happy healthy boy to me, he’s got a good heart listen close you can hear it beating stronger.
I can show you the mold, I can show you the mold.
Chorus
They say he’s got Springs on his toes
He says he’s got Springs on his Sole
He says I don’t chose who I Love
But you, You chose who you loath.
I’ve been told I got a good heart
Can you hear it
Beating stronger
Beating louder
And at the age of fifteen he was caught in the arms of his best friend and it spread like wild fire through the brick built council estates.
Father hung his head in shame, stamping out fires that burnt his name, and in the public houses you could hear a pin drop.
Come along sweet sixteen back in the arms of the same best friend everything he owned few out the window on to the frosted pavement, his father said look in to my eye see this house is not your home now so don’t you dare tippy toes a crossed the threshold.
I see cracks in the mold see those cracks in the mold.
And the years slipped away and his wife she became his slave all the pictures taken down and hidden in Clarks shoe boxes.
Then a letter was read to say that the boys had adopted a son that day who played with plastic guns and loved silver spacemen.
At the news of that his wife she began to pack followed her apron strings to the boys spare room, lived happily ever after died in the summer with loving arms a crossed her shoulder blades.
I see no cracks in the mold; I see no cracks in the mold
His father sits in a chair, stars at the television and the walls that are bare, there’s no love in his veins to keep his heart beating,
They carried him in to the light at five and twenty minutes past midnight two years shy
Of the twenty first century.
Ian Bell Acoustic 