Caffeine & Paracetamol
“… a very personal view of the crutches we all seem to need to get through modern life - the title details my own drugs of choice”
– Sleeve notes, The World, The Flesh And The Devil
Milton Keynes
“…inspired by an advert I once saw on the London Underground, which was designed to encourage people to relocate to this sterile New Town. The tagline was ‘Why did we move to Milton Keynes?’, which I interpreted as a cry of despair and attempted to articulate further in this song”
– Sleeve notes, The Book Of Lies
Sleeping Policemen Wake
Inspired by, among other things, an article in Time magazine about sleep research. One view expressed was that dreams are our reward for putting up with real life. I turned that notion on its head and came up with this song.
By Charing Cross Station I Sat Down And Wept
“The title … is a parody of the title of Elizabeth Smart's novel By Grand Central Station I Sat Down And Wept (which itself was a parody of lines from Psalm 137). I based the verse structure on a Scottish lament called Jamie Raeburn's Farewell”
– Sleeve notes, A Peck Of Dirt
Harriet’s Nurse
This might be the first ever song about Munchausen’s Syndrome By Proxy.
Trick Or Treat
“Being a lifelong atheist, I usually give little thought to organised religion, but on the occasions I am coerced into attending a church service (weddings, christenings and funerals, usually), I can’t help looking around me and wondering how many of the regular members of the congregation genuinely believe in the concepts they are singing and praying about, and how many are merely buying themselves some insurance – just in case there really is an afterlife…”
– Sleeve notes, The Book Of Lies
Sea Of Tranquillity
“…about my astonishment at the return, after a break of twenty years, of my desire to write and perform songs”
– Sleeve notes, The Book Of Lies
Invertebrates
This is the third incarnation of possibly the only song I’ve ever written “on demand” for a specific purpose (in this case, for the We Couldn’t Agree On A Title compilation LP).
Raw Head And Bloody Bones/An Ugly Customer
“Raw Head And Bloody Bones, a bogeyman employed to frighten naughty children, crops up in a number of oral traditions from European to Afro-American. This song was inspired by the Irish version, who is supposed to live behind the pipes under the kitchen sink, and is a tribute of sorts to M.R. James, the father of the English ghost story. An Ugly Customer (which seemed an appropriately-titled companion-piece) is a reel from O’Neill’s Music of Ireland”
– Sleeve notes, The Book Of Lies
Tried Too Hard
“When bad things happen for no apparent reason, who do you blame? I suppose the religious can always explain away disasters as being “God’s will”, but the rest of us tend to blame ourselves…”
– Sleeve notes, The Book Of Lies
Murder On Meon Hill
“ I wanted to have a go at writing a broadside-style murder ballad, so I chose the true story of the unsolved murder of Charles Walton, killed near the village of Lower Quinton on 14 th February 1945… In a separate musical experiment, all of the sounds on this track (apart from the vocal and acoustic guitar) originate from traditional Malaysian instruments, which I think gives it something of an other-worldly feel”
– Sleeve notes, The World, The Flesh And The Devil
Vacant Possession
“The last ever Instant Automatons song, this didn’t even make it as far as being performed (let alone recorded) during the life of the band”
– Sleeve notes, Another Wasted Sunday Afternoon
Don’t Turn It Down, Maria
The bulk of this song dates from the time of the Instant Automatons, but was left unfinished as I didn’t think it was really “our thing”. I resurrected it, rewrote a couple of lines and supplied a final verse for inclusion on How Different From The Home Life Of Our Own Dear Queen. I changed the girl’s name in the title, too – to protect the innocent, as they say.
There’s A Man Going Round Taking Names
“…has its roots, I believe, in an old spiritual in which the ‘Man’ of the title was Jesus, taking the names of the ‘saved’. In the modern climate of conspiracy theories and post-9/11 paranoia however, ‘The Man’ who goes around taking names assumes a much more sinister aspect…”
– Sleeve notes, The Book Of Lies
Mister Monster
“The tune, chorus and first few lines come from the popular sailor’s song New York Girls (also known as Can’t You Dance The Polka?), while the remaining verses were inspired by letters written to the New York Police Department by serial killer David Berkowitz, the notorious Son Of Sam who terrorised the Big Apple in the 1970s. When I first read these letters, I was struck by the curiously poetic construction of some of the sentences, and wondered if they could be fashioned into some sort of song. This is the result. (He signed the first letter ‘Yours in murder, Mr. Monster’ – hence the title.)”
– Sleeve notes, A Peck Of Dirt
Naked Lunch
Almost nothing whatsoever to do with the William Burroughs book of the same name.
Radio Silence
Yet another old Instant Automatons song (the title track of our very first cassette, no less) that I thought deserved dragging out of retirement and being given a second chance. Of all the things I’ve ever written, this probably comes closest to being my personal manifesto.
Bonus Track: The Possession Of Billie Jean
A bit of fun to end with. | 
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