10.1.07

SUSPENDED SENTENCE by John Cooper Clarke

Read the paper - humdrum
Henley Regatta - page one
Eat die - ho hum
Page three - big bum
Giving a lunatic a loaded gun
He walks - others run
Thirty dead - no fun
Foreigners feature as figures of fun
Do something destructive chum

Sit right down - write a letter to the Sun
Say... "Bring back hangin' for everyone"

The took my advice - they brought it back
National costume was all-over-black
There were corpses in the avenues and cul-de-sacs
Piled up neatly in six-man stacks
Hanging from the traffic lights and specially made racks
They'd hang you for incontinence and fiddling your tax
Failure to hang yourself justified the axe
A deedely dee, a deedely dum
Looks like they brought back hangin' for everyone


The novelty's gone - it's hell
This place is a - death cell
The constant clang of the funeral bells
Those who aren't hanging are hanging someone else
The peoples pay - the paper sells
It's plug ugly - sub-animal yells
Death is unsightly - death smells
Swingin' Britain - don't put me on
They're gonna bring back the rope for everyone



LYRICS © JOHN COOPER CLARKE.

'This is what grace is' – Alvaro Barrington | Tate

Artist Alvaro Barrington invites us into his London studio to talk about GRACE, his 2024 installation in Tate Britain's Duveen Galleries...