You and your daughter
and your father
flew airplanes

You and your sister
can tell by the back of her hands

It was a dinosaur act
dinosaur act
dinosaur act
dinosaur act

After expenses
and pulling up fences
no more airplanes

And putting your foot down
a nail shot up like a bright red snowflake

Just like a dinosaur act
dinosaur act
dinosaur act
dinosaur act
dinosaur

ooo...

And all through the dust
you feel that you must hear the strings of a dove

But it's a dinosaur act
dinosaur act
dinosaur act
dinosaur act
dinosaur


Lyrics submitted by blasfemme

Dinosaur Act song meanings
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    General Comment

    Brilliant, brilliant song. I love the joy in the chorus - the harmony is just ... epic. Seen footage of them singing this live and Alan was just beaming when he sang it. One to belt out in the shower, I've always found.

    I agree with the cmments above that the song is open to any interpretation and that it may even be meaningless. BUT for me the song seems to tell the story, albeit in a dreamily veilled way, of some sort of tragety. The lines "After expenses and pulling up fences" imples that there was a payout of some sort (redundancy? life insurance? something more sinister - silence money? witness protection?) and that the family had to up sticks and move house. Why move house? A simple downscale due to loss of earnings or was it the fleeing of some sort of scandal?

    So for me those lines are at the heart of the song.

    tony_mon March 31, 2011   Link

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