This is a hauntingly beautiful song about introspection, specifically about looking back at a relationship that started bad and ended so poorly, that the narrator wants to go back to the very beginning and tell himself to not even travel down that road. I believe that the relationship started poorly because of the lines:
"Take me back to the night we met:When the night was full of terrors: And your eyes were filled with tears: When you had not touched me yet"
So, the first night was not a great start, but the narrator pursued the relationship and eventually both overcame the rough start to fall in love with each other:
"I had all and then most of you"
Like many relationships that turn sour, it was not a quick decline, but a gradual one where the narrator and their partner fall out of love and gradually grow apart
"Some and now none of you"
Losing someone who was once everything in your world, who you could confide in, tell your secrets to, share all the most intimate parts of your life, to being strangers with that person is probably one of the most painful experiences a person can go through. So Painful, the narrator wants to go back in time and tell himself to not even pursue the relationship.
This was the perfect song for "13 Reasons Why"
(This is it folks, over the top)
He was selling postcards from a paper stand
The whiskey bottle in his withered hand
Put his finger on a photo from an old magazine
Saw himself in the shadow of his dream
They found him with his head inside a tin-pot crown
Told him his feet stank and took him downtown
Called him agitator, spy and thief
Shut him up in solitary third degree
Take a long line
Take a long line
Take a long line
Reel him in
He tried to appeal to the king of might
Said "I'm just exercising my sacred right"
The king he said "You ain't got no rights
You're a madman, a traitor, get outta my sight"
Take a long line
Take a long line
Take a long line
Reel him in
They found him with his head inside a tin-pot crown
Told him his feet stank and took him downtown
Called him agitator, spy and thief
Shut him up in solitary third degree
Then they put him aboard a well wound whirlwind
Pulled out his teeth and they told him to grin
He gave them a smile, pulled out a bottle of wine
And said "I never existed, you've been wasting your time"
Take a long line
Take a long line
Take a long line
Reel him in
Take a long line
Take a long line
Take a long line
Reel him in
Take a long line
Take a long line
Take a long, long long long line
Reel him in
He was selling postcards from a paper stand
The whiskey bottle in his withered hand
Put his finger on a photo from an old magazine
Saw himself in the shadow of his dream
They found him with his head inside a tin-pot crown
Told him his feet stank and took him downtown
Called him agitator, spy and thief
Shut him up in solitary third degree
Take a long line
Take a long line
Take a long line
Reel him in
He tried to appeal to the king of might
Said "I'm just exercising my sacred right"
The king he said "You ain't got no rights
You're a madman, a traitor, get outta my sight"
Take a long line
Take a long line
Take a long line
Reel him in
They found him with his head inside a tin-pot crown
Told him his feet stank and took him downtown
Called him agitator, spy and thief
Shut him up in solitary third degree
Then they put him aboard a well wound whirlwind
Pulled out his teeth and they told him to grin
He gave them a smile, pulled out a bottle of wine
And said "I never existed, you've been wasting your time"
Take a long line
Take a long line
Take a long line
Reel him in
Take a long line
Take a long line
Take a long line
Reel him in
Take a long line
Take a long line
Take a long, long long long line
Reel him in
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verses and chorus work together so outstanding. what a great great party song. 1980 memories.
After listening to this song for 40 years I still have no idea what it is about
Always thought this was a wry coke reference, until, y'know, I actually read the lyrics.
Fuckin doc neeson. For an Adelaide "pub band", this has whiffs of Kunderra, particularly laughter and forgetting amongst other references. A well read coke-fuelled punk.
P.S. guess I'm preaching to the converted here, but didnt know am i ever gonna see your face again was their debut single. Similar to recently realising another Adelaide pub band formed at the same time's debut single was khe sahn. A fuckin debut single! Which then got banned from radio. Still, not a bad debut single