When a man is running from his boss
Who holds a gun that fires cost
And people die from being old
Or left alone because they’re cold
And bombs are dropped on fighting cats
And children’s dreams are run with rats
If you complain you disappear
Just like the lesbians and queers
No one can love without the grace
Of some unseen and distant face
And you get beaten up by blacks
Who though they worked still got the sack
And when your soul tells you to hide
Your very right to die’s denied
And in the battle on the streets
You fight computers and receipts
And when a man is trying to change
It only causes further pain
You realize that all along
Something in us going wrong
You stop dancing
I’m flowing under bridges,
Then flying through the sky,
I’m traveling down cold metal,
Just a tear in a baby’s eye...
Drowned.
Speaking as a Who fan...
We know now that Townsend was a very tortured soul
from abuse/a dysfunctional family
For someone who claimed to find spirituality
and truth a lot of his lyrics ^ not only ring hollow but have an
sordid perverted pessimistic nihilistic aura about them
I always liked Who By Numbers because it stripped away
much of the sprawling pretentiousness of Quadrophenia
and for a Greatest Hits lp Meaty Beaty...can’t be beat