New World City
Too much long distance flying, all the cities start to merge into one big one with the countryside around them a distant memory. Written on glimpsing the third world that you can disappear into in America if you go mad, lose your health insurance, or fail to pay your rent. Originally appeared on ‘Skin And Bone’.
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Come away with me and we’ll have ourselves a life in the new world city
Trade this stubborn farmland for a million neon nights in the new world city
We’ll build a house on a piece of torn up land
Made of board and tin with our own bare hands
In the new world city
Each early morning hopeful souls line up in the new world city
Sweat our hearts out fill a rich man’s cup in the new world city
Break our backs building monuments to the sky
Catch our fingers in the teeth of the machinery
In the new world city
La la la la, le la le la
La la la la, le la le la
La la la la, in the new world city
We’ll rule the six square feet that we can sleep upon in the new world city
We’ll look away while the violence carries on in the new world city
Make a new religion out of rusted cars
Our televisions and our hollow stars
In the new world city
[chorus][instrumental]
Hold on to each other for dear life we’re hanging on in the new world city
So very precious though we’re only worth a song in the new world city
Try to keep breathing as we watch the waters rise
Run harder and faster and race for the prize
We rats are never gonna break this wheel
These illusions it’s all for real
In the new world city
In London, Calcutta, Manhattan, LA
In Beijing and Moscow, Mexico, Bombay
Chicago, Jakarta, and Cape Town, Baghdad
In Cairo, Buenos Aries, in Bangkok, Tehran
In the new world
