Liverpool Lyrics

Morning of my fifteenth birthday

Shoplifting celebratory sweets from Safeway

No sooner have I left the supermarket

I get collared

Secret door, upstairs, check out my image on the multiple screens

The manager's mean - calls the police to the scene

I come clean - to no avail

Legs between my tail

The handcuffs hurt but I remember not to wail

Then to the pig pen

With a pair of big men

Humiliation

Lying on a blue mat

It's juts like PE - but much rougher

Third time here and I'm still not much tougher

Watch me suffer

Till about midday

When the Head Of Year's here and I'm on my way

Hey!

Three hours late for my art GCSE

My cheeks burn red as the other kids stare at my

My Auntie Lexy's boyfriend the art teacher glares at me

Feels like nobody cares for me

I think carefully

I'm like, damn

Terrified of going back home to my Dad and my Mam

I'd only just regained their trust, understand

That's when I formulate a plan

At the end of the day, hey, I'm gonna run away

It's not that I wanna, I'm a gonner if I stay

So I polish off that red letter box

Then I'm off out of school

Doobleanga down to Bangor station hit the first train to Liverpool

I'm like, f*ck it

Seven pound thirty in my pocket

The ticket costs five pound something so that doesn't leave much from the deal

So on arrival I'm a steal a meal

And a bible

Yo!

Don't think I've ever been to Liverpoool before

But I'm OK on my own

Wandering alone

Blood Brothers is on and I've a plan to get a job

In the Burger King and rent a bedsit

Maybe next week

First though I've gotta find a place to sleep

I walk the streets

Meet - whores, randoms, children, finally find an abandoned building

Break in through a broken window

I step inside, smells like somebody died

Climb up these rickety stairs to find

Someone'd already been there

Needles and porn everywhere

Clumps of hair and a blanket, smashed glass, blood, and a tooth

Plus the place didn't have a roof

I curl up in a ball on the ground

Dream as the rain falls down

Wake up, shivering, shuddering

Just in the middle of dreaming about what could have been

Should have been blowing out candles

Should have been opening bangles

Instead I've been moping with vandals

Coping with thinking

Soaked to the bone and I'm stinking

Have a little moan then an inkling How I can have a shower, like - cool!

Walk for about a half an hour then I find a swimming pool

In Liverpool - I rule!

No need to fool the lady at reception

No deception in my conversation, I just mention my situation

And the girl's like

Hey kid, you can have a shower for free

Here's some shampoo and a towel, you don't have to thank me

So I wash, then I scuttle off, ashamed of myself

Into town where I steal myself some breakfast off the shop shelf

M & S, concerned about my dress so I plan to steal some trousers and a shirt

This one's covered in dirt

But that won't hurt for the present

I scrawl "homeless" on some paper, sit my ass down on the pavement

And it's not pleasant begging

But some people seem to feel sorry for me sitting on the ground

One lovely lady gives me twenty pounds, a note

I practically gloat

Gather up my coat, and the paper that I wrote homeless on

Then on the W.H. Smiths, I steal some books, some graphic novels and some comics

And I spend the afternoon in Maccy D's

Drinking milk shake, reading Spiderman and Tank Girl

And the former gives me my new name

Ben Riley

I figure that I'll shave my head, and maybe one day I'll do Kylie

Yeah I'm wiley and I'm optimistic, but here's the piss take

They kick me out of Maccy D's

And bugger me, it's freezing

So I find myself a pub, in there I buy myself a coke

I sit down at the back and I take of my steaming coat

The landlord and the regulars they seem to share a joke

They all laughing in my direction as I'm scheming and I hope they f*cking choke

And die, I start to f*cking cry

A wrinkly old lady wonders, and she asks me why

Pick up my steaming coat, and streaming eyes I run outside

Past some children to my building

I curl up on the ground and lie

As it was, I didn't last that long in Liverpool

And that's because I made a phonecall to a friend from school

No sooner had a I hung up, than a wagon pulled up

Shouted "ADAM!" and I turned around, a pair of coppers ran me down

I said, "my name's Ben Riley", but they didn't believe it

Drove me back to the station where I played to Jesus

And for a few hours, impatiently I waited

For my folks to drive from Anglesey to Liverpool to strangle me

I was as scared as I'd ever been

But my Mam and Dad cared, so I shouldn't have been

And that's the thing

Published by BMG Music Publishing. Lyrics reprinted with permission

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