Quotes from Shane MacGowan

Something that's obvious to a lot of people but it's never said much on the television or anything, that the architects and planners and whatever in London are inhuman to a really disgusting extent.

A devil moon took me through the alley Down by the Kardomah and the Centrale To the mews running through the backstreets Where the Blacks sell fire and sleep The devil moon took me out of Soho Up to Camden where the cold north winds blow Sucked along by a winter shower To stand beside your shining tower

If I should fall from grace with God Where no doctor can relieve me If I'm buried 'neath the sod But the angels won't receive me Let me go, boys Let me go, boys Let me go down in the mud Where rivers all run dry

Ah sweet city of my dreams Of speed and skill and schemes Like Atlantis you just disappeared from view And the hare upon the wire Has been burnt upon your pyre Like the black dog that once raced Out from trap two

Dehydration Humiliation Degradation Mind castration And the sky is black And the one next to you Keeps thinking that they're having a heart attack. Desolation On medication Nurse nurse nurse Can't sleep easy Nurse nurse nurse Are you fucking with me ECT fucking did a thing on me ECT did a job on me ECT did a job on me ECT did a job on me. Pinned Down Pinned Down.

I can type with me toes Suck stout through me nose And where it's gonna end God only knows

One, two, three, four, turn your poles Give me a cup of sweet poitin Madness from the mountains crawling When I first saw you, my own Aisling

Oh the torn up ticket stubs From a hundred thousand mugs Now washed away with dead dreams in the rain And the carparks going up And they're pulling down the pubs And its just another bloody rainy day

And as I sit and talk to you I see your face go white This shadow hanging over me Is no trick of the light The spectre on my back will soon be free The dead have come to claim a debt from thee

Here a tower shining bright Once stood gleaming in the night Where now There's just the rubble in the hole from "White City

Down the dirty old street The Angel of the East is calling And with a trembling hand I open up a can I can hear a baby bawling

Sometimes I wake up in the morning The ginger lady by my bed Covered in a cloak of silence I hear you talking in my head

There's a Tesco on the sacred ground Where I pulled her knickers down While Judas took his measly brass And St. Anthony gazed in awe at Christ Down on Rain Street

We watched our friends grow up together And we saw them as they fell Some of them fell into Heaven Some of them fell into Hell

There's an art to playing live. It's a great feeling. It's indescribable. It's what I love. I wouldn't do it if I didn't enjoy it.

My dad has no control over who works with me. Me, me and me alone has to take responsibility for anything.

I'm not so much a rock star, d'ya know what I mean? I play Irish music. There's really no age when you stop playing Irish music. Even if I retired from playing onstage, I'd still be singing in pubs.

I've been here all the time; I could be putting out as many albums as Costello, y'know what I mean?

What I do is I'm a bandleader, frontman, entertainer.