Wednesday, June 2, 2010

Paul Weller on urban transportation problems



Paul Weller, once of The Jam, has long used cities and transportation as images in his songs. Thirty years ago he sang about being down in the tube station at midnight. He also sang about what happens in the city.

Now, as happens to all of us, I suppose, in a new song he has resigned himself to being stuck in traffic (see above video for "Fast Car/Slow Traffic"). The guy who made London and the Underground sound like the coolest places in the world to me now sits on congested roads with a case of road rage. That's pretty far from late night underground adventures on the subway.

1 comment:

David said...

Don't forget The Planner's Dream Goes Wrong by The Jam

Letting loose the lunatics - wasn't the greatest of ideas
Giving them plans and money to squander -
Should have been the worst of our fears
The dream life luxury living was a pleasant No. 10 whim,
But somewhere down the line of production
They left out human beings
They were gonna build communities
It was going to be pie in the sky -
But the piss stench hallways and broken down lifts
Say the planners dream went wrong
If people were made to live in boxes
God would have given them string
To tie around their selves at bed time
And stop their dreams falling through the ceiling
And the public school boy computers -
Keep spewing out our future -
The house in the country designs the 14th floor
Old Mrs. Smith don't get out much more -
Coitus interruptus 'cause of next doors rows
Your washing gets nicked when the lights go out -
Baby's scream in the nightmare throng
But planners just get embarrassed when their plans GO WRONG!

http://www.lyricsdirectory.com/index/J/The%20Jam/The%20Jam%20-%20THE%20PLANNERS%20DREAM%20GOES%20WRONG%20lyrics.htm