This Building

Cathal Coughlan's Grand Necropolitan album

Released in 1996 by Kitchenware Records

BACK TO CHORDS

Transpose

INTRO

Abmaj7

VERSE 1

Abmaj7

The greying tower

Abmaj7

Lines massive, baggy-eye windows

Abmaj7

Streets of a slum

Abmaj7

Point to it, dumbly, like arrows

Abmaj7

It speaks of futures

Abmaj7

Lived out in fear with death close at hand

Abmaj7

Overgrowth

neutered

Abmaj7

A warning, blatant, the skyline jammed

CHORUS 1

It’s

Cm9

crippled and

Abadd9/A#

blind

Fm7

But it’s

Cm9

act is a

Abadd9/A#

mime

Fm7

Which means:

Gm/C

“Look here

first

Edim

This building hates us”

VERSE 2

Abmaj7

The timid tones

Abmaj7

Fake chat and ditties, rotating

Abmaj7

Down windy halls

Abmaj7

Cracked sheeting screeches as breath goes in

Abmaj7

Gases of food

Abmaj7

(Past, present, absent and formerly)

Abmaj7

Seep, cell to cell

Abmaj7

Down stairwell, needle-lined, normally

CHORUS 2

The

Cm9

tail-lights of

Abadd9/A#

Earth

Fm7

Seem

Cm9

faint from this

Abadd9/A#

perch

Fm7

As we

Gm/C

live out this

curse

Edim

This building hates us

INTERLUDE

Gm/G#

Bdim/G#

The crew of a tiny camcorder crowds around one doorway where a resident is pointing at his leg. Buried in here is the nozzle of a pressurised paint gun. He says, “It’s never coming out! I am transformed. I have created a new being out of old.”

I’ve been quite a Don Juan

Led man and woman on

My heyday, downed with a

belch

I gave my cash to pinstripe thieves

And my partners in delinquency

All of them as damaged as my

self

Gm/G#

Bdim/G#

Gm/G#

Bdim/G#

Like a shaman sent from hell

led the dance, I chanted spells

And

down on all disaster did

rain

Oh but

now they beat upon my door

I say

go where there is no cure

But

back they come, every single

day

VERSE 3

Abmaj7

No rite will mark

Abmaj7

Birth, growing, pairing, spawning, death

Abmaj7

Nor lying down

Abmaj7

Amid the grime of years will stone suggest

Abmaj7

Hold tight, hold tight

Abmaj7

To your digital twist and scrape

Abmaj7

They got you good

Abmaj7

So now let’s see you try going straight

OUTRO/FADE

Abmaj7

Oh no don’t be like that or the

Eb/G#

bossman won’t in

Eb/G

vite us back

Abmaj7

Oh no don’t be like that or the

Eb/G#

impresari

Eb/G

o won’t clap

Abmaj7

Watch them dance on gallows trees,

Eb/G#

burn the birdies,

Eb/G

burst the bees

Abmaj7

Feed her whisky ’til she’s senile,

Eb/G#

ask if you can

Eb/G

buy a missile

Abmaj7

Oh no don’t be like that or the

Eb/G#

bossman won’t in

Eb/G

vite us back

Abmaj7

Oh please watch my hat,

Eb/G#

paint my walls and

Eb/G

windows

black