Flood

Artist: They Might Be Giants

1990 Elektra Records

All selections by They Might Be Giants unless noted.

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Theme from Flood

Why is the world in love again?

Why are we marching hand in hand?

Why are the ocean levels rising up?

It's a brand new record for 1990

They Might Be Giants' brand new album:

Flood

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Birdhouse in Your Soul

I'm your only friend

I'm not your only friend

But I'm a little glowing friend

But really I'm not actually your friend

But I am

CHORUS

Blue canary in the outlet by the light switch

Who watches over you

Make a little birdhouse in your soul

Not to put too fine a point on it

Say I'm the only bee in your bonnet

Make a little birdhouse in your soul

I have a secret to tell

>From my electrical well

It's a simple message and I'm leving out

The whistles and bells

So the room must listen to me

Filibuster vigilantly

My name is blue canary one-word

Spelled l-i-t-e

My story's infinite

Like the Longines Symphonette

It doesn't rest

CHORUS

I'm your only friend

I'm not your only friend

But I'm a little glowing friend

But really I'm not actually your friend

But I am

There's a picture opposite me

Of my primitive ancestry

Which stood on rocky shores and

Kept the beaches shipwreck free

Though I respect that a lot

I'd be fired if that were my job

After killing Jason off and

Countless screaming Argonauts

Bluebird of friendliness

Like guardian angels its

Always near

CHORUS

(And while you're at it

Leave the nite lite on inside the

Birdhouse in your soul)

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Lucky Ball and Chain

I lost my lucky ball and chain

And now she's four years gone

Just five feet tall and sick of me

And all my rattling on

She threw away her baby-doll

I held on to my pride

But I was younng and foolish then

I feel old and foolish now

Confidentially

She never called me baby-doll

Confidentially

I never had much pride

But now I rock a bar stool

and I drink for two

Just pondering this time bomb in my mind

CHORUS

She walked away from a happy man

I thought I was so cool

I just stood there whistling

"There goes the bride"

As she walked out the door

I could shake my tiny fist

And swear I wasn't wrong

But what's the sense in arguing

When you're all alone?

Sure as you can't steer a train

You can't change your fate

When she told me of that day

I knew I'd lost my home

Confidentially

I never told you of her charms

Confidentially

We never had a home

But this railroad apartment

Was the perfect place

When she'd sit and hold me in her arms

I lost my lucky ball and chain

And now she's four years gone

Just five feet tall and sick of me

And all my rattling on

CHORUS

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Istanbul (Not Constantinople)

(J. Kennedy/N. Simon)

Istanbul was Constantinople

Now it's Istanbul, not Constantinople

Been a long time gone, Constantinople

Now it's Turkish delight on a moonlit night

Every gal in Constantinople

Lives in Istanbul, not Constantinople

So if you've got a date in Constantinople

She'll be waiting in Istanbul

Even old New York

Was once New Amsterdam

Why they changed it I can't say

People just liked it better that way

So take me backto Constantinople

No, you can't go back to Constantinople

Been a long time gone, Constantinople

Why did Constantinople get the works?

That's nobody's business but the Turks'

Istanbul

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Dead

I returned a bag of groceries

Accidentally taken off the shelf

Before the expiration date

I came back as a bag of groveries

Accidentally taken off the shelf

Before the date stamped on myself

CHORUS

Did a large procession wave their

Torches as my hed fell in the basket

And was everybody dancing on the casket?

Now it's over I'm dead and I haven't

Done anything that I want

Or, I'm still alive

And there's nothing I want to do

I will never say the word

"Procrastinate" again; I'll never

See myself in the mirror with my eyes closed

I didn't apologize foor when I was eight

And I made my younger brother

Have to be my personal slave

CHORUS

So I won't sit at home anymore

And you wn't see my head in the window

And I won't be around ever anymore

And I7ll be up there on the wall at the store

I returned a bag of groceries

Accidentally taken off the shelf

Before the expiration date

I came back as a bag of groceries

Accidentally taken off the shelf

Before the date stamped on myself

CHORUS

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Your Racist Friend

CHORUS

This is where the party ends

I can't stand here listening to you

And your racist friend

I now politics bore you

But I feel llike a hypocrite talking to you

You and your racist friend

It was the loveliest party that I've ever attended

If anything was broken

I'm sure it could be mended

My hed is tired from bobbing and pretending

Listen to some bullet-head

And the madness that he's saying

This is where the party ends

I'll just sit here wondering how you

Cn stand by your racist friend

I know politics bore you

But I feel like a hypocrite

Talking to yo

You and your racist friend

Out from the kitchen

To the bedroom to the hallway

Your friend apologizes, he could see it my way

He let the contents of the bottle do the thinking

Can't shake the devil's hand

And say you're only kidding

CHORUS

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Particle Man

Particle man, particle man

Doing the thins a particle can

What's he like?

It's not important

Particle man

Is he a dot, or is he a speck?

When he's underwater

Does he get wet?

Or does the water get him instead?

Nobody knows

Particle man

Triangle man, Triangle man

Triangle man hates particle man

They hve a fight

Triangle wins

Triangle man

Universe man, Universe man

Size of the entire universe man

Usually kind to smaller man

Universe man

He's got a watch with a minute hand

Millenium hand and an eon hand

And when they meet it's a happy land

Powerful man, universe man

Person man, person man

Hit on the head with a frying pan

Lives his life in a garbage can

Person man

Is depressed or is he a mess

Does he feel totally worthless?

Who came up with person man?

Degraded man, person man

Triangle man, triangle man

Triangle man hates person man

They have a fight

Triangle wins

Triangle man

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Twisting

She set your goldfish free

And now she's sighing

Blew out your pilot light

And made a wish

She doesn't have to have

her db's records back now

But there's not a lot of things

That she'll take back

CHORUS

She wants to see you again

She wants to see you again

See you twisting in the wind

She's not your satellite

She doesn't miss you

So turn off your smoke machine

And Marshall stack

She doesn't have to have

Her Young Fresh Fellows tape back

But there's not a lot of things

That she'll take back

CHORUS

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We Want a Rock

Where was I? I forgot

The point that I was making

I said if I was smart that I would

Save up for a piece of string

and a rock to wind the string around

Everybody wants a rock

To wind a piece of string around

Throw the crib door wide

Let the people crawl inside

Someone in this town

Is trying to burn their playhouse down

They want to stop the ones who want

A rock to wind a string around

But everybody wants a rock

To wind a piece of string around

If I were a carpenter I'd

Hammer on my piglet

I'd collect the seven dollars and I'd

Buy a big prosthetic forehead

And wear it on my real head

Everybody wants prosthetic

Foreheads on their real heads

Throw the crib door wide

Let the foreheads come inside

Someone in this town

Is trying to burn the foreheads down

They want to stop the ones who want

Prosthetic foreheads on their heads

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Someone Keeps Moving My Chair

Mr. Horrible

Mr. Horrible

Telephone call for Mr. Horrible

But before he can talk to the ugliness men

There's some horrible business left

For him to attend to

Something unpleasant has spilled on his brain

As he sponges it off they say:

"Is this Horrible?

Is this Horrible?

It's the ugliness men, Mr. Horrible

We're just trying to bug you

We thought our ddreadfulness

Might be a thing to annoy you with."

CHORUS

But Mr. Horrible says, "I don't mind,

The thing that bothers me is

Someone keeps moving my chair."

"Would you mind if we balance

This glass of milk

Where your visiting friend

Accidentally was killed?

Would it be okay with you

If we wrote a reminder

of things we'll forget to do today otherwise

using a green magic marker, if it's alright

On the back of your head?

CHORUS

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Hearing Aid

Forsty the supervisor lives by himself

Sometimes I feel sorry for him

Usually I can't

I've turned off my hearing aid

Don't say the electric chair's not good enough

For king-lazy-bones like myself

More coffee for me boss

Because I'm not as messed up as I want to be

Because

Because

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Minimum Wage

Minimum Wage....HEYAH!!!!

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Letterbox

I'll never know what you'll find when you

Open up your letter box tomorrow

'Cause a little bird never tells me anything

I want to know, she's my best friend

She's a sparrow

CHORUS

And I'll never know what you never never

Want to know when you know

What you are-o

If I had a pair of eyes in the back of my hed

For each time you forgot to take out

All the things you forgot to talk about

When you took a bite out of my spine

I would have a lot of eyes on me by this time

Wouldn't I? Wouldn't that just be fine

CHORUS

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Whistling in the Dark

A woman came up to me and said

"I'd like to poison your mind

With wrong ideas that appeal to you

Though I am not unkind."

She looked at me, I looked at something

Written across her scalp

And this is what it faintly said

As I tried to call for help:

CHORUS

There's only one thing

That I know how to do well

And I've often been told that you only can do

What you know how to do well

And that's be you

Be what you're like

Be like yourself

And so I'm having a wonderful time

But I'd rather be whistling in the dark

There's only one thing that I like

And that is whistling in the dark

A man came up to me and said

"I'd like to change your mind

By hitting with a rock," he said,

"Though I am not unkind."

We laughed at his little joke

and then I merrily walked away

And hit my head on the wall of the jail

Where the two of us live todaay

CHORUS

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Hot Cha

CHORUS

Hot Cha, where are you?

Everybody's eyes are closed

I can't see why I miss you so

So Hot Cha, where are you?

First time Hot Cha went away

A floating island was his home

then the phone rang off the hook

And Hot Cha had to run back home

CHORUS

Second time he went away

Left the bathtub running over

Stereo on and cooking bacon

Never came back to tell us why

CHORUS

If that honey would come back

We would throw such a party

Drink and cook the prodigal son

Fondue forks for everybody

CHORUS

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Women and Men

When the ship runs out of ocean

and the vessel runs aground

Land's where we know the boat is found

Now there's nothing unexpected

About the water running out

"Land's" not a word we have to shout

But there's something beside the shoreline

Coming up from the shipwreck

Moving across the beachhead

Making as if to say

CHORUS

Women and men

Women and men

Women and men

Bringing with them messages of love

And everywhere they go love will grow

When you see the faces of the women

And the men, you too will know

Women and men have crossed the ocean

they now begin to pour

Out from the boat and up the shore

Two by two they enter the jungle

And soon they number more

Three by three as well as four by four

Soon the stream of people gets wider

Then it becomes a river

River becomes an ocean

Carrying ships that bear

CHORUS

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Sapphire Bullets of Pure Love

Pistol shots

Gun shots

Pistol shots

gun shots

Bullets from a revolver

Bullets from a gun

Bullets through the atmosphere

here they come

John I've been bad and they're

Coming after me

Done someone wrong and I fear

That it was me

Sapphire bullets

Bullets of pure love

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They Might Be Giants

They might be giants

They might be rain

They might be heat

They might be frying up a stalk of wheat

They might be brain

They might be washed

They might be Dr. Spock's backup band

CHORUS

Tabloid footprints in your hair

Tabid footprints everywhere

We can't be silent

Because they might be giants

And what are we gong to do unless they are

They might be giants

They might be bald

They might be snow

They might be something else in the snow

The might be fake

they might be lies

The might be big, big, fake, fake lies

CHORUS

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Road Movie to Berlin

We're in a road movie to Berlin

Can't drive out the way we drove in

So sneak out this glass of bourbon

And we'll go

We were once so close to heaven

Peter came out and gave us medals

Declaring us the nicest of the damned

You said you were the king of liars

And I believed you and called you sire

But I realize now that I have been deceived

Time won't find the lost

It'll sweep up our skeleton bones

So take the wheel and I will take the pedals

We're in a road movie to Berlin

Can'T drive out the way we drove in

So sneak out this glass of bourbon

And we'll go

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DON'T BLAME ME...

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Eric Wincentsen "Greetings from the Humungous-

[email protected] The Lord Humungous!"

Glendale Community College, -The Road Warrior

Glendale, Arizona

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I DIDN'T VOTE FOR SLICK WILLY!