"Simply Everyone's Taking Cocaine" (Murray Lachlan Young)

The man who fell to Conwall:

Murray Lachlan Young

"Simply Everyone's Taking Cocaine"

(Murray Lachlan Young)

From Mayfair to Morden from Soho to Sidcup
From Richmond to Dalston through old Regents park
From Borough to Bayswater, Crouchend to Clapham.
From Debden to Tooting beneath Marble Arch.

There are daughters of ministers children of clergy
There are amiable honarables barristers verging
On every single section of today’s society
Have thrown figs to the wind and embraced with such glee
The most wonderful pastime to have come around in years
Yes policemen and plumbers road sweepers and peers

Simply everyone’s taking Cocaine

Well last weekend I rode the Millennium wheel
From above and beneath I heard giggle and squeal
For instead of enjoying fine views all about
All the tourists were busily racking them out
Even those from the west of Ukraine

Simply everyone’s taking Cocaine

In the marathon runners are running with glee
With a vigour quite plain for spectators to see
It’s a marvel how thousands have slashed at their times
By at regular intervals hoofing a line
They’ve been stoking it up like a train

Simply everyone’s taking cocaine

Well I saw a young fireman helmet in hand
With a placard declaring we need thirty grand.
When I asked him to justify such an increase
He said “we have to buy it unlike the police”
Then he left for his villa in Spain

Saying everyone’s taking cocaine

Well I saw fizzy Sipworth attempting to eat
Inexplicably missing the most of her teeth
I said Fizzy your gummy what gives you old wag
She said “snorting Peruvian from the pound bag”
Then she laughed like a Portuguese drain

Simply everyone’s taking cocaine

Well I saw aunty Millie, her nose in a cast
I asked how would she manage her hourly blast
“She said needs must dear boy though it may seem a farce
I’ve been having it blown up the old Khyber Pass
By an elderly friend from Bahrain”

Simply everyone’s taking Cocaine

Uncle Percy set off on his great expedition
I said Percy you look in the peek of condition
“Quite so dear boy I’m a jack in the box
Since I purchased a sack of Bolivian rocks
From a couple I met on a plane ”

Simply everyone’s taking Cocaine

In the jungle old Percy’s supply was near done
He said this lack of chang is impeding my fun
When a barer discovered the wreck of a plane
Fairly stuffed to the gunnels with bales of Cocaine
For a year did he chatter and gurn
His remains were returned in an urn

Well the vicar proclaimed it the poorest of taste
To be scattering ashes all over the place
And if as he suspected, the powder were pure
“We should snort the old goat off the rectory floor”
So he chopped out old Percy in lines
Well at first aunty Millie declined

But she quickly gave in when the reverend stepped in
And assured her that Percy would waggle his chin
If he heard that his very last blast
Was a trip up the old Khyber Pass?
Then we all shouted hip hip hooray

Simply everyone’s taking Cocaine

For bus drivers are tooting it
Jockey’s are hoofing it
DJ’s are spinning it
Gamblers winning it
Forces manoeuvring it
Cleaners are hoovering it
Models are booked on it
Anglers hooked on it
Pensioners drawing it
Footballers scoring it
Technicians miking it
PA’s are biking it
Producers are trying it
AnR men denying it
Publishers collecting it
Lawyers protecting it
Artists are begging it
Some of them pegging it
It seems like it’s simple there’s no one to blame
For the whole of this nation is taking Cocaine
Simply everyone’s taking Cocaine

Oh how gay it all seems and how bright we all are
How much fun we are having and Oh what a lark
To have blistering jousting and sharp repartee
Oh please less less, less, about you
And please more, more, more, about me

The dullest weeks of the year are those in mid-January. For those who might be needing a boost to their flagging spirits (by substance or spirit), Murray Lachlan Young offers a tonic of social satire and biting wit. His rock-oriented poetry and performance style is comment with a certain gimlet eye; imagine, if you will, performance that is part Oscar Wilde velveteen, part Bonzo Dog Band antic. Here's Murray's own louche performance of "Simply Everyone's Taking Cocaine." In 2005, he collaborated with the band Morcheeba to record a now-legendary trip hop version.

(Photograph from Corduroy Lines, September 2011)