Tommy Shooter

Lyrics

I got news for you
I got news for you my friend
To which you will have to attend
Reduce your knees to noodles
Your Doberman Pinschers to poodles
Tommy Shooter (1)
Painting yellow flowers
Sorry after blowing her away
Tommy Shooter
See the clouds are darkening
With wings of chickens
They're coming home to roost (2)
I tell you my friend
Pinschers to poodles
Chickens coming home
To sit on your shoulder bone
Painting yellow flowers
After blowing away
Another balloon string
Held at bay (3)
Tommy Shooter
Rather than
Facing up to it
It is you
In Chicken Shack (4)
Father, short-sighted
Me, blind
The rubbish that accepted
Piles up in the corridor
The locals are in the realm of humiliation
Painting yellow flowers
Sorry after blowing her away
Tommy Shooter
I got news for you
I got news for you my friend
To which you will have to attend
Reduce your knees to noodles
Your Doberman Pinschers to poodles
Tommy Shooter

 

Notes

1. The Thompson submachine gun, colloquially known as a Tommy gun, was invented by John T. Thompson in 1919 and quickly became the heater of choice, during the Prohibition era, for both goodies and baddies (making it even harder to determine which was which). In live performances of the song, for some reason, vocals were often farmed out to a roadie named "Nikki" or "Nick," as can be seen here. In its earliest live incarnation, the song had different lyrics and was apparently entitled "I'm Me, Mark." According to The Story of the Fall, the song in this guise began with the memorable lyric "I love orange juice - always have...I'm the witchfinder" (see "More Information" below).  

CMN points out that "Ponto" is musically similar to this.

^

2. This saying, in one form or another, is quite old, and has been traced back to Chaucer's statement "[O]ftentimes such cursing returns again upon the head of him that curses, like a bird that returns again to its own nest." The saying shaped up into its modern form some time during the 19th century, but by far its most famous usage was Malcolm X's application of the analogy to John F. Kennedy's murder.

The MC5 almost certainly had this instance in mind in "American Ruse," from 1970:

Yeah, but I can see the chickens coming home to roost/Young people everywhere are gonna cook their goose/Lots of kids are working to get rid of these blues/'Cause everybody's sick of the American ruse      (thanks to The Jukebox Rebel)

Ward Churchill later got in some hot water for an essay entitled "Some People Push Back: On the Justice of Roosting Chickens" (subsequently expanded into the book On the Justice of Roosting Chickens: Reflections on the Consequences of U.S. Imperial Arrogance and Criminality), which applied the analogy to the events of September 11th, 2001. Here it simply suggests that if you mess with the Tommy Shooter, there will be consequences, so to speak, and lots of them, from the look of the sky. The sky darkening with the wings of chickens and the Doberman Pinschers turning into poodles are two complementary extensions of a figure of speech, both using animals, that inject a pronounced streak of humor into the foreboding feel of the song. The music performs a similar function in that, while it is tense and dramatic, is so in a stylized way reminiscent of music from a spy movie, and thus the music also has a whimsical side to it even as it conveys suspense and dread. The lyrics to "Spectre vs. Rector" perform a similar entwining of dread and humor in the register of spritual, rather than physical, peril.    

^

3. Dan is reminded of the famous scene in The Third Man where various characters are staked out waiting for Harry Lime to appear; an enormous shadow appears on a building across the way, but it turns out to be a drunken man carrying a bunch of balloons.

^

4. A "chicken shack" is a term for a restaurant that specializes in (usually fried) chicken; here the roosting chickens have transformed into fried ones, but we can rest assured that all that's really on the menu is hot lead.  

Polar Bear remarks "Chicken Shack were a British blues band in the 1960s. Their big hit was a version of the song 'I'd Rather Go Blind.'"

^

Notes

Tommy Shooter: Fall Tracks A-Z

The Story of the Fall: 2008

See here for couple of attempts at transcribing "I'm Me, Mark," although the first one seems to be a pretty loose rendering, to say the least.

Comments (21)

dannyno
  • 1. dannyno | 17/06/2013
"Another balloon string
Held at bay"

I'm reminded of this scene from 'The Third Man":
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TIGlTCOn0tY
Martin
  • 2. Martin | 16/02/2014
Dannyo's link no longer works, unfortunately.
Martin
  • 3. Martin | 10/10/2014
Googling the phrase "the realm of humiliation" throws up a few examples, in case anyone thinks that MES invented it.
The Jukebox Rebel
  • 4. The Jukebox Rebel (link) | 15/03/2016
A distant trigger for MES perhaps?

Yeah, but I can see the chickens coming home to roost
Young people everywhere are gonna cook their goose
Lots of kids are working to get rid of these blues
'Cause everybody's sick of the American ruse


MC5 - The American Ruse
PolarBear
  • 5. PolarBear | 14/03/2018
Chicken Shack were a British blues band in the 1960s. Their big hit was a version of the song I'd Rather Go Blind.
dannyno
  • 6. dannyno | 17/03/2018
The balloon scene from Third Man, again:

https://youtu.be/7U_2AWPm4IE
bzfgt
  • 7. bzfgt (link) | 21/03/2018
Did I summarize it correctly? I haven't seen the movie in years and years.

Fortunately there was a completely worthless note at that line already, I just replaced it...
Paul G
  • 8. Paul G | 18/05/2018
Obviously we're going to start looking at some lyrics with January's sad news in mind but does anyone else see this song as a diagnosis of a serious illness?

News that would make you go week at the knees, news that would 'blow someone away'. Someone who has perhaps lived an unhealthy life and now that has caused them a medical problem bringing the chickens home to roost?

Is the 'yellow flower' in question the daffodil? It's the symbol of the Marie Curie charity that support people with a terminal illness.
dannyno
  • 9. dannyno | 20/05/2018
Well, there are plenty of medical/health-related songs in the canon, including some with what seems like autobiographical content. But I don't think this is one of them. I think this is about war, or the consequences of war.
bzfgt
  • 10. bzfgt (link) | 15/07/2018
Yeah I definitely think it could be, he has some medical-related lyrics in this era for sure
nutterwain
  • 11. nutterwain | 03/08/2019
Isn't Tommy a hitman? Who, following a job blowing her away, paints yellow flowers to try and rebalance himself.
bzfgt
  • 12. bzfgt (link) | 16/08/2019
Yeah or "Tommy" just refers to his gun, or both
Commoner
  • 13. Commoner | 01/12/2020
The song is so obviously about the suicide of Van Gogh, the most famous painter of yellow flowers, that it is almost laughable and pointless to point it out.
dannyno
  • 14. dannyno | 18/12/2020
A bold theory. Is there anything else in the song we might point to? Because as things stand, the lyric refers to "blowing her away" not "blowing Van Gogh away" (or "him", if you must).
Common-Ah
  • 15. Common-Ah | 06/01/2021
@dannyno
You are very literal minded.
dannyno
  • 16. dannyno | 15/02/2021
A curious reaction, since it again neglects to put forward any further textual reason why we should think that the song is "obviously" about the suicide of Van Gogh, which leaves us only with the presence in the song of "yellow flowers" and guns - and the implicit invitation to therefore to take them literally.
bzfgt
  • 17. bzfgt (link) | 22/02/2021
Dan, I think Commoner is just being silly (intentionally). Commoner, Dan is also being somewhat tongue in cheek but doing due diligence, lay off him.
CMN
  • 18. CMN | 07/04/2021
I think this started off as Ponto (at least there is a 2007 version with the lyrics, 'what is your fear?' etc).

They are very similar. Very very basic.
bzfgt
  • 19. bzfgt (link) | 10/04/2021
I never noticed the connection, but I can hear it now you say it
bzfgt
  • 20. bzfgt (link) | 10/04/2021
Shit, we don't have Ponto! I texted myself to add it and note the connection to this, I might not get to it tonight, but thanks it shall be done...got to add Inferior Product Man too, maybe to the More Information of 50 YOM
Wrayx8
  • 21. Wrayx8 | 13/04/2021
18. has it down -- I can hear it now. Glad they persevered, Tommy Shooter is far superior.

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