LYRICS // Bad Hair Day (1995)

I wrote my first full set of lyrics at 16, in collaboration with the school friend that I started my first band with. Not wanting to write yet another silly love song and captured by the nonsensical nature of the wordplay, we tried to write our own version of 'I Am The Walrus'. It was ambitious in its own way, yet came out as a shoddy stab at schoolboy psychedelia with pretty awkward imagery and rhyming. Still, we all have to start somewhere.

This song was a little further down the line in my development as a lyricist, but still with some way to go. It was at least one of the first times that I started tackling better wordplay, running with the sound of it as opposed to the actual meaning. A song can sound fantastic musically, but if the lyrics don't cut it, the song's let down. Words can sound just as musical as a guitar line or a drum break.

Many writers will use their craft to mend a broken heart, and I'm sure there's a little exorcising an ex in here somewhere. I also tried to tackle that existential question about whether suffering for one's art makes one a better artist. It may help with inspiration and in England at least, there's the perception that the suffering artist is somehow more credible. It's a drag to live that way though and sometimes you just have to have the bread on your table, man.

The line about being cast for a film happened, but I did get the part (the male lead in a young filmmaker's show reel; my character ending up slitting his wrists in the bath, so a bleak ending to my film acting debut!).

A very rough acoustic demo of the song was issued on the collection of early recordings I put out under the Quagga moniker.

Bad Hair Day

I saw you crying in the neon afterglow
Of another broken summer painted fallout shades of red
I heard you trying on another Christ for size
Just to see what suited best what lay inside your head

I don’t want to wake up on a bad hair day
I just want to wake up another way

I thought of you as I turned over in my grave
Couldn’t find another way to announce my death
I know that you can’t ever forgive yourself
For not being the one wearing my wooden suit instead

I don’t want to wake up on a bad hair day
I just want to wake up another way

You said an artist should always starve for his art
But even great outsiders need to feed their head sometimes
You cast me for the film then tell me I’ve lost the part
So it’s about time for me to claim what’s mine

I don’t want to wake up on a bad hair day
I just want to wake up another way

You promised me the moon, the stars, and all that lay below
But you still can’t even think of me as someone with a name
I’d shave my head for you although I don’t know why
I’m getting kind of tired of playing your silly games

I don’t want to wake up on a bad hair day
I just want to wake up another way

Tried deep sea fishing in those caverns in your mind
Only to find a twisted line and nothing to bring home