I. Fool's Gold


Wake in the morning
Kick-start your body for another day
Life leaves you yawning
Feel you deserve a chance at another way

You have a talent you can share
A soul that you so long to bare
And all the dreams of who you are
All the mirages of superstars

Into the city
Past all the money-men with stolen lives
The lights are pretty
But there's a secret behind their disguise

And you see them everywhere you turn
Projecting menaces with cash to burn
Yet still you want to play their game
To go from nobody to household name

And the humdrum love to see you cry
The fickle, fake and fawning pay to watch you die

You didn't go to the right school
So you're opened up to ridicule
And no matter how hard you protest
You're shedding feathers to another's nest


ii. Dead Reckoning


It's alright until reality kicks in
It's alright until reality kicks in
It's alright until reality kicks in and you
Find out that you're left with nothing in the end

Everything is filtered through the eyes of money and
Payback time and due dates call you to account

We don't find belief inside a carbon copy
The formula stacks up but so too does the price

Go on, hedge your bets with someone else's future and
Bailout as the card-house comes down to the crunch

Hope is the one thing we've got on our side
Hope can be salvaged when all else has died *

It's alright until reality kicks in

Everything is filtered through the eyes of money and
Payback time and due dates call you to account


iii. Rainbows End


I'll have a shower
And then phone my brother up
Within the hour
I'll smash another cup **

How are we to scope the impossible
If it can't be you don't understand
We only see plain misdirection
As the elephant struts through the room
Eyes of the world are upon you
Burning holes as they focus the sun
Blurring the lens of perception
And the camera lies on its side
Twisting our dreams into nightmares
'Til you wake in the cold sweat of dawn
Bearing our soul to the monsters
You will fight them with all of your might
Hoping to prove we are stronger
Pick it up, look at it, and then throw
Bounce from the nine to the constant
As the story turns back on itself
Hold on to your inspiration
It inspires your heart and your soul
Feel it burn brightly inside you
And the lantern sails into the night
Guard it and sell it to no-one
Once it's lost it can never return
It opens windows to breathe through
With the voyage an end in itself
Never to lend or to borrow
Be yourself, be yourself, be yourself
Or to mortgage your soul to tomorrow


(Reprise:)


Wake in the morning
Kick-start your body
Leaves you yawning
Feel you deserve
Everything filtered through money
Only see plain misdirection
Never lend, never borrow
Or mortgage your soul to tomorrow

Check...
Check...
Check...
Mate

(With thanks for the inspiration - and lyric snippets - to Hazel O'Connor * and the late, great Billy Mackenzie **.)


"There are lots of things going on lyrically in that song! I enjoy writing songs that have two - sometimes more- threads going through them. From my point of view, the threads in Reality Cheque are about the illusions of fame and the perils of living on borrowed goods and money, both personally and as a country."



Rich Harding