In exactly one week from now (I am writing this on the stroke of mid day), The False Dots will be launching our brand new album "We don't live in America" live on stage at the Jester Festival in Fortune Green. When I initially started writing the album, I very much envisaged a different album. My original concept was an album with a real Northern Soul vibe. However, as it developed and I wrote songs, it became clear that this wasn't to be. Our trumpet player Tom Hammond was a big part of this change of direction, which is ironic, because I recruited him specifically for the purposes of giving us a more Northern soul feel. But when Tom heard some of the old, legacy material, he loved it. Much of it doesn't really suit my voice, which is why we don't do a lot of it.
One of the songs that Tom heard and really liked was "Please myself", which was written by our old singer Allen Ashley. Allen is a brilliant writer and poet. His lyrical style is mostly what I'd consider classic romantic, with a dollop of bitter lemon to give it a twist. But "Please myself" is a diatribe, a real two fingers up at the rise of social media and the billionaires who make fortunes by sucking us into the platforms then bombarding us with ads for rubbish we don't want. We played it and Tom loved it. The song had been the centrepiece of the set when Allen was in the band. It is a huge part of our musical legacy and it fits the theme and style of the album perfectly. We do a different arrangement and play it in a different key from when Allen was in the band, but it works perfectly and is a rich nod to the bands past.
Please myself
Four bar intro then
stop
All you trolls and haters,
with your messages and spam
You won’t say things to
our faces, coz your only half a man
All you commentators,
trying to set the news
Have you heard the latest,
no one’s listening to you
Chorus
We don’t need
your adulation, we are just our own creation
You won’t find
us in the mainstream we’ve been hived off to the slipstream
We’ve been
struck off all your playlists whilst running from the bailiffs
I may be hard of
hearing, but I’ve never heard you
cheering
But I did the
whole thing just to please myself
STOP - Please myself
All you spinning doctors,
with your data and your claims
Spinning words to fit your
meaning making language just a game
All you corporations
turning workers into clones
Writing algorithmic
profiles set to fill the sky with drones
CH
Smily Dick and Jesus Rabbit,
you’ve got one chance
you’d better grab it
Or you’ll never kick the
habit
of trashing things you couldn’t dream of
Breakdown riff
achieving
I’ve stopped watching
programs, I won’t vote by phone
Catch us in the margins
making shows up of our own
All you fashionistas on
your Sponsored chatty shows
Brashly lacking substance
just the emperors new clothes
CH
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