Duet

My life used to be monotone
Like a boring and tuneless old drone
With no colour or melody there
Just a one-note air

         I on the other hand wandered around
         Back and forth, up and down, round and round
         My whole life a directionless blur
         My character one big slur

     Then we gazed into each others' eyes
     And we started to harmonise

     It started one June 
     When we found an old tune
     As we gazed at the stars up above
     We found an old lyric
     A trite panegyric 
     And we wrote a new song called Love

     Everyone said - I'm sure 
     It's been written before
     It's a very familiar sound
     But we were in love 
     And we just soared above
     All petty quibblings and quarrellings in an ecstatic high-flying cadenza
                 still somehow we managed to land with our feet on the ground

     Then the beat of our hearts got faster
     As the tempo of loving grew
     And we found that we just couldn't master
     The art of cramming all the words we wanted to say into the limited number
                 of bars meant that the whole thing ended up incomprehensible and
                 so from a musical point of view we decided it just wouldn't do

[Later: The art of cramming all the words we wanted to say into the short time
                 we spent together until eventually we realised it just wouldn't do]

     But in a very short time it was obvious
     That anyway words were superflu .....

     Do-do-do doodn-do bwe
     Sha bweedn-do bwe
     Bop bop sha bweedn-do bwe pow
     Heebie-jeebie bop shbam 
     Kerplutt thud zowie splam
     Oooby-dooby oom-mow-mow

     Sha bweedn-do bwe
     Bop bop sha bweedn-do bwe pow
     Heebie-jeebie bop shbam 
     Kerplutt thud zowie splam
     Oooby-dooby oom-mow-mow

         Then just as I crossed a barline
         You were humming a different tune
         It was far removed from our line
         And I didn't like the way you were crooning at that tune

  To try to explain was futile
  Though I told her our song hadn't changed
  But when she just sat there mute I'll 
  Have to admit that it didn't sound quite the same

  So I thought - before she modulates me
  And puts me down, I'll get in first and change my key

         I just sang the blues
  And I wouldn't give up the little tune I'd found
         All I asked he'd refuse
  She didn't believe there was no sweeter sound
         I didn't want to be two-timed
  She really thought our love had been a symphony
         Our words no longer rhymed
  But a symphony with one theme sounds awful dull to me

| So I found myself left with no tune                      | *omitted from recorded version
| Unaccompanied, solo, jejune                              |
| I was back with my old used to be                        |
| Where there's only one note and one key                  |
|                                                          |
|         We parted and I started wand'ring again          |
|         After singing with all of my heart o-            |
|         Ver you, I was just moderato                     |

     And then out of the blue with no logical reason
     Our notes seemed to coincide
     And the rhythm just flowed with a perfect ease an'
     We felt a warm harmonic glow inside

     And the glow became a flame again
     Our life was not the same again
     By any other name again
     Our love was twice as sweet -

|    So never underestimate the power of a song            |
|    'Cause when you start to sing it's hard to stop       |
|    When you hum a little tune you find before very long  |
|    You're blowing wild till you blow your top            |

     I used to think that our arrangement was a little bit stale
     We never seemed to go to town
     Well it's not so much a matter of degree as scale
     And this scale is going up not down

     And from a simple duet our orchestration's now
     Like a hundred-and-ten piece band
     Like Basie, Herman, Duke and Bean and Pres all shou- [later 'Basie, Herman, Dankworth, Diz and Duke']
     Ting, roaring, stomping, rocking hand in hand

     Sha doodn doodn-do bwe
     Sha bweedn-do bwe
     Bop bop sha bweedn-do bwe pow
     Heebie-jeebie bop shbam 
     Kerplutt thud zowie splam
     Oooby-dooby oom-mow-mow

     So if there's any of you sitting in the auditorium
     Nodding off to sleep again
     Or waiting for an ending to a nice love story, I'm
     Bound to inform you our song 
     Will never -
     Never never -
     Never never -
     Never never -
     Never never -
     Never never never end

back to Pete Atkin Discography