'
Cut My Hair' is one of the weaker songs on the album, where Jimmy tells of his home life and the hopelessness of always trying to stay ahead of the latest fashions
The song, which features Pete singing the verses and Roger on the chorus, quotes from the High Numbers track '
Zoot Suit' and finishes with a news report about the Mods and Rockers fighting on Brighton beach read by BBC announcer John Curle
"Why should I care
If I have to cut my hair?
I've got to move with the fashions
Or be outcast.
I know I should fight
But my old man he's really alright,
And I'm still living at home
Even though it won't last.
Zoot suit, white jacket with side vents
Five inches long.
I'm out on the street again
And I'm leaping along.
I'm dressed right for a beach fight,
But I just can't explain
Why that uncertain feeling is still
Here in my brain.
The kids at school
Have parents that seem so cool.
And though I don't want to hurt them
Mine want me their way.
I clean my room and my shoes
But my mother found a box of blues,
And there doesn't seem much hope
They'll let me stay.
Zoot suit, etc.
Why do I have to be different to them?
Just to earn the respect of a dance hall friend,
We have the same old row, again and again.
Why do I have to move with a crowd
Of kids that hardly notice I'm around,
I have to work myself to death just to fit in.
I'm coming down
Got home on the very first train from town.
My dad just left for work
He wasn't talking.
It's all a game,
'Cos inside I'm just the same,
My fried egg makes me sick
First thing in the morning."
One of the hardest songs on the album, '
The Punk And The Godfather' sees Jimmy coming face to face with The Who - with Pete as The Godfather - and questioning his allegiance towards everything. He realizes that the band have lied to him, and live in a world he doesn't understand or could ever attain to. Opening with a magnificent double tracked guitar chord riff, and with echos of 'My Generation' and crowd noise, uptempo passage fades away to one of the most evocative autobiographical asides that Pete has ever written - "
I have to be careful not to preach / I can't pretend that I can teach / And yet I've lived your future out / By pounding stages like a clown"
"You declared you would be three inches taller
You only became what we made you.
Thought you were chasing a destiny calling
You only earned what we gave you.
You fell and cried as our people were starving,
Now you know that we blame you.
You tried to walk on the trail we were carving,
Now you know that we framed you.
I'm the guy in the sky
Flying high Flashing eyes
No surprise I told lies
I'm the punk in the gutter
I'm the new president
But I grew and I bent
Don't you know? don't it show?
I'm the punk with the stutter.
My my my my my mmmm my my my.
GGGGG-g-g-g-g generation.
We tried to speak between lines of oration
You could only repeat what we told you.
Your axe belongs to a dying nation,
They don't know that we own you.
You're watching movies trying to find the feelers,
You only see what we show you.
We're the slaves of the phony leaders
Breathe the air we have blown you.
I'm the guy etc.
I have to be careful not to preach
I can't pretend that I can teach,
And yet I've lived your future out
By pounding stages like a clown.
And on the dance floor broken glass,
The bloody faces slowly pass,
The broken seats in empty rows,
It all belongs to me you know.
You declared etc."