One better day

Words and music by GRAHAM McPHERSON and MARK BEDFORD
From the Madness album KEEP MOVING (1984)
Released as a single (1984)

This is a haunting and disturbing song, and if you don't agree then there's something wrong with you. In my view this is the best song about homelessness and loneliness since Ralph McTell's Streets of London, and is easily better than Phil Collins' histrionic Another Day in Paradise. Listen, then do.

Arlington house
Address no fixed abode
An old man in a three-piece suite
Sits in the road
He stares across the water
And sees right through the lock
But on and up like outstretched hands
His mumbled words, his fumbled words

Further down theres a photo booth
A million plastic bags
And an old woman filling out
A million baggage tags
But when she get thrown out
Three bags at a time
She spies the old chap in the road
To share her bags with, she has bags of time

Surrounded by his past
On a short white line
He sits while cars pass
Either side
Takes his time
Trying to remember
One better day
A while ago when people stopped
To hear him say

Walking round you sometimes
Hear the sunshine
Beating down in time with the
Rhythm of your shoes

Now she has walked
Enough through rainy town
She rests her back against his
And sits down
Shes trying to remember
One better day
Awhile ago when people stopped
To hear her say

Walking round you sometimes
Hear the sunshine
Beating down in time with the
Rhythm of your shoes

Walking round you sometimes
Hear the sunshine
Beating down in time with the
Rhythm of your shoes

The feeling of arriving
When youve nothing left to lose