The Machine

Here I am it’s midnight, I’ve had a few to drink
I’m wandering through the streets alone, battery’s on the blink
Barcelona, November 2017
I thought it’d be the future by now but it’s gone and been
I look at all the girls, why they don’t look at me
I’m an Elvis baby as I stumble through a scene
Four white guys explaining white privilege
To their one black friend with no hint of irony
I think of saying something but someone else jumps in
Three of them go silent but one of them’s got the hump come on
What am I doing in this life, what am I doing in this city
The show I played tonight had six attendees
What’s happening in the world, what is that pigeon doing
It’s in moments like these i start to judge human beings come on come on
Ah come on
Then I think of everything I do, think, feel or see
It barely contributes to the economy
But the joke is on all of us though i make it drunkenly
Better make yourself useless, lest you get replaced by the machine
The irrepressible machine
Oh machine
Do you have to do it so coldly
I wake up in a chair with another person’s legs
Things aren’t hard to normalise when you still feel the effects
Involuntarily scowl at infernal howling dogs
But i wonder if they suffer these same internal dialogues
I take up the kind offer to get coffee shop lean
And I’m crouched behind a tractor at the age of sixteen
Pondering ergonomics, pondering anything
Thinking even dealers won’t escape being replaced by the machine
But then anything I think, do, feel or see
It doesn’t mean a thing to market driven policy
I’m an animal honey, I’ve got flaws and I’ve got feelings
I’ve got very human issues on the cusp of the rise of the machine
The irrepressible machine
Ah machine
Do you have to do it so coldly