Doin what your Ma says
But not really
Takin her at her face
But not really
A packet of crisps
Large bottle of coke
To mollify
Just for a little while
A hard wooden seat and an old wicker basket
Twenty p put into your hand
Without askin
But not really
You’re not guilty
Not really
The city breeds me

I wake up in Baile Atha Cliath
And it shatters my soul sometimes when I see you
Like is it for real or is it an idea
Can I screw it together like a yoke from Ikea?
Said I wake up in Baile Atha Cliath
Anda briste is the chroi sometimes when I see you
Like a bird in a cage and I just want to free you
Or a word on a page and I want a melodia
I walk through the Dubh Linn Baile
The town full of drugs and the alcohol ye
The boardwalk junkies, the banklink beggars
Ah the muppet monkeys, the insulin feckers
Yeah I walk through the Cliath Baile Atha
But never in the places I know I’m not ought to
The same shits done by the Garda Siochana
Or the elected dopes over there in the Dail ye

Takin your cues from the heritage set
Coloured by the way your Da was brought up
But not really
You’re not guilty
Not really
The city breeds me

I walk through the capital of Ireland
The dole queue with the workers up for hire
How many heads are down with nothing to inspire them
I’ve seen their eyes
Aw the anger and the fire in them
I lived in the suburb of the D5
It’s an odd number so I guess I’m from the northside
Coolock, Darndale, Belcamp, Meauview
These were the spots where once I did flow through
I’ve seen it with my own two suile
How folk chase the cash cause the lack of it rules you
I’ve heard it with my own two cluais
In a joe, on the dart, on the bus, on the luas
All the vicious pathetic chinwaggery
And smilin the face with the dose of backstabbery
People begrudgin other people
The robotic greaseballs of being on the diesel

Your way laid out with a thousand clackin keyboards
Half remember green seats on the bus
Multi colour shades of the Ilac
Stolen downward glances
Double seats at the pictures

The hometown can hammer the ceann down
But we can rise up above the ground and the pound down
The hometown …
Up above up above up above …

And then a few pints
And then twenty blue
And I’m fuckin broke
Then so are you
And what is the story?
What are you doin?
Ah sure you know
That’s how it goes for me