Written by: Jarvis Cocker
Produced by: Graham Sutton and Jarvis Cocker
Engineered by: Graham Sutton and Robbie Nelson
Assistant engineers: Colin Elliot and Liam Walsh
Sitting in the World's End with some indie friends, a newsflash on the TV says the world's about to end. Can't catch all the details 'cos the volume's turned down: this is the last night on Earth – as spent in Camden Town.
There's no way to escape - this is it. Tomorrow we will all be gone, so check what time the band are on. Let's go outside.
Yeah and this was the night I was going to balance the books; the night I turned a minus into a plus. The night my adjustment became complete – I could start again with a clean sheet.
Now I can't get through 'cos all the networks are down, and fires are starting all over town, and you're probably being gang-banged by tattooed locals: Damn those Yokels! Damn those Yokels!
And a girl cries as she stumbles by "No, the world can't end now – no, it's got to wait. It can't end when I haven't got a boyfriend and I'm half a stone overweight."
The guys from Arlington House are marauding the streets, and convent girls are screwing every man that they meet, and the album you just bought will never get heard: Oh yeah, complete social breakdown has occurred.
And then you find yourself thinking about Egyptian Sue and the evil things that she used to do. And the night you almost did it after the wedding reception but you didn't have any contraception, and anyway, you couldn't get an erection.
Now, what the hell made you think of her? Could it be that old saying coming true? That: 'Nothing could survive a nuclear holocaust except cockroaches and Egyptian Sue?' But even Sue won't make it through. No, even Sue won't make it through this time.
It was around this time that the levels of hysteria around the Kentish Town Road caused a warping of the space/time continuum and I found myself face to face with a version of myself from 15 years earlier, when I'd lived in the area. "Greetings indie legend", said I. "Fuck off sad bell-end", came the reply. I wanted to warn him about the rough times ahead but for some reason he had his coat pulled over his head and wouldn't listen. I left him trying to extricate a punctured Spacehopper from under some rubble in a skip. "He'll find out soon enough", I thought.
And then suddenly I realised that I could no longer breathe.
Here we go, move along, one last time. The Loss Adjuster lost his mind: too many claims, too little time to file them.
And then suddenly it was a Tuesday afternoon and I could see it all, crystal clear; like a giant chandelier turning slowly in the sideways sunlight – hanging by a thread with only seconds to last. And each time you rang it was like an Indian call centre on the line: "Yes, I'm doing fine – just like the last time, and the last time; make this the last time."
We'll all be gone by Monday morning – this is it: your final warning. You never did see Dog Day Afternoon. Here today but gone tomorrow – now you could hang your head in sorrow or you could do it. But you'd better do it soon.
We'll all be gone by Monday morning – this is it: your final warning. You never did see Dog Day Afternoon. Here today but gone tomorrow – now you could hang your head in sorrow or you could do it. But you'd better do it soon.
We'll all be gone by Monday morning – this is it: your final warning. You never did see Dog Day Afternoon. Oh, here today but gone tomorrow – now you could hang your head in sorrow or you could do it. But you'd better do it soon.
The World's End is a pub on Camden High Street in north London.
Arlington House is a hostel for the homeless located in Camden, north London.
Dog Day Afternoon is a 1975 film. It is a crime drama directed by Sidney Lumet.