"I was at an airport and there 
were these two young oriental 
girls with short skirts and these 
two enormous Middle Eastern guys, 
and I thought, this is an unlikely 
pairing. One of the girls literally 
had something in her ear that was 
probably cotton but looked like 
chewing gum, 
and I had this vile fantasy: 
She's putting it in her ears so 
she doesn't have to listen to all 
the shit this guy's telling her. 
So the story turned into a guy 
and his mail-order bride and he 
never gives her anything. 
Then I saw this TV program about 
literacy programs in certain parts 
of the world where one faction argued 
that they were only being taught 
words that made sense in terms of 
the other's propaganda, to manipulate them, 
I thought, 'God, what a warped thought.' 
I reduced it to this personal thing 
where the guy only tells her the 
words he wants to hear back. 
By the way, do you recognize the 
second horn riff the Dirty Dozen plays 
in that song? It's a little fragment 
of 'Koko', really slowed down. Kind of 
turning jazz snobbery back on itself."


[Musician Magazine, 1989]








With their cardboard hands by their sides
here's a naked man and lady
And they're yours to cut out and keep
So you can dress them up maybe
They don't know just who they are
or who they're supposed to be
You can make them happy or sad
Or assume their identity

So here they are in the departure lounge
It's the "Gateway to the East"
She is just another mail-order bride
She doesn't know he's a kinky beast
So he gives her a picture of Maradona and child
She wants to "roll and rock"
As he spills his beer over her 
bumps and he grinds 
as he repeats "Bang-Cock"

Chorus

There must be something that is better than this
It starts with a slap and ends up with a kiss
Begins with you bawling and it ends up in tears
Oh my little one,
take that chewing gum out of your ears

She might as well be in the jungle
She might as well be on the moon
He's away on a business trip in Dusseldorf 
but she's becoming immune
To the lack of glamour and danger 
in a West German city today
The nearest she comes to the "Dynasty" 
he promised her
Is a Chinese takeaway

(chorus)

Though he only taught her three little words, 
it doesn't matter if they're dirty or clean
He can only control what they look like
He can never possess what they mean
Now he wants to whisper in her ear
All the shrinking nothingness
But something always comes between them,
I wonder if you can guess

(chorus)