Faculty X

By Peter Hammill

On pH7

Released on September 1979

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[Instrumental Intro]


[Verse 1]

Hope by and by, hope by and by –

Motes in the eye, portcullis is shut...

A skull isn't much

Of a c-c-castle to live in


[Pre-Chorus]

The change has got to come

The change has got to come


[Chorus]

Explosions in the brain attest to it

Evolution down the drain –

Let all the rest do it

Oh, yeah, the only result

Is cumulative drek

It won't be the drug

It won't be the sex

It's got to be the Faculty X


[Post-Chorus]

Looking for a method, I play a straight bat

Throw away the chances to slip

Yeah, you talk about the average –

I don't care about that

And my words are only giving me lip


[Pre-Chorus]

When I know that the change has got to come

The change has got to come

Well, the change has got to come

The change has got to come

Well, the change has got to come

Or what am I living for? (The change has got to come)

Or why am I here? (The change has got to come)

I'm running, I give in more (The change has got to come)

Far away from the near


[Chorus]

Go meta-physical world

The sign that protects

It wasn't the last

It won't be the next

It's Faculty X


[Post-Chorus]

Reading seers, sages, prophets, obscurantist tracts

Draining the elixir to the dregs;

Active yeast in the bottom is on the attack

And it leaves me without any legs to stand on

Still I hope that the change will come


[Instrumental]


[Chorus]

Meanwhile I don't know

I think I'll have to go

Go for the governing body

My consciousness elects

But it won't be so clear

And it won't be direct

It's all that I fear

It's all I suspect

And I'll disappear in Faculty X


[Post-Chorus]

I pluck all these characters out of thin air

I push them down into the lungs;

I infuse them with meaning as much as I dare

Stretch out for the shoreline and wait for the wave...


[Instrumental Outro]