"This World Over" is a song by Andy Partridge. It appeared on and was released as a single for the 1984 album The Big Express.
A live in-studio version, for BBC, appeared on the 1998 Transistor Blast box set.
Single tracklisting[]
7" single[]
- A-side: "This World Over (edit)"
- B-side: "Blue Overall"
12" single[]
- A-side: "This World Over"
- B-side: "Blue Overall"
France 12" single[]
- A-side 1: "This World Over"
- A-side 2: "Blue Over All" [sic]
- B-side 1: "Washaway" (Colin Moulding)
- B-side 2: "All You Pretty Girls"
Quotes[]
Andy: “This track, in fact most of the [Big Express] album was written on an open-E tuning. The squeaky feedback noises are Stuart Gordon playing harmonics on a violin. I won an award for the sleeve design on this, but nobody sent it to me.”
Lyrics[]
Ah well, that's this world over
Ah well, next one begins
Will you smile like any mother
As you bathe your brand new twins?
Will you sing about the missiles
As you dry odd numbered limbs?
Ah well, that's this world over
Ah well, next one begins
Ah well, that's this world over
You sadly grin
Will you tell them about that far off and mythical land
About their leader with the famous face?
Will you tell them that the reason nothing ever grows
In the garden anymore
Because he wanted to win the craziest race
That's this world over
Will you smile like any father
With your children on a Sunday hike?
When you get to a sea of rubble
And they ask “What was London like?”
You tell them, “Ah well, that's the world over”
Will you tell them about that far off and mythical land
And how a child to the virgin came?
Will you tell them that the reason why we murdered
Everything upon the surface of the world
So we can stand right up and say we did it in his name?
That's this world over
Or so it seems
That's this world over
The end of dreams
That's this world over, over, over and out