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Quicksand Kerry - I'm Smiling (live)

from Music Kept Me Sane: The Best of Quicksand Kerry 1998​-​2008 by Kerry JK

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about

First appearing on the 2000 album Sick Parody of Normality, this fanciful yarn became my signature song. I have often been criticised for smiling too much (I can't help it, I have that kind of a face) so this is kind of a rebuke to that.

Reading it back now, I guess the "angry young man" antagonist is a personification of my own insecurities, though I didn't give it that much thought at the time.In any case, this sums up my mission statement throughout my time as Quicksand Kerry, a period during which I experienced anxiety, depression and alienation, but found a way by embracing misfit identity and just being myself:

Never stop smiling, and don't care what they think.

lyrics

(A statement of attitude - I'm going to tell you a story!)

I was walking down the road feeling happy and carefree
When an angry young man came up to me
And he said. "What give you the right to wear that expression?
Surely you must know it's a terrible world
With all its pain and heartache, misery and disease
And then I see you
Grinning, smiling
As if you've some right to enjoy yourself
Denied the rest of us
What do you have to say for yourself?"
I looked him squarely in the eye
I smiled disarmingly
And I told him my attitude
As summed up within the words to this song:

I'm smiling 'cause I don't care
I'm smiling 'cause I don't care
You can take your problems elsewhere
I'm smiling 'cause I don't care what you think.

For one moment this confused that angry young man
Then he said, "But doesn't it affect you when you turn on the news
And it's a parade of war and suffering and human misery
And we're all powerless to do anything about it
We have to leave it all to a bunch of politicians
Who I wouldn't trust to mend a fence, let alone a country
And we're supposed to be living in a democracy
But all that means is you have to vote in one set of sharks
So the other set of sharks won't get in
And everything's shit and everything's broken
And you don't seem to care about any of it
What on earth do you have to say for yourself?"
And I said, "Look!
I don't know what part of this is giving you trouble
But allow me to tell you my attitude
As summed up within the words to this song:

I'm smiling 'cause I don't care
I'm smiling 'cause I don't care
You can take your problems elsewhere
I'm smiling 'cause I don't care what you think.

But this angry young man just couldn't take a hint.
One more time he tried it on.
He said, "But don't you see..."
And with that I flipped.
There was a tussle between us
A flash of steel
A splash of crimson
And he crumpled to my feet.
And suddenly I felt a huge weight being lifted
As if all the problems of the world
That he'd tried to place on my shoulders over the last few minutes
Had melted away like snow
And in their place I was left feeling happy
I was left feeling free.
I went to carry on up the street
But something was obscuring my path.
I looked down to see what it was
And it was a human hand
Clutching
The final stages of rigor mortis having already begun
I've no idea whose leaving these things lying around
So I kicked it to one side and continued on my way
Singing softly to myself
My attitude
As summed up within the words to this song:

I'm smiling 'cause I don't care
I'm smiling 'cause I don't care
You can take your problems elsewhere
I'm smiling 'cause I don't care what you think.

credits

from Music Kept Me Sane: The Best of Quicksand Kerry 1998​-​2008, released June 1, 2019
Written and performed by M P Jackson.

Recorded live at the Primrose, Leeds in 2007.

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all rights reserved

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Kerry JK Northampton, UK

Gender and genre fluid singer-songwriter producing songs of identity, isolation and defiance incorporating jazz, electronica, art rock, vocal looping, poetry and rock opera theatrics.

Be yourself, as yourself. There is no greater fulfilment, and no sweeter revenge. ... more

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