Because I went to see his show in Sydney last night, and it was hugely enjoyable, and he sang this song which I’d temporarily forgotten about, and it’s just lovely.
With a full orchestra accompanying him, and the piece arranged especially by the symphony’s conductor Iain Grandage? Extraordinary.
This is my Earth
And I live in it
It’s one third dirt
And two thirds water
And it rotates and revolves through space
At rather an impressive pace
And never even messes up my hair
And here’s the really weird thing
The force created by its spin
Is the force that stops the chaos flooding in
This is my Earth
And it’s fine
It’s where I spend the vast majority of my time
It’s not perfect
But it’s mine
It’s not perfect
This is my country
And I live in it
It’s pretty big
And nice to walk on And the bloke who runs my country
Has built a demagoguery
And tought us to be fearful and boring
And the wierdest thing is that he is
Conservative of politics
But really rather radical of eyebrow
This is my country
And it’s fine
It’s where I spend the vast majority of my time
It’s not perfect
But it’s mine
It’s not perfect
This is my house
And I live in it
It’s made of cracks
And photographs
We rent it off a guy who bought it from a guy
Who bought it from a guy
Whose grandad left it to him
And the weirdest thing is that this house
Has locks to keep the baddies out
But they’re mostly used to lock ourselves in
This is my house
And it’s fine
It’s where I spend the vast majority of my time
It’s not perfect
But it’s mine
It’s not perfect
But it’s mine
This is my body
And I live in it
It’s 31
And 6 months old
It’s changed a lot since it was new
It’s done stuff it wasn’t built to do
I often try to fill it up with wine
And the weirdest thing about it is
I spend so much time hating it
But it never says a bad word about me
This is my body
And it’s fine
It’s where I spend the vast majority of my time
It’s not perfect
But it’s mine
It’s not perfect
This is my brain
And I live in it
It’s made of love
And bad song lyrics
It’s tucked away behind my eyes
Where all my screwed up thoughts can hide
Cos God forbid I hurt somebody
And the weirdest thing about a mind
Is that every answer that you find
Is the basis of a brand new cliché
This is my brain
And it’s fine
It’s where I spend the vast majority of my time
It’s not perfect
But it’s mine
It’s not perfect
I’m not quite sure I’ve worked out how to work it
It’s not perfect
But it’s mine
That’s one of my favourites of his.
The lyrics above are for that version as sung on the Sideshow. He left out the lines referring to John Howard’s eyebrows in what he sang last night, and dropping that little dig lifts the song to a purely philosophical plane which suits it well.
Pretty sure he tweaked a few other lines as well, which all seemed to improve the central message whatever they were exactly, so I’m glad that he’s evolving it over the years.
Sometimes his body’s age is accurate to fractions of months which is rather endearing. :-)
It’s wonderful, and I wish more women would take on the message.
I had just about forgotten this one too. :) Goes nicely with my morning coffee.
I loved this interview. He tackles the question of why comedians don’t have the right to gratuitously fling racist/sexist/etc stuff around to be “edgy”. He understands privilege. He’s all right.
http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/latenightlive/tim-minchin/3805022
Helen – thanks for the link to the interview, I’m enjoying it right now.