‘Misfits’ Inspires Cornwell Song

Screen test for ‘The Misfits’, published in ‘MM – Personal’

Hugh Cornwell, best-known as the original vocalist and guitarist for The Stranglers, will be touring the UK this spring.

Music News: One song on the ‘Guilty’ album (from 1997) is called Torture Garden’. I’m very intrigued by the title and the song’s lyrics…

Hugh Cornwell: Ha-ha (laughs). You know, I’m very much into cinema and movies and my favorite movie is The Misfits, it was the last film with Clark Gable and Marilyn Monroe and Montgomery Clift. It was their last movie they appeared in together and it’s about the passing of the age of the romantic cowboy and how their days were numbered. It was really groundbreaking at the time and it was written by Marilyn Monroe’s husband as well, the playwright Arthur Miller. It was very odd that all could make this film and then die. So the lyrics are about that.

Music News

Here are the lyrics:

One step forwards, two steps backwards
That’s the dance I want to learn
If I could master it and put a little style in it
I’ll have some fun when it’s my turn

Gable and Monroe in the garden
In the desert getting well
Eli and Thelma in the DC
It wasn’t easy you can tell

It’s just a step away
Please will you show us how to live
It’s just a step away
When you got nothing left to give

Seven horses, not enough to
Even fill the tank with gas
Monty’s outside, he wasn’t inside
But he knows all things must pass
Bucking broncos, we’re all cowboys
Hanging from another age
Getting sauced, that’s just how the film goes
It’s gotta be better than a wage

It’s just a step away
Please will you show us how to live
It’s just a step away
When you got nothing left to give

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