Amsterdam (Live Friars, Aylesbury, 25th September, 1971)

Lyrics

[Intro] I want to go to another, hmm? "Port of Amsterdam" This a number by another songwriter, yet again It's, uh, by a French composer called Jacques Brel, who was writing a long time ago And he wrote this song about fifteen years ago Um, and it was called "Port of Amsterdam" It was true then, it's not untrue now, merely, probably insufficient Um, if we're slow, I haven't been up very long you see I'm very bad at getting up, always have been bad at getting up, haven't you? It's terrible When I was at school my mother could never get me up She got over it, shе, she found out the trick of getting mе up She used to put on a black dress and sit on the bed and cry I'll be up like a shot Enough of this frivolity This is, this is the Jacques Brel number Anyway, it's called "Port of Amsterdam" [Verse 1] In the port of Amsterdam there's a sailor who sings Of the dreams that he brings from wide-open sea And in the port of Amsterdam there's a sailor who sleeps While the river bank weeps to the old willow tree And in the port of Amsterdam there's a sailor who dies Full of beer, full of cries, in a drunken down fight In the port of Amsterdam there's a sailor who is born On a hot muggy morn by the dawn's early light [Verse 2] In the port of Amsterdam where the sailors all meet There's a sailor who eats only fish heads and tails He'll show you his teeth that have rotted too soon That can haul up the sails, that can swallow the moon And he yells to the cook with his arms open wide "Hey, bring me more fish, throw it down by my side" And he wants so to belch but he's too full to try So he stands up and he laughs and he zips up his fly [Verse 3] In the port of Amsterdam you can see sailors dance Paunches bursting their pants, grinding women to porch They've forgotten the tune that their whiskey voice croaked Splitting the night with the roar of their jokes And they turn and they dance and they laugh and they lust Till the rancid sound of the accordion bursts And then out of the night with their pride in their pants And the sluts that they tow underneath the street lamps [Verse 4] In the port of Amsterdam there's a sailor who drinks And he drinks and he drinks and he drinks once again He drinks to the health of the whores of Amsterdam Who've given their bodies to a thousand other men Yeah, they've bargained their virtue, their goodness long gone For a few dirty coins, when he just can't go on Throws his nose to the sky, aims it up above And he pisses like I cry for an unfaithful love In the port of Amsterdam, in the port of Amsterdam [Outro] Thank you Thank you very much indeed