Elly Songtext

von Paul Kelly & The Coloured Girls

Elly wrapped her 19 years in a coat from '41
She had the looks that would make a grown man cry
From the Diamantina River country, she crossed the dry mid-west
From her childhood dreams and sheltered schemes she cut the ties

The commercial man made blunt demands, as they travelled south by east
Elly turned into a woman overnight
The her sat her down in the heart of town
The millionaire's retreat
She gazed up the tall, glassed concrete walls of main street Surfers
Paradise

If the deck's been marked before the deal
You learn to compromise
Get to know the cool hand with dice
Learn to live off losers, cause they make their mistakes twice
Your'e living in high society cos your'e street wise
Just to Survive (who knows what he sings in this little ad lib?)
Just to Survive

With her big blue eyes and centerfold looks, man she stacked them in
All the senators and doctors called her Madam
With her fifteen girls she built a world, A pleasured paradise
On what a man of God would call the wages of sin

Now a wealth woman drinks with diamnd rings, sits 20 storeys high
And gazes out as the sun lifts from the sea
To make it to the top, Elly sacrificed a lot
And found that a seven figure sum, much too high a fee