Madness

Primrose Hill

(McPherson/Foreman) from the album The Rise and Fall, 1982.

A man opened his window and stared up Primrose Hill
Out there enjoying themselves I've seen them from this sill
Green splashed with white and red going brown
Children baiting animals running up and down
I stare out of this window
See the world go past...

Deliveries every day newspapers and food
Never had to venture out the phone has been removed
Open up the window and stare up Primrose Hill
Sitting here it's dark outside and everything is still...

Recorded in the 1980's when the North London ska/pop band was at its peak, the album had a photo of Primrose Hill on the cover. In an interview in Q Magazine, April 2001, singer and frontman Suggs (Graham McPherson) said, 'Primrose Hill was somewhere that had featured in most of the band's lives. We all came from the surrounding area so we'd always had good memories of the place. Primrose Hill was somewhere you could play football or, in the winter, go tobogganing, so it'd always been a place of fun and frolics.'